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WALK 7

Ward’s Stone from Tarnbrook

Start/Finish	Lee Bridge; limited parking (SD567552)
Distance	17km (10½ miles)
Total Ascent	475m (1558ft)
Terrain	Good upland tracks and clear paths; a little minor road walking
Maps	Explorer OL41 (Forest of Bowland and Ribblesdale)

Even before the introduction of Access Land laws, this fine traverse of Ward’s Stone, the highest of the Bowland summits, was available to walkers thanks to the imaginative use of a concessionary path across the high ground. In a way it is a mirror image of Walk 5 from the north, and likewise shows these lovely moorland fells to good advantage.

You start from Lee Bridge, from where a surfaced lane follows the Tarnbrook Wyre to the hamlet of Tarnbrook at the confluence of Tarnsyke Clough, Thrush Clough and Gables Clough. Tarnsyke, a tiny, sequestered hamlet, was once the centre of a small industry manufacturing gloves and felt hats.

Here, near the last of the buildings, pass through a gate where the roadway gives way to a broad farm access track that soon runs along the course of Higher Syke. Go past the turning to Gilberton farm, and follow the track as it continues ascending the flank of Tarnbrook Fell high above Gables Clough and the upper Tarnbrook Wyre. For a while the path escapes the clutches of the infant river, but rejoins it as the two bully their way through a narrow ravine, blessed with a fine display of cascades.

The summit of Ward’s Stone with Ingleborough in the far distance

Above the falls, you cross the stream and ascend in a northeasterly direction to the col between Wolfhole Crag and Ward’s Stone, near a small puddle known as Brown Syke. At the col, a fenceline and drystone wall meet, and here you turn left, following the wall to a stile over a fence. Cross this, and continue following the fence uphill, channelled to a point at which fences meet, where you can cross the fence once more.

Not far away stands a trig pillar, one of two on Ward’s Stone. By just one metre, the first trig you encounter is higher than the second, though it doesn’t look it. The summit plateau is largely bare, dotted with outcrops of gritstone boulders and littered with rocks. From the top there is a fine panorama, north and east especially, to the Three Peaks of Yorkshire, and northwest to the purple-blue uplands of the Lakeland fells.

Continue west, past the second trig, and onwards towards a minor summit, Grit Fell – but don’t go as far as Grit Fell. Before reaching it you cross a track at SD565588. Turn left onto this and follow it as it descends past Grizedale Head and all the way down to rejoin the road near Rakehouse Barn. Here, turn left for the short distance to Lower Lee and the conclusion of the walk.