Hiking

Ellerside from Cartmel

Easy

7.4 miles | 11.9 km | 203 m Ascent | 8.4 Naismith miles | Alison Kinder & Colin Stroud
Bentham Footpath Group has visited the Cartmel Peninsula a number of times: It’s a great place to start a walk and offers a good choice of routes. We could head east onto Hampsfell with cracking views over the Kent Estuary and into Morecambe Bay, or as we do on this walk, west onto the ridge at Ellerside with equally good views across the Levens Estuary and over to the Lakeland fells. Along the way we have the opportunity to explore Cartmel Village, potentially adding a visit to the Priory and Cartmel Park racecourse, before heading through Park Wood, and scaling Ellerside where from the top of a ridge running along the side of the estuary, we have great views over to Ulverston. Our return is south past How Barrow, then down to Low Bank Side where we pick up a lane back to the racecourse tracking the river Eea.

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Lancaster – City country and coast

Moderate

7.5 miles | 12.1 km | 139 m Ascent | 8.2 Naismith miles | Sandra Craggs
A couple of years ago, we tried an interesting experiment – we started a walk in the centre of Lancaster and included a significant rural element in our route. That walk was a great success, and with a little time having passed we thought it worth re-running with a few minor changes to the points of interest we visit in the city centre.
Starting from Sugar House Alley, we walk through the city centre to the Lancaster Canal where we head South along the towpath – this gives a very urban view of Lancaster and its industrial heritage.
We leave the canal just after the west coast main line railway bridge, and head down a side street into the Fairfield Association Nature Reserve. That trail brings us back to the canal at Haverbreaks, and we again head South before leaving almost immediately to take a path through Aldcliffe to the Lune estuary where we take the embankment North through the marshes. Opposite Oxcliffe Hill, we head inland through Freemans Wood and on to Abrahams Heights. We are now back in a very urban environment, heading past the bustle of the railway station and then the Priory and Castle, before returning to the city centre, where we visit more heritage sites.

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Longridge Fell from Hurst Green

Easy

7.4 miles | 11.9 km | 267 m Ascent | 8.7 Naismith miles | Kate Rowe / Kate Butcher
Just one week on from a walk where the weather worked against us, we have a little more luck: This walk, like last week’s offers great views, but this time we got to enjoy them, along with interesting diversions on the way round. These include Cromwell’s bridge (which we drive past just before the start of the walk), the Shireburn alms-houses, The Ribble Jubilee Trail, Greengore – a buttressed hunting lodge once used by Henry VII, the fell top forestry path at Longridge Fell, a lunch break with jaw dropping views over to Parlick and Fair Snape Fell, Bleak House, sculptures of horses, the original site of the alms-houses – yes they were moved, and the manicured grounds of the famous Stonyhurst College. And as a bonus we got a free organ recital hearing the majesty of Widor’s Toccata. It’s only January, but this must be a candidate for best walk of the year.

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Bordley

Easy

7.2 miles | 11.7 km | 296 m Ascent | 8.7 Naismith miles | Sandra Craggs
We try very hard when we design our walks: We need to find starting points with suitable parking, and we need to find walks that offer a wide variety of interests on the way round. We need to think about where we can stop for breaks, and we need to think about whether changing conditions might make the route impassible – ideally, with an alternative if that’s the case. Finally, we like to offer great views – because that after all is such a big part of why we go walking in this wonderful landscape.
What we can’t do unfortunately is turn off the fog. So, today’s walk does have brilliant views . . . it’s just that they were hidden by mist and so don’t show on the pictures. Follow the route on a better day and we promise you there’s a lot to see.

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Into the heart of Three Peaks Country from Gearstones

Easy

6.8miles | 10.9 km | 279 m Ascent | 8.2 Naismith miles | Mary & Kate Taylor
January can be a great time of the year to go walking, but as we have seen over the last couple of weeks, snow and ice can make some routes inaccessible or unsafe. No such problems this week, and it’s great to get back to our published programme.
We start at Gearstones and then set out up the Cam Road on the Dales Way, as far as Cam End where we pick up the Pennine Bridleway which we follow down to the lovely Ling Gill bridge, and the nearby Ling Gill nature reserve. The bridleway contours around Cave Hill to High Birkwith, where we take the Ribble Way over to God’s Bridge, then Nether Lodge, before crossing Thorns Moss on the way back to Gearstones.

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Local Walk January 2025

Easy

5.2 miles | 8.4 km | 171 m Ascent | 6.1 Naismith miles | Sandra Craggs
The walk for January 9th was scheduled to be at Winster. However, prolonged freezing conditions made the minor roads in that area a significant black ice risk.
We therefore postponed that walk and substituted a local stroll in and around Bentham.
This is the second week in a row that icy conditions have triggered a change of plan, and just as last week, we see this as an opportunity rather than a problem: Bentham is a great place to live, and a great place to walk. The route we present here stands comparison with any of our more distant routes and reminds us how lucky we are to live here.

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Bentham Heritage Trails

Easy

4.9 miles | 8.0 km | 166 m Ascent | 5.8 Naismith miles | George Sheridan
This walk took place on January 3rd 2025, and is not the route originally scheduled – icy conditions on the morning meant that the drive to Dunsop Bridge over the Slaidburn Road was considered too dangerous. We therefore substituted a local walk largely based on the Bentham Heritage Trails: The Under Totridge from Dunsop Bridge walk will be re-scheduled.
The walk may have been planned at short notice, but it still has much to offer: Easy access from Bentham, Great views along the Wenning Valley, information boards detailing local history, crisp crunchy ice, riverside sections, and numerous benches to take a break. What a great place to live.

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Christmas Walk Low Bentham 2024

Easy

4.2 miles | 6.7 km | 123 m Ascent | 4.8 Naismith miles | Mary Pickstone & Valerie Eccles
The days between Christmas and New Year – referred to by one group member as “Twixtmass” – are filled with leftovers, repeats of TV programmes that were lack-lustre the first time round, and a general confusion about what day it really is.
Bentham Footpath Group offers its members a welcome escape from all this by organising a Christmas Walk every year. Our aim is to get out, get some fresh air, and show off those new boots / kit that Santa brought. We generally aim for a short and easy walk, to encourage a good turnout, and end at a pub or café where we share lunch – the recently re-opened Punch Bowl at Low Bentham was our host this year.

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Bracewell from Gisburn

Easy

7.2 miles | 11.6 km | 212m Ascent | 8.2 Naismith miles | Alison Kinder & Colin Stroud
Bentham Footpath Group is lucky enough to have good access to the Yorkshire Dales, The South Lakes and the Forest of Bowland, and it’s to the latter that we head for this walk.
It might be tempting to assume that a walk in the forest would involve a lot of time spent amongst the trees. Not necessarily so, as the name Forest of Bowland, was first applied when medieval Royal hunting forests were established – the title ‘forest’ refers here to hunting rights, and not to a large expanse of woodland, as we would interpret it today.
From the attractive village of Gisburn, we loop out round Gisburne Park, before following Stock Beck upstream to Horton, and then Bracewell. We have a quick look at the lovely church of St Michaels, then head west across farmland to Sullside Hill, before strolling back down into Gisburn, via another ancient church – St Mary the Virgin.

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Copplestone Gate and Conistone Pie 2

Easy

6.9 miles | 11.1 km | 369 m Ascent | 8.8 Naismith miles | Peter Lennard
Offering interesting walks on as frequent a basis as we do within the Bentham Footpath Group is a challenge. One which we compound for ourselves by trying to ensure that everything we do is new to the group. Every now and again though, we complete a walk that is so good we think it’s worth revisiting with a minor variation.
So, this is a slight reworking of our walk from 6th May 2022, taking a different route through the mine workings at Benfoot Brow. This simple change makes the walk sightly shorter and a little easier, making it more suitable for the shorter winter days.
It still includes the wonderful climb up the Dib, along with an alternate gentler route to the fantastic limestone pavement adjacent to the Bycliffe Road. We still walk the Conistone Turf Road, via Copplestone Gate to see the bleak spoil tips from past lead mining, before taking in Swinber Scar, Conistone Pie and St Mary’s church in Conistone. Take the GPS for both versions and you can decide which walk to follow as the day unfolds.

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