This dramatic tour is one of the great walks of England. Start out on the beautiful sandstone cliffs and beaches of St. Bees on England’s west coast, home to kittiwakes, shags and fulmars, and finish on the east coast, the Dinosaur Coast at Robin’s Hood Bay, where it is said the legendary Robin Hood spent many quiet years fishing after his escapades with the Sherriff of Nottingham.
Inspired by Alfred Wainwright, the tour has all the poetry of the Lake District, the romance of the Yorkshire Dales and the grittiness of the North York Moors, three of England’s greatest National Parks. At 190 miles and an ascent (and descent) of 22,825 feet, the crossing of northern England is for the more experienced walker. It takes between two and three weeks to complete. But you don’t have to walk it in one fell stride, you can take in the beautiful lakes and mountains of the Lake District, then the rivers and dry stone walls of the Yorkshire Dales, and finally the rugged wilds of the North York Moors, dipping your toe in the Irish Sea on the west coast and in the North Sea on the east coast in different years.
Holiday details
Price
- Classic
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from £3,700 per person
The tour has three key sections running West to East: The Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales and the North York Moors. A price is available for each section on request - Luxury
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from £8,690 per person
Based on two people sharing a room
What’s included?
The luxury tour includes transfers at the beginning and end of most days to and from your hotel. See what’s included as standard
Duration
21 nights
Start & Finish
Starts Cartmell (luxury tour) or St Bees and finishes in Robin Hood's Bay. Trains run from London Euston to St Bees and to Grange over Sands for Cartmell. For Robin's Hood Bay, Whitby is the nearest station (five miles away) with trains to London King's Cross
Hotels
- Classic
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Hotels and B&B's full of charm and character
- Luxury
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3 and 4* charming country house hotels and restaurants with rooms
Holiday type
Self-guided
This tour is priced without a guide and you are free to explore on your own. If you would like a guide for part or all of your trip, we are happy to provide a knowledgeable, local guide
Activity level
Not so gentle walking (5) More info...
Mileage
21 days of walking 3-14 miles (5 - 22 km) per day
Terrain
7 days with ascents over 1700ft mixed with flat or gentle days
Traffic-free
100%
Itinerary day-by-day
Classic
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1. Day one
St. Bees
St. Bees. Arrive at your hotel in St. Bees at your leisure. Your host will meet you and run through your itinerary, answering any questions you may have. Enjoy the town visiting the church of St. Mary and St. Bega, the oldest in what was once West Cumberland, and the nearby town of Whitehaven, spend the evening as you wish.
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2. Day two
St. Bees to Cleator
Here on the west coast of England, your walk begins at St. Bees Head where the Isle of Man rises from the sea. The birdlife is prolific, with kittiwakes, fulmars, guillemots, razorbills, cormorants, puffins, shags and herring gulls. Walking towards Fleswick Bay and St. Bees lighthouse. Dip a toe, you’ve started! And then turn east to views of the granite Lakeland Fells, High Stile, Red Pike and Scafells, to Cleator, the gateway to the Lake District, the river Ehen marking the boundary. If you have time visit E.W. Pugin’s St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Cleator.
9 miles (14 km)
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3. Day three
Cleator to Ennerdale Bridge
Today you enter the Lake District, climbing up to Dent Fell and the glories of its views back to the Irish Sea, the Isle of Man and Galloway, and forward to the Lakeland Fells. Over the moorland pass Kinniside Stone Circle and into Ennerdale Bridge and St. Mary’s Church, the ‘homely priest of Ennerdale’ referenced in Wordsworth’s ‘The Brothers’.
5 miles (8 km)
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4. Day four
Ennerdale Bridge to Honister Pass
To reach Honister Pass, you have an energetic day ahead with 1870' of ascent. You walk the full length of Ennerdale Water, the Lake District’s most westerly lake, and not far beyond a steep climb up and over the top at Brandreth. Spectacular view of the Buttermere valley lie to your left, and you start the descent to Honister Pass where we meet you for the short transfer to the village of Rosthwaite in the gorgeous Borrowdale valley
11.6 miles (18 km)
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5. Day five
Honister Pass to Rosthwaite
After yesterday's exertions, you have a short and gentle walk and time to explore. Start at Honister Pass with an opportunity to visit the working slate mine that produces high quality Westmorland Green slate, and then walk down into Borrowdale Valley, one of the most loved of the Lakeland’s valleys with its oak woodland and stone walls, back to the small eighteenth century village of Rosthwaite for a second night there. The afternoon is yours - maybe you will take a taxi to Keswick with a boat trip on Derwent Water on the way back?
3 miles (5 km)
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6. Day six
Rosthwaite to Grasmere
Beautiful cascades of water meet you at Stonethwaite and Stonethwaite Fell, the Galleny Force and surrounding landscape ‘a thing of beauty, a joy for ever’ before you enter the more austere ‘Crag’ country, Eagle Crag, Bull Crag, Long Crag and Helm Crag, its ‘lion and the lamb’ summit one of the best known. You have ascended 1866' to here and beyond it's all downhill towards Grasmere, the village of Wordsworth and Thomas Gray. Wordsworth is buried in St. Oswald Church and his socks can be seen in the Wordsworth Museum.
9 miles (14 km)
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7. Day seven
Grasmere to Patterdale
Today it’s a 1700' climb up to Grisedale, the Great Tongue and Rydal Fell to either side. Pause at Grisedale Hause and Tarn, its waters the final resting place of the crown of Dunmail, the last King of Cumbria slaughtered by the English and Scots in 945, a good time to reflect on the Lakeland journey and the Yorkshire Dales that lie ahead. From here, passing Ruthwaite Lodge where Wordsworth said goodbye to his brother soon to perish as the Captain aboard the Earl of Abergavenny when the ship struck the Shambles off Portland, walk down to the serene village of Patterdale at the southern end of Lake Ullswater. If you have time, see the beautiful tapestries in St. Patrick’s church.
8 miles (13 km)
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8. Day eight
Patterdale to Haweswater Hotel
Rising up out of Patterdale to the Angle Tarn Pikes, Satura Crag and the Knott dramatic views of Fairfield and Hellvelyn. Cross High Street Fell with its old Roman road, the highest in the country, linking Brocavum (near Penrith) and Galava (Ambleside), to reach the sharp ‘summit’ of Kidsty Pike. You have ascended 2,500' and in the far distance you see the limestone romance of the Yorkshire Dales. From there walk down to the Haweswater Reservoir, built in the 1930’s to provide water for Manchester.
11 miles (18 km)
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9. Day nine
Haweswater Hotel to Shap
Continue along the south side of the reservoir through Naddle Forest and its oak trees, heath and scrub to Burnbanks built to house those building the reservoir. Past Thornthwaite Force, a pretty cascade of water, continue to the ruins of Shap Abbey, a twelfth century monastery for the Premonstratensian Order of White Canons. Just beyond are the 3,000 B.C. late Neolithic Shap Stones and Avenue, the Thunder Stone and Goggleby Stone most prominent. Nearby stands Keld Chapel thought to be the Abbey’s chantry chapel.
6 miles (10 km)
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10. Day ten
Shap to Orton
From the granite of the Lake District to the limestone of moorland and the Yorkshire Dales, pass Oddendale Stone Circle and distant view of the Fells, from time to time pass large granite boulders brought down by glaciers and Crosby Ravensworth Fell, an important breeding ground for moorland birds, redshank, red grouse and curlew. Nearby is Robin Hood’s Grave, a link to Robin’s Hood Bay, before walking over Orton Scar and down into the charming village of Orton with its church of All Saints and Farmers Market.
9 miles (14 km)
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11. Day eleven
Orton to Kirkby Stephen
At Tarn Moor see the bleak beauty of Sunbiggin Tarn, a Site of Special Scientific Interest, and the squawking of breeding gulls. Walk through beautiful moorland filled with ancient settlements of huts and dykes overlooking the wild flowers of Scandal Beck and Smardale Bridge. At the old market town of Kirkby Stephen see the 'Cathedral of the Dales', the Church of St. Stephen, its Loki stone (‘chained devil’) and Lord Wharton’s tomb.
13 miles (21 km)
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12. Day twelve
Kirkby Stephen to Keld
Cross the Eden, Wordsworth wrote an evocative poem of the river, ‘EDEN! till now thy beauty had I viewed by glimpses only…’, via Frank’s Bridge and head across Hartley Fell to the Nine Standards whose waters on the west run into the Irish Sea and on the east into the North Sea, the watershed a half way mark of sorts. Admire stunning views to the Lakelands and the Fells before pushing on down Whitsun Dale to Ravenseat, calls of curlew and golden plover, to Keld the first village in Swaledale.
11 miles (18 km)
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13. Day thirteen
Keld to Reeth
The Royal Road to Reeth follows the course of the river Swale, passes Crackpot Hall built by Lord Wharton for his keeper, through buttercups and daisies, over stiles to Ivelet, Gunnerside Bottom and Feetham Wood, sycamore and beech, and then into Reeth at the confluence of the Swale and Arkle Beck that flows in from the north. Visit the Swaledale Museum.
11 miles (18 km)
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14. Day fourteen
Reeth to Richmond
Walking north-east and away from the Swale, cut across fields edged by dry stone walls to the twelfth century Marrick Priory founded for Benedictine nuns and then on to the quiet village of Marske with Marske Hall and twelfth century church dedicated to St. Edmund. Beautiful views to the upper valleys of Marske Beck before travelling on through Applegarth and Whitecliffe Woods to Richmond. Visit the twelfth century Holy Trinity Church today the Regimental Museum of the Green Howards, Alan Rufus’s Richmond Castle where the English imprisoned two Kings of Scotland, William the Lion and David II, and the Georgian Theatre Royal.
11 miles (18 km)
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15. Day fifteen
Richmond to Danby Wiske
Cross the eighteenth century Richmond Bridge into elegant woodland, heading for Colburn Hall and on to St. Mary’s church at Bolton-on-Swale where you can admire the tomb of Henry Jenkins who lived to be 169. Walk on to Kiplin Hall, a major Jacobean House built between 1622 and 1625 for George Calvert, Secretary of State to James 1, later Lord Baltimore and founder of Maryland, the U.S. state. Crossing farmland to the Saxon village of Danby Wiske, visit the village’s Norman church.
14 miles (22 km)
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16. Day sixteen
Danby Wiske to Ingleby Cross
Relax and enjoy the rural walking in the Vale of Mowbray across fields and hedgerows in a beautifully quiet pastoral setting as you head for Ingleby Cross, Ingleby or Englebi, the village of the English, on the very edge of the Cleveland Hills and the North York Moors.
9 miles (14 km)
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17. Day seventeen
Ingleby Cross to Clay Bank Top
To Arncliffe Hall a Georgian House dating from 1754, passing through woods to the Mount Grace Priory. Built in 1398 it is one of the finest examples of a Carthusian Monastery in England, its monastic cell, ruined tower and cloisters evocative of that important period in English history. The moors here have a number of Bronze Age barrows or grave mounds as you cross drove roads along which Scottish cattlemen drove their cattle.
12 miles (19 km)
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18. Day eighteen
Clay Bank Top to Blakey Ridge
A fine stretch of the North York Moors reaching the highest point on the moors here on Urra Moor. You pass the Rosedale Ironstone Railway built in 1861 to carry iron ore to Teesside to the east. From time to time you will spot Moorland Crosses.
9 miles (14 km)
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19. Day nineteen
Blakey Ridge to Glaisdale
Passing by White Cross and Danby Head Moor, you head north-east through the heather and bracken, and then grass, to Glaisdale along the Glaisdale Rigg. The isolated village of Glaisdale once had a prosperous iron ore industry.
10 miles (16 km) or more
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20. Day twenty
Glaisdale to Littlebeck
Walking along the river Esk on centuries old pannier-ways, pass through Limber Hill Wood to Egton Bridge, the ‘town of oaks’, one of Yorkshire’s most beautiful villages and then onto Grosmont, at the confluence of the Esk and Murk Esk, before heading on across the moors and grouse butts to village of Littlebeck.
8 miles (13 km)
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21. Day twenty-one
Littlebeck to Robin Hood's Bay
The last day of your 190 mile journey, walk south through the woods past Midge Hall and then north-east towards the coast, Hawsker Bottoms, where Robin Hood and Little John displayed their archery skills, and Robin Hood's Bay, joining the coastal path with its views across the North Sea. Dip a toe, you’ve done it!
12 miles (19 km)
Luxury
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1. Day one
Cartmel
Save up St. Bees for tomorrow. First enjoy your stay at L'Enclume, the U.K.'s leading restaurant, near Morecambe Bay to the south of the Lake District, a luxury preparation for the task ahead. Your host will meet you and run through your itinerary, answering any questions you may have.
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2. Day two
St. Bees to Cleator
Picked up from L'Enclume and dropped off on the west coast of England, your walk begins at St. Bees Head where the Isle of Man rises from the sea. The birdlife is prolific, with kittiwakes, fulmars, guillemots, razorbills, cormorants, puffins, shags and herring gulls. Walking towards Fleswick Bay and St. Bees lighthouse. Dip a toe, you’ve started! And then turn east to views of the granite Lakeland Fells, High Stile, Red Pike and Scafells, to Cleator, the gateway to the Lake District, the river Ehen marking the boundary. If you have time visit E.W. Pugin’s St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Cleator. You will be picked up and dropped off at Hunday Manor, the first of your two nights.
9 miles (14 km)
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3. Day three
Cleator to Ennerdale Bridge
Today you enter the Lake District, climbing up to Dent Fell and the glories of its views back to the Irish Sea, the Isle of Man and Galloway, and forward to the Lakeland Fells. Over the moorland pass Kinniside Stone Circle and into Ennerdale Bridge and St. Mary’s Church, the ‘homely priest of Ennerdale’ referenced in Wordsworth’s ‘The Brothers’. You will be picked up and transferred for your second night at Moresby Hall.
5 miles (8 km)
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4. Day four
Ennerdale Bridge to Honister Pass
To reach Honister Pass, you have an energetic day ahead with 1870' of ascent. You walk the full length of Ennerdale Water, the Lake District’s most westerly lake, and not far beyond a steep climb up and over the top at Brandreth. Spectacular view of the Buttermere valley lie to your left, and you start the descent to Honister Pass where we meet you for the short transfer to your hotel in the gorgeous Borrowdale valley.
11.6 miles (18 km)
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5. Day five
Honister Pass to Rosthwaite
After yesterday's exertions, you have a short and gentle walk and time to explore. Start at Honister Pass with an opportunity to visit the working slate mine that produces high quality Westmorland Green slate, and then walk down into Borrowdale Valley, one of the most loved of the Lakeland’s valleys with its oak woodland and stone walls, back to the small eighteenth century village of Rosthwaite for a second night there. The afternoon is yours - maybe you will take a taxi to Keswick with a boat trip on Derwent Water on the way back?
3 miles (5 km)
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6. Day six
Rosthwaite to Grasmere
Beautiful cascades of water meet you at Stonethwaite and Stonethwaite Fell, the Galleny Force and surrounding landscape ‘a thing of beauty, a joy for ever’ before you enter the more austere ‘Crag’ country, Eagle Crag, Bull Crag, Long Crag and Helm Crag, its ‘lion and the lamb’ summit one of the best known. You have ascended 1866' to here and beyond it's all downhill towards Grasmere, the village of Wordsworth and Thomas Gray. Wordsworth is buried in St. Oswald Church and his socks can be seen in the Wordsworth Museum. Walk to the door of your hotel - Forest Side which is a foody haunt and lies just outside the village
9 miles (14 km)
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7. Day seven
Grasmere to Patterdale
Today it’s a climb of 1700' up to Grisedale, the Great Tongue and Rydal Fell to either side. Pause at Grisedale Hause and Tarn, its waters the final resting place of the crown of Dunmail, the last King of Cumbria slaughtered by the English and Scots in 945, a good time to reflect on the Lakeland journey and the Yorkshire Dales that lie ahead. From here, passing Ruthwaite Lodge where Wordsworth said goodbye to his brother soon to perish as the Captain aboard the Earl of Abergavenny, the ship struck the Shambles off Portland, walk down to the serene village of Patterdale at the southern end of Lake Ullswater. If you have time, see the beautiful tapestries in St. Patrick’s church before you head to The Inn on the Lake, your hotel on the shores of Ullswater
8 miles (13 km)
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8. Day eight
Patterdale to Haweswater Hotel
Rising up out of Patterdale to the Angle Tarn Pikes, Satura Crag and the Knott dramatic views of Fairfield and Hellvelyn. Cross High Street Fell with its old Roman road, the highest in the country, linking Brocavum (near Penrith) and Galava (Ambleside), to reach the sharp ‘summit’ of Kidsty Pike. You have ascended 2,500' and in the far distance you see the limestone romance of the Yorkshire Dales. From there walk down to the Haweswater Reservoir, built in the 1930’s to provide water for Manchester and the Haweswater Hotel on its banks for your overnight stay.
11 miles (18 km)
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9. Day nine
Haweswater Hotel to Shap
Continue along the south side of the reservoir through Naddle Forest and its oak trees, heath and scrub to Burnbanks built to house those building the reservoir. Past Thornthwaite Force, a pretty cascade of water, continue to the ruins of Shap Abbey, a twelfth century monastery for the Premonstratensian Order of White Canons. Just beyond are the 3,000 B.C. late Neolithic Shap Stones and Avenue, the Thunder Stone and Goggleby Stone most prominent. Nearby stands Keld Chapel thought to be the Abbey’s chantry chapel. Transfer for your third night at Sharrow Bay.
6 miles (10 km)
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10. Day ten
Shap to Orton
From the granite of the Lake District to the limestone of moorland and the Yorkshire Dales, pass Oddendale Stone Circle and distant view of the Fells, from time to time pass large granite boulders brought down by glaciers and Crosby Ravensworth Fell, an important breeding ground for moorland birds, redshank, red grouse and curlew. Nearby is Robin Hood’s Grave, a link to Robin’s Hood Bay, before walking over Orton Scar and down into the charming village of Orton with its church of All Saints and Farmers Market. Transfer to Sharrow Bay for your last night at this idyllic hotel.
9 miles (14 km)
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11. Day eleven
Orton to Kirkby Stephen
At Tarn Moor see the bleak beauty of Sunbiggin Tarn, a Site of Special Scientific Interest, and the squawking of breeding gulls. Walk through beautiful moorland filled with ancient settlements of huts and dykes overlooking the wild flowers of Scandal Beck and Smardale Bridge. At the old market town of Kirkby Stephen see the 'Cathedral of the Dales', the Church of St. Stephen, its Loki stone (‘chained devil’) and Lord Wharton’s tomb before your transfer to Augill Castle, an 1840's folly.
13 miles (21 km)
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12. Day twelve
Kirkby Stephen to Keld
Cross the Eden, Wordsworth wrote an evocative poem of the river, ‘EDEN! till now thy beauty had I viewed by glimpses only…’, via Frank’s Bridge and head across Hartley Fell to the Nine Standards whose waters on the west run into the Irish Sea and on the east into the North Sea, the watershed a half way mark of sorts. Admire stunning views to the Lakelands and the Fells before pushing on down Whitsun Dale to Ravenseat, calls of curlew and golden plover, to Keld the first village in Swaledale. You will be picked up and transferred to Yorebridge House in the heart of the Dales.
11 miles (18 km)
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13. Day thirteen
Keld to Reeth
The Royal Road to Reeth follows the course of the river Swale, passes Crackpot Hall built by Lord Wharton for his keeper, through buttercups and daisies, over stiles to Ivelet, Gunnerside Bottom and Feetham Wood, sycamore and beech, and then into Reeth at the confluence of the Swale and Arkle Beck that flows in from the north. Visit the Swaledale Museum, a short walk away from The Burgoyne Hotel, a late Georgian House with views of the Dales.
11 miles (18 km)
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14. Day fourteen
Reeth to Richmond
Walking north-east and away from the Swale, cut across fields edged by dry stone walls to the twelfth century Marrick Priory founded for Benedictine nuns and then on to the quiet village of Marske with Marske Hall and twelfth century church dedicated to St. Edmund. Beautiful views to the upper valleys of Marske Beck before travelling on through Applegarth and Whitecliffe Woods to Richmond. Visit the twelfth century Holy Trinity Church today the Regimental Museum of the Green Howards, Alan Rufus’s Richmond Castle where the English imprisoned two Kings of Scotland, William the Lion and David II, and the Georgian Theatre Royal. Stay at pretty Millgate House in the centre of Richmond.
11 miles (18 km)
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15. Day fifteen
Richmond to Danby Wiske
Cross the eighteenth century Richmond Bridge into elegant woodland, heading for Colburn Hall and on to St. Mary’s church at Bolton-on-Swale where you can admire the tomb of Henry Jenkins who lived to be 169. Walk on to Kiplin Hall, a major Jacobean House built between 1622 and 1625 for George Calvert, Secretary of State to James 1, later Lord Baltimore and founder of Maryland, the U.S. state. Crossing farmland to the Saxon village of Danby Wiske, visit the village’s Norman church, before your transfer for the first of three nights to The Black Swan at Oldstead, elegance and tasting menus.
14 miles (22 km)
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16. Day sixteen
Danby Wiske to Ingleby Cross
Relax and enjoy the rural walking in the Vale of Mowbray across fields and hedgerows in a beautifully quiet pastoral setting as you head for Ingleby Cross, Ingleby or Englebi, the village of the English, on the very edge of the Cleveland Hills and the North York Moors. Transfer for a second night at the Black Swan, owned by a family who have farmed here for generations.
9 miles (14 km)
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17. Day seventeen
Ingleby Cross to Clay Bank Top
To Arncliffe Hall a Georgian House dating from 1754, passing through woods to the Mount Grace Priory. Built in 1398 it is one of the finest examples of a Carthusian Monastery in England, its monastic cell, ruined tower and cloisters evocative of that important period in English history. The moors here have a number of Bronze Age barrows or grave mounds as you cross drove roads along which Scottish cattlemen drove their cattle. Transfer for your last night at the elegant Black Swan.
12 miles (19 km)
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18. Day eighteen
Clay Bank Top to Blakey Ridge
A fine stretch of the North York Moors reaching the highest point on the moors here on Urra Moor. You pass the Rosedale Ironstone Railway built in 1861 to carry iron ore to Teesside to the east. From time to time you will spot Moorland Crosses before a transfer for the first of three nights at the historic sixteenth century White Swan Inn in Pickering.
9 miles (14 km)
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19. Day nineteen
Blakey Ridge to Glaisdale
Passing by White Cross and Danby Head Moor, you head north-east through the heather and bracken, and then grass, to Glaisdale along the Glaisdale Rigg. The isolated village of Glaisdale once had a prosperous iron ore industry. Transfer to the historic sixteenth century White Swan Inn in Pickering for your second night.
10 miles (16 km) or more
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20. Day twenty
Glaisdale to Littlebeck
Walking along the river Esk on centuries old pannier-ways, pass through Limber Hill Wood to Egton Bridge, the ‘town of oaks’, one of Yorkshire’s most beautiful villages and then onto Grosmont, at the confluence of the Esk and Murk Esk, before heading on across the moors and grouse butts to village of Littlebeck. Transfer for your last night at the White Swan Inn in Pickering.
8 miles (13 km)
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21. Day twenty-one
Littlebeck to Robin Hood's Bay
The last day of your 190 mile journey, walk south through the woods past Midge Hall and then north-east towards the coast, Hawsker Bottoms, where Robin Hood and Little John displayed their archery skills, and Robin's Hood Bay, joining the coastal path with its views across the North Sea. Dip a toe, you’ve done it! Celebrate in York's leading hotel, Middlethorpe Hall, and if you still have the energy after your 190 mile Coast to Coast visit York Minster, an architectural gem and the largest Gothic cathedral in Europe.
12 miles (19 km)