Making good on our promise to ourselves to spend more time in the North Pennines, we recently managed to get back up to Teesdale for another walk in this most underrated of areas. With the sun shining and temperatures set to rise, we were after a short(ish) walk which would could get around without the dogs getting too warm. Sam was in charge of route selection this time and he picked a 10km circular route from our Pocket Mountains guide to the North Pennines, starting from the quiet County Durham village of Cotherstone.
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Cotherstone is a quiet little village which seems to be largely overlooked by visitors. Certainly, we were the only people setting out with walking boots and backpacks when we set off bright and (reasonably) early on the Sunday morning. The route we followed makes use of the Teesdale Way, a 92 mile long distance path following the course of the river Tees, which runs from Dufton in Cumbria to Redcar on the Yorkshire Coast.
In this part of the world near Barnard Castle, the Teesdale Way often runs along both sides of the river, and our route took advantage of this to make a very pleasant (and surprisingly varied) circular walk. Looking at it in the book I thought it would be fairly flat – running along the river and through woodland – however it was certainly not flat! On the plus side it also wasn’t too strenuous, just fairly up and down.
There’s free roadside parking in Cotherstone or by the football field, where there’s space for about four cars. As with all small villages (actually, anywhere really), make sure that you park considerately. Following a quiet lane to reach the river, we soon gained some lovely riverside views as we crossed the Tees, with me stopping in the middle of the bridge to snap some photos – not realising there were some people waiting to cross on the other side. Whoops!
To my surprise, the first half of the route wound its way away from the river through farmland, crossing meadows with fine views across the North Pennines (shows how closely I’d examined the route). For relatively little effort, the surroundings really were very pleasant. The route followed way markers for the Teesdale Way, crossing fields with sheep and cows, then traversing a caravan park to climb back up to more farmland.
As with most of our walks in this area, we reached the half way point (the even quieter village of Romaldkirk) and we were yet to see another person, although we did spy a couple enjoying their lunch on a well placed bench on Romaldkirk village green. From here, we crossed more fields and a bridge on the main road, to eventually join the riverside path back to the start. We reached the river (for the first time since the very start of the walk) after traversing a few fields and skirting the edge of the woods via a somewhat overgrown path (which I’m not 100% sure wasn’t a navigation error on our part).
There’s a nice spot by the river when you reach the banks, however, we didn’t stop here as there was another dog walker having her lunch with an off-lead dog. Who, we were reassured as it charged over to us, we didn’t need to worry about as it was friendly. When I mentioned that our dog wasn’t friendly she did in fairness try to recall it, unfortunately she had about as much success as a chocolate teapot. Never mind…
From this point, the path became a little rocky and uneven: nothing technical or challenging, but I was glad I’d put my boots on just for a bit of extra grip on the slippery surface. I was glad too that we’d followed the route in this direction, with the woods providing plenty of shade as the sun climbed higher and the day heated up. The dogs were grateful for the quick paddle they had towards the end too. Then, seemingly having walked much faster than on the outward leg, we were back to the start. The closest route to this that I can find online is this slightly different walk on AllTrails, starting from Romaldkirk.
Dog friendly rating: 3.5/5. We kept our dogs on leads for all of this walk, much of which passes through farmland where you could find sheep or cattle grazing. There are many stiles, most of which are the easier to get a dog over stone steps in a wall, but there were one or two of the wooden planks which are slightly tougher. While the river Tees is accessible in places for dogs to have a swim, we kept ours on the lead close to the edge due to signs up warning of strong currents.
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