| 2001
walks | 2002
walks | 2003
walks | 2004
walks |
| 2005
walks | 2006
walks |
2007 walks | 2008
walks |
|
Find a Route | A
few Routes to print out |
5 March2003
Semer Water, Cam High Road, Raydale
Wensleydale, Yorkshire dales . . .
Map: OS Explorer OL30 Yorkshire Dales Northern & Central areas at 1:25000
This
morning my neighbour, Jim, and I drove to Semer Water, a natural
lake in Raydale. Raydale is a side valley that joins Wensleydale
at Bainbridge. We parked in the gravel car park at the end of
the lake (map ref. SD 922875) and started walking at about 10.30
It was a fine bright day but forecast to cloud over later. We
walked a few hundred metres along the road towards the north eastern
corner of the lake and took the footpath across the fields, down
the side of the lake towards Stalling Busk. We did not climb the
hill to Stalling Busk itself, but instead we kept to the path
over a footbridge to join a track to the village of Marsett. In
Marsett we crossed the bridge over Marsett Beck and imediately
turned left to follow the path upstream beside the beck.
The beck changes its name to Bardale Beck and we continued up
the valley for about 5km to the road at map ref. SD 862846. The
path climbs all the way and is quite steep in places. We turned
right onto the road and followed it towards Hawes. After about
1km we turned right onto the Cam High Road and ancient green road
that is suffering a bit from use by off road vehicles. We walked
along the Cam High Road for about 3.5km to map ref. SD 886873.
Here we turned onto a bridleway for about 3km. to join the road
above Countersett. We walked down the road for about 1.5km back
to the car park at the end of the lake. Overall the route was
about 14km and took us almost 5 hours including a couple of stops.
With hindsight I think it would be better to walk the route the
oposite way round. That way the big climb would be at the beginning
and although quite steep, is not too long. After that the route
is quite gentle and the views down the valley of Bardale Beck
over Semer Water to Addlebrough Hill are wonderful. The highest
point on the route is about 600m. 
