The Cleveland Way offers walkers plenty of interest, on and off-track, writes Mark Hennessy
STANDING ON the Sutton Bank in North Yorkshire in the middle of an afternoon-long thunderstorm, amidst a howling gale, one could be forgiven for thinking that one should have gone to a Spanish beach for rest and relaxation.
Shortly afterwards, however, the rain clears, leaving only sumptuous views of the purple heath; the occasional sign of grouse and the lands below; all that and the prospect of a hot bath within hours to ease away the pains of a day on the moors.
Starting in Helmsley, the Cleveland Way runs 110 miles from there in a clockwise, horseshoe direction to Filey on the north England coast, passing through Staithes, the town where James Cook spent some of his young adulthood; onto Whitby and Scarborough, before ending in Filey.
Opened in 1969, the Cleveland was the second of the UK’s National Trails to be brought into life, and offers hikers the opportunity to connect with a number of other walks opened since: the Ebor; the White Rose Topping and the famous Coast-to-Coast.
From Ireland, Helmsley requires a flight to Leeds/Bradford; a bus to York and another to this quaint, beautifully laid out village on the southern edge of the Yorkshire Moors – still with a weekly market in its main square among echoes of the past.
For many Cleveland hikers, the village is nothing more than a starting point, but it merits examination, particularly the local church, where bell-ringers practice on summer evenings and visitors can read a letter written to a local by explorer David Livingston.
Helmsley Castle lies just off the market square. Built in the 12th century, it was once known as Furstan Castle and its defenders were brought to their knees during the English Civil War by Oliver Cromwell.
Following a relaxing night and superb breakfast in the Carleton Lodge, the journey begins next morning with 22 miles ahead to Osmotherley – longer if one takes a tour to visit the museum in Thirsk that was once the home of vet Alf Witby, creator of the Darrowby vet, James Herriot ( All creatures great and small).
Indeed, the off-route distractions are numerous: Rievaulx Abbey, once one of England’s wealthiest monasteries before its dissolution by Henry VIII after more than 400 years of life, lies a mile off-route.
Within minutes of leaving Helmsley, the sound of modern-day life disappears, only to make occasional reappearances until one reaches the coast at Saltburn. Instead, despite its popularity, the Cleveland leaves walkers to their own thoughts.
By evening, Osmotherley – a village mentioned in the Domesday Bookand one that bears its Catholic past proudly, even down to calling its hotel Catherine of Aragon – is reached with limbs sore and tender, though dinner in the superb Three Tuns restores the spirits.
FROM THERE, the Cleveland heads for more than 20 miles onto the windswept Clay Bank and the village of Kildale and Percy Rigg Farm, more than a mile off-route but worth it, if only for a night under the roof of its beautiful, 200-year-old farmhouse.
The following morning, the way ahead through farmland and deer-filled forest takes us onto Roseberry Topping, which is compared by locals to the Matterhorn in Switzerland, passing Great Ayton – another place linked to James Cook – on the way. Following his death, an obelisk was erected on Easby Moor, and its inscription reads: “Erected to the memory of the celebrated circumnavigator, Captain James Cook, FRS, a man in nautical skill scarcely inferior to any, and in zeal, prudence, and indefatigable exertion superior to most.”
Leaving Cook to the past, the Cleveland heads on to Saltburn-by-the-Sea, although, unfortunately, it first passes through Skelton. The walker first realises Skelton lies ahead from the litter that begins to appear from two miles out, and continues for a similar distance on the other side once the walker has made his or her way through its ill-planned streets.
However, Saltburn, cleansed by the winds off the North Sea, recovers the spirits. Brought into life by Victorian entrepreneur Henry Pease in 1861, it was built to fulfil his vision of Jerusalem in the Book of Revelations.
The so-called “jewel streets” on the seafront – named Coral, Garnet, Ruby, Emerald, Pearl, Diamond and Amber streets – are adorned by what was once one of the world’s earliest railway hotels: the Zetland, complete with its private platform.
A short trip brings one to Staithes (pronounced Stairs); an historic fishing town of narrow streets and rises; the home for a period of James Cook before he began his seagoing adventures; and a place where the 1700s ooze from the very bricks. The locals are known as “ringers” – for reasons unclear – but the village also boasts an extraordinary population of seabirds nesting in the overlooking cliffs. Sleep can sometimes be at a premium because of them.
By now, one has well turned southeast, walking just yards from what are often sheer cliff-faces heading for Whitby – famed for its abbey and for being Dracula’s landing point in the UK in Bram Stoker’s imagination. During the summer, Whitby hosts the UK’s biggest folk festival and, while it is on, accommodation is at a premium and walking though the old town’s narrow streets can take an age.
Nightfall, however, brings one to Robin Hood’s Bay, with its narrow, sharply-inclined streets. Once it was inhabited by smugglers, who were protected by the marshy grounds that surround the village on three sides, but never by Robin Hood.
In the early 1800s, the authorities complained that the village was a “general rendez-vous for large smuggling vessels which are given every facility by almost all the lower class of people and a large proportion of the higher ranks of society”.
Already, the Cleveland has become busier as people join it for short stretches en route to Ravenscar and Scarborough, though idylls of peace dot the route. And then there is Scarborough, a town blessed surely with one of the most beautiful sitings in Europe but, alas, it is unfortunate what has happened since.
The seafront is a collection of arcades, populated by the foul-mouthed, each blaring music to the four winds, with food other than fish and chips hard to come by. It is a town to pass through and quickly.
By now, the walker has more than 100 miles covered, and most dally on the cliffs taking in the sight of trawlers and ferries making their way slowly northwards as the end in Filey looms.
The Cleveland Way is magnificent throughout for two-thirds of its route, up to reaching the sea, where it merely manages to be magnificent in frequent parts. But it is enough, so much more than enough, to justify travelling its length, in any kind of weather.
The Cleveland Way
STARTHelmsley
FINISHFiley
DISTANCE110 miles
STAYCarlton Lodge, Bondsgate, Helmsley, 0044-1439-770557, carlton-lodge.com.
Vane House, North End, Osmotherley, vanehouse.co.uk, 0044-1609-883448.
EATBlack Swan, Market Square, Helmsley, blackswan-helmsley.co.uk, 0044-01439-770466.
The Three Tuns: South End, Osmotherley, threetunsrestaurant.co.uk, 0044-1609- 883301.