Austwick ~ Medium Walk

Distance Covered: 5 miles Time to Complete Walk 2.5 hours

Suitable for dog walking: No - Sheep in most fields

Just a stones throw from the Lake District, Austwick is one of those beautiful Yorkshire villages that offers amazing walks in every direction. This walk visits the Norber Erratics - a series of stones left by a glacier, and then makes its way over fields down to a ford and back to Austwick via the pretty hamlet of Wharfe. With amazing views, your camera phone will try and capture the scenery but will never be a substitute for the views firsthand. A very possible bucket list walk!

General Safety Tips: Prepare for a short steep climb to visit the Norber Erratics. There are plenty of ladder stiles along the way- prepare for climbing the stiles and a few scrambles along the way.

The Austwick Walk 

Getting There

From Middlesbrough, follow the A19 to Thirsk and then take the A168  to Ripon. From Ripon take the A61 through Ripley and at Killinghall follow the Otley Road and then follow the A59 through Blubberhouses. At a roundabout turn right towards Gargrave on the A65 - follow the A65 to Austwick. Parking can be found next to the bridge at Austwick.

    

                                          Maps of the Austwick Walk

The Walk

From the bridge walk into the village centre. Turn right when you reach the village green.

Follow the road to the right passing the Game Cock pub and look for a left turn just after Hobbs Gate cottage.

Turn left and climb the road and just after the last building look left for a ladder stile.

Walk across the field and over a stile.

Head to another ladder stile and turn right onto a lane.

Look for a gate on your left and head onto the track ahead.

When the track bends to the left, stay ahead with a wall on your left.

Keeping the wall to your left, go through the gate and keep following the path ahead.

When you come to a large boulder to the right of the wall, turn right and follow the path to your right.

Following the path around, you eventually arrive at a signpost signed to Norber on your left.

Scramble up the rocky path carefully and once you reach the plateau at the top vist the many different shaped rocks carried and then left by the glacier as it retreated.

Once you have finished, head back down to the signpost and turn left heading down to the wall below.

Follow the wall, scrambling up the rocks until you reach a ladder stile in the wall on your right.

Over the stile, follow the grassy path down beneath a rocky outcrop.

Pass the rocky outcrop and follow a grass path down.

Follow the path all the way to the bottom and climb a stile and cross the road to go over another stile.

In the field turn left and head to a stile with a small gate in it.

In the next field head in the same direction to another stile in the wall.

Cross over the farm track and head towards a gap in the wall in the distance.

Head through the gap in the wall and over another stile and head over the field to a final stile.

Once over the stile, turn left and a sharp right onto a track.

Go over a bridge over the ford and head down a track between two walls.

Keep on the track for some time keeping right at a fork.

Soon you arrive at the hamlet of Wharfe. Turn left at a T-junction and follow the road to the right out of Wharfe.

When you meet a road, turn right and head along the road until you come to a path to Wood End Farm on your left.

Head up the track to just before the farmhouse. Turn right onto a track.

Follow the track as it sweeps to the left and then to the right.

Turn right at a junction and then straight ahead at a crossroads.

Follow the track as it conveniently ends at the bridge and where you left your car.

Austwick

Austwick is a village and civil parish in the Craven district of North Yorkshire, England, about 5 miles (8 km) north-west of Settle. The village is on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park.

Before local government reorganisation in 1974, Austwick parish was within Settle Rural District which was in the County of the West Riding of Yorkshire.

According to the Austwick & Lawkland Tithe Map of 21 October 1851 the parish has an area of 8,201 acres (33.19 km2) of which around a quarter is uncut moorland. The highest point within the parish is at Lord's Seat on Simon Fell at 2,079 feet (634 m).

The area around Austwick has been inhabited by humans for over 4,000 years. Archaeological finds in and around the village include prehistoric burial places, a large Bronze Age settlement, and even an Iron Age settlement. The area surrounding Austwick has many ancient remains including extensive walls and structures constructed of slate, limestone, and sandstone.

At one time, Austwick, Clapham, Lawkland, and Newby were independent manors with their own lord that together formed the larger parish of Clapham. In the Domesday Book, which was a survey of England conducted in 1086, Austwick was the head of 12 manors spread along a northern route. Austwick still has a lord of the manor; the most recent holder of the position was Dr. John Farrer, who died in 2014. The Farrer family has had the position of lord of the manor since 1782. Austwick Hall, a grade II listed building, is said to have originally been part of a pele tower. The building was renovated in the 17th and 19th centuries, though evidence of its purchase by the Ingilby family exists pointing to the year 1573.

A local folktale tells of an Austwick man who fell into a deep pool. As bubbles broke on the water's surface, his companions thought they could hear the words "T' b-best's at t' b-bottom", so they jumped into the pool as well, and were not seen again.

The Anglican Church in the village was originally a lecture hall, but was later converted into the Church of the Epiphany. The grade II listed structure was consecrated in 1841.

The village was originally in the Wapentake of Ewecross, later being part of the Settle Rural District within the county of the West Riding of Yorkshire.It was moved into North Yorkshire in 1974. Austwick was originally in the Parish of Settle, but was established as its own parish in May 1879.

Austwick was on the original turnpike road between Keighley and Kendal, which north west of Settle became the A65. The village was bypassed progressively in the 1980s and early 1990s.

The Norber Erratics

The Norber erratics are one of the finest groups of glacial erratic boulders in Britain. They are found on the southern slopes of Ingleborough, close to the village of Austwick in the Yorkshire Dales. The Ordnance Survey grid reference of the boulder field is SD764698.

The erratics are classic geomorphological features from the glaciation of northern England. In his chapter on the Pennines, A.E. Trueman wrote: "Particularly well known are the great perched blocks of dark grit which stand on the limestone platform at Norber near Settle.

Many of the Silurian greywacke boulders at the site are perched on pedestals of limestone up to 30cm high. The boulders were probably deposited by melting ice sheets at the end of the last ice age, around 12,000 years ago. The pedestals have developed because the erratic boulders have protected the underlying limestone from solution by rainfall, giving estimates of the rate of lowering of the surrounding limestone pavement of around 25mm per 1000 years. Recent cosmogenic dating suggests that the boulders have been exposed for around 17,900 years.