At the weekend we took a walk from Garrigill in the North Pennines to the nearby waterfall of Ashgill Force. We bought an Alston Moor walk leaflet in the outdoors shop in Alston for 60p.
The route begins at Garrigill’s Village Green, we parked near the village church. Garrigill looks to be a lovely little village , whose pub and shop have seen better days.
The leaflet says that there were once two pubs in Garrigill. The George & Dragon was the haunt of visiting gentry, Tories and shooting parties, whilst the Fox was for miners, poachers and Liberals!
The weather went a bit wild and after navigating about a million steep stiles we came across the waterfall. Unfortunately we had managed to deviate from our maps directions somehow, but we got there in the end.
It is apparently possible to walk behind the waterfall, and indeed ‘ Dance with the Fairies’ , although it looked a bit busy with Gill Scramblers the day we visited.
Hugo was joined in the gorge by another Black Labrador boy, which would be lovely if Hugo actually liked other boy labradors. Fortunately Hugo was more interested in the stones Wil were throwing in the water, than fighting. Phew!
The rest of the walk was more of a gentle meander, following the River South Tyne back to Garrigill.
I really enjoyed this scenic 5 mile walk and hopefully we will try it out again, maybe when the meadows are full of wildflowers come early Summer. 🙂
sunshine and celandines 
Nice photo of the kestrel and the fan of its tail
Thank you. 🙂 I also saw a Hobby in flight. They are shaped like very large swifts in flight, but I couldn’t get a photo unfortunately.
Lovely Sharon & very meaningful to me as a couple of my ancestors came from Alston(where you bought your brochure) & Kirkhaugh which is in that area too. I love the bridge above the waterfall & glad you found it and enjoyed. The birds, old buildings & scenery are all gorgeous. I do hope you walk it again in wildflower season so I can see it too. Thanks, take care, stay safe & huggles.
Thanks Susan, glad you liked the walk. I Loved the scenery too. I would have liked to go behind the waterfall but it was too busy. X
Looks like a nice walk, i can imagine it will be quite pretty in late spring/early summer 🙂
Apparently there are quite rare flowers that grow in the fields there. 🙂 X
I’ll have to show this to my OH, we’ve not walked here and I think we should! thanks for sharing x
Your welcome! X
Glorious pictures – we are looking forward to getting back up there.
It’s a splendid area, from what I’ve seen.
This looks gorgeous. My kind of walk!
Mine too. 🙂
Looks like a lovely walk, hope you have the chance to dance with the fairies behind the waterfall next time, and the photo of the kestrel is amazing. 😁 X
Hopefully! And thank you, was a bit of a lucky shot. X
Amazing photos! What a lovely walk. I have not walked up in that area, it is a long drive from home for us so we don’t go that often.
It is about 20 minutes from the caravan for us over Hart side fell, so definitely local. 🙂
What a lovely walk!! A buzzard?!? Is that the same as a vulture? We have vultures here. They used to nest in caves in riverbanks and were on the decline due to habitat loss till they discovered old abandoned farm buildings. Now population is soaring due to nesting in old attics!! Nature’s clean up crew. 😊
No buzzards are not vultures. We don’t have native vultures here. They are some impressive bird. And I love that they are known as ‘Natures Clean Up Crew’. Buzzards are definitely a success story here. They have become increasingly common here, if you see a big bird of prey soaring, it is most probably a buzzard. X
What a lovely walk. Thanks for sharing your beautiful photos xx
Thanks Christine. X
Gorgeous photos! I can’t imagine Hugo fighting! 😁
Thank you. Unfortunately he can be a baddie. He’s totally fine with smaller dogs but dislikes boy dogs his size or bigger. Typical eh!
The waterfall is so beautiful!
It was a nice one. X