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The Time Line Walk 4.5 miles, plus an extra mile, if you take the spur to the Hoffman Kiln
The walk starts in the village car park.
Walk thirty meters up the Malham road and enter the fields through a small gate at the junction of the churchyard wall and the field wall. Follow the path signposted, "BW Settle." A few yards up the field pause to look back at the village.
1. A tannery once stood on the ground now occupied by the church which was built in 1851. Tanning was an important local industry which used the burnt lime from the limekilns in its processing tanks. The raw hides were scraped before steeping and the ‘fleshings’ provided tallow for candles. The three - storey building across the Green is known locally as the’ Candle Factory’. There’s no documentary evidence of the existence of a commercial enterprise but it is highly likely that the tallow from the tannery was used in a cottage industry of candle-making by the workers who lived there.
Continue up the field keeping the wall on your right
If you look carefully at the walls you can make out the uneven lines of an early wall which was built before the Enclosure Acts of the late eighteenth century.
Early walls were formed by throwing the rocks which had been dug out of the ground onto the nearest convenient heap. Large immovable rocks often formed the base line. The higher courses of the wall are built with more skill.
Go through the gate at the top of the field and continue towards Settle keeping the wall on your right. There’s a good view of the village over this wall. Continue through the next gate. On your right, in the valley, you can see Langcliffe High Mill. At the end of this field, climb the ladder stile onto a green track.
2. The crag ahead of you is called Blua. It once carried a bed of blue chert which could be napped to form sharp arrow heads. It was not as sharp nor as hard as flint, which had to be imported from the coast, but it was a good substitute and readily available to the early hunters of Langcliffe .
Now turn sharp left along the green track. This track is very old and was used by the monks. It continues over to Malham and links up with a network of monastic routes.
Ahead of you to the north is Pen-y-Ghent and to your left, you can see the flat table top of Ingleborough.
Parallel to the wall on your left are the remnants of a much earlier wall and near the next gate a boulder, which may have been a marker stone.
Go through the gate and take the right fork up a stony rise. There’s a small field quarry on your right. As the path levels out turn to your right and look at the little grassy plateau behind you.
3. The stone terraces on the slopes surrounding the village have been used for pasturing animals for many centuries. There are remains here of enclosures and hut circles. They are easier to spot in the winter. These are of uncertain date but may have been in use as early as the Bronze Age.
Continue along the path, past the copse and through the next small gate. Notice the fine Horton slate slabs used as gate posts.
From the top of the rise you have a good view of the patchwork of fields in the valley bottom. These fields carry evidence of agricultural exploitation since the Iron Age. Aerial photographs show that there are Celtic, Roman and Monastic field systems.
The next gate brings you on to the Malham Road. Turn sharp right on to a metalled track, which soon becomes a cart track.
The area to your right is known as the Clay Pits. The clay was used to line the base of the dew ponds which provided water for the animals where there was no natural spring.
Continue over the cattle grid with the wall on your right. About twenty five meters past a gate in the wall you can see, (over the wall), a lime kiln built into the side of the bank.
4. This is a field kiln and was built for commercial use but did not operate for long. It is unusual because it has a storehouse attached to it.
Carry on along the track past a small field barn. Just beyond the barn, on your right you can see a Hollow Way.
Through long usage the track has sunk and formed a channel. The travellers and packhorses chose alternative tracks alongside the worn ones.
Go through the metal farm gate at the end of the track and turn right following the sign for Victoria Cave. When you come to the warning notice turn left up the hill to the platform outside Victoria Cave.
5. A notice erected by the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority explains the significance of this extraordinary site and the things that were discovered here. 120,000 years ago, elephants, hippopotamus, rhinoceros and hyenas roamed around here! PLEASE HEED THE WARNING NOTICES. THERE ARE ROCK FALLS IN THE CAVE AND FROM THE CLIFF. If you turn your back on the cave and look below, you can see a reconstructed Roman dew pond. The builders dug a saucer shaped hollow and lined it with stones and clay to form an impervious basin. This basin collected dew and rainwater and was a water source for the animals when there was no natural spring.
Now retrace your steps to the Monk’s road and turn right up the track to Jubilee Cave.
6. This cave was explored in 1935 by members of the Settle Pig Yard Club. Iron Age tools and skeletons were discovered within it.
Turn your back on the cave, walk to the wall and climb the ladder stile. At the other side follow the track which veers to the right round a limestone crag.
To the right of this path there are vestiges of enclosures and hut circles. The easiest one to spot is at the junction of the next wall and the crag. There is a good water supply here.
Climb the stile by the water trough and make your way down to the Malham road. Turn right over the cattle grid and take a look at the notice erected by Plantlife in the little roadside quarry.
You are now between two sections of the Winskill Stones Reserve which has been purchased by Plantlife and dedicated to the memory of Geoff Hamilton who campaigned in his broadcasts for the preservation of the limestone pavements. Look across the road and you will see what must be the most photographed tree in the Dales, emerging from a section of pavement. The blocks of limestone are called ‘clints' and the spaces between are ‘grykes.’ The grykes offer shelter to some rare and interesting plants.
Cross the road , go down the track and over the cattle grid. Continue on to the tiny hamlet of Winskill.
7. On the right of the track, there is a boulder, known as an‘erratic’. This is a Silurian mudstone boulder, which was dumped by a melting glacier about twelve thousand years ago. It is known locally as ‘Samson’s Toe’. Aerial photographs have revealed an Iron Age co–axial field system on the land to your right.
The group of buildings at the end of the track, now modernised, are on the site of an ancient settlement . Tenements were built here for seven farming families in the sixteenth century.
At the end of the track turn left through the gate and follow the path to Langcliffe. After the bend in the track there’s a stile in the wall on your left with a little gate on top. Go over the stile, cross the field and over the stile at the other side of the field. Before descending through the little thorn grove, look down over the fields at the bottom of the hill.
8. There are clear patterns of Medieval lynchets in the fields below and if the shadows are right you may be able to make out the ‘lazy beds’ in the field to the right, behind the field barn.
Make your way down the grove and through the little gate at the bottom. Continue down the field to the walled track at the bottom.
If you look to the right, half way down the field you will see the spoil heaps of the Craven Lime Works. This is the site of the Hoffman Kiln.
Continue across the next field to the gate.
As you walk across this field you walk over a grassy mound which is the domed top of a field lime kiln. It is now a very 'des.res.' for rabbits.
Through the gate is Pike Lane. Continue on this track until you have nearly reached the village of Langcliffe. You now have a choice.
9. At the sign post on your right you can take the Stainforth path to the Hoffman Kiln or take the small gate to the left and cross the field to the railway and the river Ribble. If you want to continue on the main walk, go to *.
The Hoffman Kiln Spur
The path to Stainforth crosses the wall, then a wooden stile in a wire fence. It continues past and through a broken wall and on to a stile in a wall with a small gate on top.
The path now is the old road which was used before the building of the present Horton road.
You now cross the tarmac road, which goes to the refuse area in the old quarry. Climb the opposite embankment and walk by the side of the Settle Carlisle track to the gate into the refuse yard.
10. To your left you will see the Hoffman Kiln. The chambers were packed with quarried limestone. Coal was fed between the stacks of stone from holes on top of the kiln. The chambers were sealed and the coal set alight. Two fires were started at opposite ends of the kiln. They chased each other as they ignited each chamber in turn and this resulted in a continuous production of burnt lime. The Lime Works were in operation from around 1870 to 1939. This site is an important relic of industrial archaeology but it is also a haven of wild life and it is hoped that plans to restore some of the buildings will be sensitive to this fact.
Return to the tarmac road and go under the railway bridge. Cross the Horton Road to the pavement outside the paper re-cycling mill - once a Medieval corn mill - and turn left until you come to a ladder stile in the wall on your right. Climb the stile and walk along the bank of the Ribble until you reach the cottages at the Locks. You have now re–joined the route of the main walk.
* The Main Route
Continuing along the main route, cross the field to another small gate, turn left and, on reaching the main road, turn right over the wooden footbridge over the Settle Carlisle railway. Cross the main road and go down the lane on the opposite side. This road leads to the Locks.
11. If you stand on the little foot bridge you can see the cobbles of the old ford. This area was the site of a Medieval corn mill built by the monks of Furness Abbey and was the subject of a dispute in 1221. Elias of Giggleswick claimed the mill was on his land. The river was probably braided then and the boundaries unclear. The Papal Legate was called in to settle the matter. Elias got the mill and the monks got the mill pond and rights on Stackhouse. In 1784, Clayton and Walshman built the Langcliffe High Mill and the cottages that you can see here.
Walk between the cottages and turn left at the end of the terrace. The walk continues past the mill pond, round the wall of the mill and down three steps onto a tarmac road. Beware the large lorries which unload in this area. Turn left and you will see, directly ahead of you in about 200 meters where the road turns right, a rough little path climbing up to Langcliffe.
12. The mill pond is home to Mallards and Coots and a bed of Yellow Iris. Across the mill pond you can make out a partially derelict house and estate, Langcliffe Place. The grounds are now a caravan site. This was the home of the mill owners and was a hive of social activity at one time. The mill now manufactures packaging materials. The mill once had a canal linking it to the Shed mill (now Watershed Mill), which carried the spun yarn to Langcliffe High Mill for ‘gassing and doubling’.
Climb up the little path, crossing the Settle Carlisle railway again.
The railway reached Langcliffe around 1871. The navvies slept in railway huts and drank in the village beer house, The Bay Horse. A brawl between the landlord and a navvy resulted in a manslaughter charge and the navvy was sentenced to five years penal servitude. This path was the direct path for the millworkers and, older residents recall the clatter of clogs as the workers crossed the road to the path.
Cross the road with care ( heavy quarry lorries use this road).
Glancing right you can see Langcliffe Hall, which is just old enough to be Elizabethan. It was built in 1602 and is the private home of the Bell family.
Pass between two stone bollards into the village.
Directly facing you is Cock House, which has been a workhouse, post office and general shop. It is now a private house. Walking round the village green you will pass the Methodist Chapel and Sunday School and get another look at the ‘Candle factory’. The Institute, across the village green, was built by Hector Christie, owner of High Mill, in1899. Here, on Sundays afternoons in summer, you can enjoy a cup of tea and some delicious cakes before you return to the car park.
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