Leave Station car park at 9.00am. Start at Rukin’s Farm campsite in Keld (parking charge, toilets available) (GR: NY 892 012, What3Words: ///chained.presuming.belief) at 10.00am. 11 Miles. Hard. £7

A chance to visit the iconic Tan Hill – and to sample a lunchtime drink at the highest pub in England! We start with a visit to the beautiful Kisdon Force where there will be time to take photographs. We then take the north bank of the Swale past Catrake Force and Currack Force before climbing north to the isolated Farmhouse of Ravenseat, as featured on so many TV programmes. The track is now over rough boggy moor to Robert Seat at 549m. We leave the lead mining history of Swaledale and Keld to see the remnants of coal mining as coal measures run just under our feet.  After our stop at Tan Hill we will return south via the Pennine Way to Keld.

Leave Station car park 9.15am. Start Bainbridge Village Green (GR: SD 933 902, What3Words: ///normal.sugar.unhappily ) at 10.00am. 9 Miles. Moderate/Hard. £7

This is one of the classic walks in the upper part of Wensleydale.  We start at Bainbridge and begin our steady climb up the first stretch of the Cam High Road, following the straight line of the old Roman Road as it climbs towards Whether Fell. We get good views to the north into Upper Wensleydale.   We head south to gain the ridge. Our steep descent into Bardale takes us through the villages of Marsett and Stalling Busk, nestled in the Dale, with great views of Semerwater,the largest natural lake in the County. We will walk alongside the lake and share some of the legends surrounding this place before walking back towards Bainbridge alongside the country’s shortest River – the Bain. As we return we will be able to see Brough Hill, the site of the Roman fort which stood here for over 300 years and explains the existence of the road on which we started our walk.

Leave Station car park 9.15am. Park at Demesnes (free car park, accessed via Gray Lane off Thorngate) (G R: NZ 050 160, What3Words: ///beeline.bring.speedily) at 10.00am. 7 Miles. Moderate. £7.

We follow the Teesdale Way for the first part of our walk, passing the Castle which gives the town its name. We cross the Tees and walk along its south bank to Pecknell Wood. Here, we pick up a bridleway that takes us into the lovely grounds of the Grade II* listed Lartington Hall.  Reaching the village of Lartington, we follow the course of a dismantled railway that once carried coal from the Durham coalfields to the Lancashire mills. An impressive bridge abutment marks the line’s crossing of Deepdale Beck, where we descend into Deepdale Wood. We follow the beck back to its confluence with the Tees, and then back into Barnard Castle, where our walk concludes with opportunities to visit the Castle, cafes, and the Bowes Museum.

Leave Station car park 9.30am. Start at Aske Stables DL10 5HQ (GR:NZ 180 037, What3Words: ///salad.ushering.listings) at 10.00am. 7 Miles. Easy. £7

This walk will take you into parts of Aske Park that are unknown to walkers using the public footpath through the Estate. For this Discovery Walk we will be accompanied by one of the Estate Forestry Team and will learn how the landscape is managed, with its mix of parkland, grazing and commercial woodland. The first part of the walk is through the private part of the estate. We will follow tracks until we reach High Coalsgarth at the half-way point. From here we return to the Hall using public footpaths returning across the racecourse and the golf club before regaining the Park. There will be time to look round the Stable Block business and retail centre. This includes a chocolatiers and coffee shop, Mocha, and for those in need of an improved night’s sleep – a visit to Kiss the Moon.

Start at pull-in on Hurgill Road out of Richmond just before the communications towers  (GR: NZ 139 024 , What3Words:  ///destined.plausible.research) at 10.00am. 4 Miles. Easy. Free just turn up on the day.  

A short walk, part of the national Ramblers Wellbeing Walks programme, takes us to the Memorial commemorating the legend of Willance and his horse, and on to the steep Deep Dale, where we descend to join the Coast-to-Coast path back through the woods towards Richmond. We then climb steadily back up, passing the old High Moor racecourse, to return to our starting point.

The Station, Richmond DL10 4LD| 11:00am – midday | £8 | Café/restaurant, bookstall, disabled access

North Yorkshire-based author Jessica Redland writes emotional but uplifting stories of love, friendship, family and community. Her home in Scarborough inspired the creation of the fictional seaside town of Whitsborough Bay, the stunning countryside of the Yorkshire Wolds is the backdrop for the bestselling Hedgehog Hollow series, and a brand new series - Escape to the Lakes - transports readers to the beautiful Lake District. Richmond played an important part in Jessica's writing journey because she started her debut novel while managing a specialist teddy bear shop on Finkle Street. She’ll talk about her journey to publication, the themes of her novels - twenty so far - and the joys and challenges of being an author.

Sponsored by: The Station

Richmond School & Sixth Form College DL10 7BQ | 7:30pm | £10 | Refreshments, bookstall, disabled access.

Imagine you could walk back in time though 500 million years. What would you see, smell, hear and feel in the worlds before ours?

Watch the rhythm of pterosaurs in flight, smell the sulphurous boiling lakes, notice the iridescence of a beetle's shell scuttling across your path… in sixteen chapters in sixteen locations on earth, Halliday thrillingly walks us through the landscapes of our past, to the birthplace of humanity in Kenya and the flooding of the Mediterranean; to the making of Europe and the laying down of the root systems that have become our fossil fuels today;  showing us the worlds that survived, those that didn’t make it, and offering a new appreciation of the one that we are making now. Drawing on the latest science, Halliday’s encyclopaedic knowledge enriches this story of life on earth, told with all the drama of the best fiction or poetry.

Thomas is an Associate Research Fellow at the Department of Earth Sciences of the University of Birmingham. He won the Hugh Miller Writing Competition in 2018.

Sponsored by: The Fleece Hotel