Act Now To Protect Our Paths

This from the Ramblers Association – it’s urgent and vital to all country walkers. We are blessed in England and Wales with a fantastic network of paths – nearly 140,000 miles of rights of way (enough to stretch round the earth five times or half way to the moon!). However, there are thousands of historical

A Place Called Robin Hood

We all associate Robin Hood with Sherwood Forest, but as far as place-names go, the outlaw appears all over England. I was minded of this the other day, as we were strolling around Richmond Castle in Yorkshire. Or Richmondshire, if you prefer. There’s a ruined tower in the castle named after the old wolfshead. As

Pennine Leadmining Tracks to Great Rundale Tarn

Industry has brought its own tracks to our countryside. Many of the paths we follow today were created or adapted by those who worked the land in various ways, not least mining. The Pennines have been worked for lead since at least Roman times, though there was a great spurt of activity in the Victorian

Walking the Old Ways to Church

Back in the days when I was an area footpaths secretary for the Ramblers Association, the usual moan of the country landowners association was that our quaint network of footpaths should be cut down and rationalised because, they said, “who is interested in the way our ancestors walked to church?” Er, well actually I am,

Open Spaces Society welcomes access provisions in the Agriculture Bill

This, from the Open Spaces Society: We (The Open Spaces Society) have welcomed the support for public access to and enjoyment of the countryside in the new Agriculture Bill which was published on 12 September. With the Ramblers, British Horse Society and other outdoor organisations, we lobbied for agricultural payments to be directed to providing