The Great Malham Adventure
Malham is in the southern Yorkshire Dales, and is a bit of a Mecca for walkers. Just getting there proved to be an adventure, with Tim from TomTom taking me down roads of ever-decreasing width. I’m now an adept at squeezing into tiny passing places, although the enormous cattle truck whose driver refused to back up was a bit of a problem!
I arrived at Malham at around 11am and found the spacious National Park carpark, where you can park all day for £3. There’s also a gift shop and information centre, and the most important feature – toilets! In the village are pubs, tearooms and a walking gear shop or two.
I was planning to cram 4 famous highlights of the area into my day’s walking, so I set off with a will to follow the Malham Beck along the Pennine Way.










Leaving the Pennine Way, I followed the path to the left towards a wood. This leads to the first beauty spot – Janet’s Foss. These woods have tales of fairies associated with them, and you can see why – all moss-shrouded boulders and darkling pools.
Janet’s Foss itself is a waterfall with plunge pool beneath, where farmers used to wash their sheep. There was not a lot of water as it hasn’t rained much recently, but some of the local “youth” were hopefully fishing in the pool. At least it was cool and shady!

The path after the waterfall soon leads to a road and turning right, I reached an ancient bridge with a catering van parked alongside – nice touch! Round the corner and on the route of my path there was a camping site – not so nice, as the tents got in the way of my attempts at scenic photography!

This path leads to Gordale Scar, an amazing geological feature with tumbled rocks and another waterfall, this time the Gordale Beck. Lots of people make it this far from the road to admire the waterfall, which must be wonderful when more water is around. However, the path continues up the waterfall and onwards. I must admit I quailed a bit when I saw the climb ahead, and sat down to eat my lunch and study the map for an easier way round. There wasn’t one! I watched young, fit people haul themselves up the rockface and older ones struggle to get their feet up high enough to gain the footholds. Oh dear! My short legs were not going to be an advantage here! I sidled up to the foot of the climb and tried a few possible routes up, but couldn’t stretch far enough. A woman around my age was having trouble coming down, and this made me even more determined that I wasn’t going to give up and go back. So I fiddled around for ages, trying this way and that, until at last I saw my way – a series of handholds and footholds that I could manage. Up I went, with not a thought for the fact that usually I shy away from heights and precipices. When I made it to the top of the climb (and to be honest it wasn’t far!), I felt so elated, I just wanted to shout “Yes!” at the top of my voice. Sadly there were no cheers from below.
A stiff climb followed over scree and then steps, to the top of the gorge. Then it was easy, level walking for about a mile to a road. I took a bridleway instead of following the road and made my way to Malham Tarn, where the cows were having a paddle.

After Malham Tarn I re-joined the Pennine Way to make my way to Malham Cove. The path picks its way through massive escarpments and rocky formations on the way, until suddenly the path turns right across the top of the Cove, and a magnificent view opens out in front of you.
The landscape here is sculpted into amazing shapes by the passage of an enormous glacier. It’s an example of a limestone pavement, with deep cracks or grints between the stone where rare plants find a niche.

After pausing for a while to admire the view, I took the path down to the bottom. This consists of rather crumbly steps that wind their way down the edge of the cliff. I met people coming up who had obviously come a different way, because they were wearing high-heeled sandals and carrying handbags – brave souls!

There must have been the most incredible waterfall over the cliff while it was being formed – it must have been comparable to Niagara Falls. There are plants clinging tenuously to ledges, but I don’t know whether anyone tries to scale this one – not me, certainly!
All that remained was a leisurely stroll back to Malham village, downhill all the way. I was thrilled to see a pair of peregrine falcons swooping around and hearing their strange, plaintive cry.
An icecream from the shop made a perfect end to the day. And I’m still feeling smug about my rock-climbing feat!



One thing that I have noticed about my pedometer is that it does not record steps taken when picking your way over very uneven ground, so I think my step count for the day, at 19889, was an underestimate. I noticed the same thing when walking the gorges in Crete. Still not bad though!