Not quite what I’d expected ***with track, voice and videos***

My route on Sunday had taken me across the watershed between the Humber catchment and the Tees catchment. My route yesterday (Monday) was to take me up the Tees, from Barnard Castle to Langdon Beck. I’d expected, naively, a comparatively easy day, essentially a straightforward riverside walk. How wrong can you be?

The path started out in Barnard Castle as the Teesside Way, but after only a few kilometres metamorphosed into the Teesdale Way. That was a warning. Even on the Teesside Way it was difficult to form the impression of walking along a riverside – there is a curtain of trees for most of the way – and once you’re on the Teesdale Way you’re decoupled from the river completely. Well, not quite, because for a couple of kilometres shortly before Middleton-in-Teesdale the Tees has a steeply cliffed left bank, along which the Teesdale Way runs. I use the word ‘along’ advisedly here, because the path runs partly at the bank top and partly at the bank bottom. Fifty metres at the top, then 30 steep stairs down to the bottom, then 25 metres there, then stairs back to the top, then repeat this eight or ten times. You get what I mean. I was glad to reach Middleton.

Time for a pot of tea and a cheese and tomato sandwich, then off to Langdon Beck along the right bank of the Tees. This was following the Pennine Way, albeit a Pennine Way that was here showing its softer side. At last I found what I’d been expecting initially – a path through fields, with the river at my side. Very pleasant, especially as later the river narrowed and crossed the sill. Families aplenty there, all out to see the waterfalls and the rapids.

After High Force there was no one. Just me and the peewits. I reached eventually the point where my LEJOG path came in from the south, from the grouse moor and Hagworm Hill. Strange to think I’d been here before and had never expected to be back.

The Tees, between Barnard Castle and Cotherstone

The Tees, between Barnard Castle and Middleton-in-Teesdale

The softer side of the Pennine Way, between Middleton-in-Teesdale and Low Force

The softer side of the Pennine Way, between Middleton-in-Teesdale and Low Force

Rapids on the Tees, below Low Force

Low Force

High Force: the limestone and the sill

Barnard Castle to Langdon Beck

A wind-affected voice recording made where my LEJOG path came in can be downloaded at:

https://app.box.com/s/etn07cmcoetcstt3rbtfvocmk3q846ft

A video taken from a viewpoint on the Teesdale Way near Cotherstone can be downloaded at:

https://app.box.com/s/jnk2c9tvyqlklcit05q3kocqxn5vv30a

Three videos of the rapids and the waterfalls on the Tees can be downloaded at:

https://app.box.com/s/r75xhly9illdb5brz49fiawp7lfqcdn2

and

https://app.box.com/s/bho25dx5tla14o9n0mj6xte3qwyz5mev

and

https://app.box.com/s/q1hy2yny9lx7pnny8ulyck23fznkuuyp

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