Settle to Malham with Rye Loaf Hill

During winter 2012, while I was still trying to get walking normally again after my broken big toe, I decided to do an old walk from Settle to Malham I’d done years ago with a group from work. I’d done a lot of my recovery walks around Settle, mainly exploring the limestone area of Warrendale Knotts and its caves. While I’d been doing these, I’d had my eye on Rye Loaf Hill – a landmark which is in view from miles around – so decided to incorporate that into my walk.

(click on photos to see full size/resolution – also, you’ll have to excuse the horizontal lines – despite all kinds of re-scanning with different orientations, the lines remained unfortunately)

The day in question was cold but sunny with lingering pockets of snow and, as my walk was to be a traverse, it was easiest if I persuaded my parents to visit Settle to drop me off and then Malham to pick me up again at the end. As they love going for drives and short walks in the Dales (not to mention frequenting the cafes there), they readily agreed. However, if a car and driver aren’t available, there are trains to Settle from Skipton and Dales buses from Malham back to Skipton (see links below).

If arriving by car, the best carpark to use is the first one as you enter Settle from the southern end. Straight above the carpark, a path heads off uphill and you can pick various routes from there to take you up the hill to the start of Stockdale Lane. You can either go straight up the road (a small lane, but this will mean breathing in noxious diesel fumes), or you can take a very quiet road to the right which eventually goes steeply uphill to Lambert Lane, or a footpath cuts off from that road to meet Lambert Lane (this passes an old reservoir). I generally take the footpath although it, and Lambert Lane, are usually rather muddy.

On the day in question I took the footpath and was soon joining Lambert Lane at the top of the hill for quarter of a mile or so to its end where it crosses the road to the start of Stockdale Lane. This is the point the Warrendale Knotts/Attermire Scar hills burst into view looking spectacularly peaky.

Stockdale Lane

Warrendale Knotts

Attermire Scar

Warrendale & Attermire

After around 2 miles along Stockdale Lane, just after passing Stockdale Farm, there was a gateway through the drystone wall on the right which I should have taken but didn’t. It seemed too soon to turn off for Rye Loaf Hill and I really wanted to go up the long and obvious ridge coming down the left-hand side (north) of the hill so I continued alongside the wall looking for another gate. Unfortunately, there were no further gates through the wall so, just after a beck, I had to climb over (very naughty!) to reach the end of the ridge.

Rye Loaf Hill & Stockdale Farm

I started straight up the ridge which is wet, boggy and tufty and doesn’t have a path until near the summit where the faint path I should have taken from the gate appeared. There is little height gain however – about 300 feet of ascent from the beck – and I was soon at the top. From the summit a lovely ridge heads south-west back to the road and I would have loved to have walked it sometime but it is blocked from the summit by another substantial wall with no stiles or gates – shame.

I followed the path back down the hill all the way and found that, after a steep descent down the grassy hillside, it continued back to the gate I should have come through for the ascent. Still, at least I’d done a ‘round’ of the hill and not just a straight up-and-back…

I rejoined Stockdale Lane which winds uphill briefly and in another mile crosses through a wall with a gate. I had a real struggle to open the gate as I had to pull quite hard on the lever to open it and the whole gateway was thick ice so I couldn’t keep my feet still!

As soon as I started descending from the gate, Malham Cove came into view. In less than a mile I’d joined the road coming up from Malham – if you didn’t want to visit the cove you could descend here but I wouldn’t recommend it as the Cove is spectacular and a must-see.

There was another gate more or less opposite where my track came out so I went through that. I could see a path headed hard left uphill but that took me away from the cove so I tried to see if I could get a route straight across towards the cove. After looking around the wall at the far side of the field, I could see there wasn’t a way and that I needed to go back up to the original path I’d seen.

I followed the small path until it crossed through a wall and soon after met a track going right heading for the top of Malham Cove. As it was a sunny day, the place was swarming with folk!

I crossed a small section of the limestone pavement atop the Cove and took the main path heading back down to Malham village on the near side of the Cove. This heads steeply down stone-pitching to just below the Cove where you can watch the climbers – it’s quite rare not to see any on a dry day…

From the cove there is a good path leads back to the village in less than a mile where I then had to try to locate my parents’ car. I must have walked right through the village from end to end several times and checked the various carparks and side roads but, although they were there, I missed them as they were doing the same but in the car! By the time I’d added a couple of miles onto my walk (the original walk from Settle to Malham had been 7 miles), I decided to stay put alongside the main road and just watch for them. After around half an hour, we finally spotted each other and adjourned to the cafe at Airton (less busy) for toasted teacakes and a hot drink.

Link to Leeds-Skipton-Settle-Carlisle train times:
here

Link to Dales bus website:
here