A loop walk from Grassington via Hebden and Yarnbury Lead Mines
- timbarber
- 3 days ago
- 4 min read

This is a great 8.5 mile walk heading off from the National Parks Centre car park in Grassington, which includes a stretch of riverside walk, a bit of industrial heritage, walking through old lead mines and some great moorland views.
I have done this walk a few times over the years, but this time I headed out with my old rugby pal McFet heading out the opposite way to the normal route.
After parking up we waalked off down the famous walled pathway known as Sedber Lane down to the River Wharfe. This old trackways was once used by residents of Grassington to walk to and from the old Linton water powered mill the other side of the river.

We followed this track down almost to Linton Falls before picking up the riverside path heading off on the left which is part of the long distance Dalesway trail.

It was a grey day, but the leaves were starting to fall and the ground on the next stretch was covered in fallen conkers. We followed the Wharfe for half a mile or so, seeing signal crayfish claws along the bank after they had fallen prey to the otters which seem to be back with a vengeance in the Wharfe.

We eventually reached the suspension bridge where the path to Burnsall crosses the river. At this point we stopped for a tea break and to watch the birdlife in the river including dippers and wagtails.

The suspension bridge crosses the river at the same point that a set of stepping stones do and was apparently built after a person called Joseph Slack drowned crossing the river. It opened in 1885, a year after Burnsall Bridge was washed away in a storm, so the bridge was a safe, yet very important way of crossing the river for locals.
At this point the track winds up the hill following Hebden Beck to the village of Hebden.
We passed a fish farm with a small weir before eventually meeting the road near the Old School Tea Room. We passed a gold post box celebrating the gold medal won by rower Andrew Tiggs Hodge in the 2012 Olympics.

Hebden was once home to a water powered textile mill employing 70 people, but sadly it was driven out of business during the industrial revolution and never converted to steam power. Lead mining success on the Moors lead to a large population rise in the 1800’s with miners moving to live in the village, but as the mines became exhausted and cheap imports came into the UK from Europe, the population of Hebden dropped by two thirds from nearly 600 to less than 200.
Eventually we met the main Grassington to Pateley Bridge Road, one of the first turnpike roads in the area which is close to the Clarendon Hotel run by the classically trained French Chef Lionel Strub.
We crossed the road, heading up a bridleway towards a settlement called Hole Bottom, where we took a fork to the right following Hebden Beck again into the lead mines.

Following the beck we travelled up past old mine buildings and adits/tunnel openings into the veins of lead. You can find more about the Lead mining in Wharfedale on the link here https://www.yorkshiredales.org.uk/things-to-do/get-outdoors/lead-mining-in-the-dales/lead-mining-in-wharfedale/





We walked through this desolate landscape heading to Yarnbury itself where evidence of some of the earlier original bell pits can be seen with the spoil around their outer lips.

The track meets the main road back in to Grassington but we crossed the road and took a path with gradually rose to High Barn an old derelict barn where we stopped for lunch.



This was the high point of the walk and we had reached a height of 1300 ft so had some stunning views.
After lunch the return to Grassington was memorable. A slow descent down off the moors on pretty obvious paths across fields of sheet and over stiles until we reached the outskirts of Grassington. The OS Map showed lots of old field systems and the location of an old Medieval settlement, but over the years evidence of these former settlements seemed to have disappeared.


We arrived at the top of Grassington at the former Mechanics Institute, now the Town Hall. It had been a good leg stretch and being a Friday and about 3pm, we decided that a couple of pints was in order. After a beer in each of the Foresters Arms and the Black Horse Hotel we walked back through the town to the main car park before heading home.

It was a great walk with a bit of everything and a good way of blowing a few cobwebs away on a Friday. I hope you like the photos, I do plan to do this walk again next year on a sunny day with blue skies as I am sure the views would be more spectacular.
If you have OS Maps – you can find the route on this link https://explore.osmaps.com/route/29181342/grassington-circular-84-miles
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