Winder, Howgills - Sedbergh

Yesterday we ventured over to Sedbergh, which, although in the county of Cumbria, is very much a part of the Yorkshire Dales National Park.

Sedbergh is the gateway to the Howgill Fells, arguably the most unique and wonderful range of hills anywhere in the country! The Howgills are too vast and special to adequately describe in a single post so we will share a more thorough and detailed description of them in a future post. In the meantime, please enjoy the photos and round up of the little taste of the Howgills we sampled yesterday in our short explorative 3 mile walk of Winder.

We parked up in the centre of Sedbergh and made our way down the quaint Main Street before taking a left on to Castlehaw Lane and passing the Motte and Bailey of Castlehaw Tower.

Following the track uphill with the serene Settlebeck Gill on our right, we made it to the gate leading to the open access area and the bottom of the fell/start of the fun part! Keeping the Gill on our right we proceeded to negotiate the rather challenging steep and narrow rocky terrain for the short distance before it opened up on to open grass.

Continuing uphill to the ridge, the 360 degree views are fantastic, despite the low cloud. We then took a left and headed to the summit of Winder. At 467 metres above sea level, it isn't the highest hill by any means but it is on the edge of the Howgills and overlooks the town of Sedbergh. From the summit we took the wide path that loops around the Eastern slopes of the fell and made our way to lower ground, joining Howgill Lane back in to Sedbergh.

This was our first taste of the Howgills and it didn't disappoint! We have been wanting to walk here for a long time and we thoroughly enjoyed it. What makes the Howgills so special and enjoyable? Well, they are very different from the craggy fells of the Lake District and the limestone features of the Yorkshire Dales. They are just grass, very similar to moorland terrain, yet not overly wet or boggy.

There are dozens of separate fells and summits within the Howgills, but they are all gathered in a large square area, and with an abundance of paths and tracks in all directions, navigating them is easy.