{"id":2275,"date":"2021-06-26T01:39:01","date_gmt":"2021-06-26T00:39:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/?p=2275"},"modified":"2021-06-21T18:04:53","modified_gmt":"2021-06-21T17:04:53","slug":"west-allen-valley-and-mohope-moor-northumberland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/?p=2275","title":{"rendered":"West Allen Valley and Mohope Moor, Northumberland"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\">function popwalk(walk) {var url = \"\/Walks\/amap.php?f=\"+walk; varwalkwindow=window.open(url,\"walkwin\",\"height=740,width=1230,resizable=yes,scrollbars=yes\"); if (window.focus) {walkwindow.focus()}}<\/script><br \/> First published in: The Times <a href=\"javascript:popwalk('Mohope.jpg');\" rel=\"nozoom\" title=\"Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window\">Click here to view a map for this walk in a new window<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199640237_38d4747afd_z.jpg\" title= \"51199640237 path down from Mohope Moor into West Allen Valley\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199640237_38d4747afd_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199638752_de262753ba_z.jpg\" title= \"51199638752 looking back to West Allen Valley from stony lane climbing to Mohope Moor 1\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199638752_de262753ba_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201418515_90c64e720f_z.jpg\" title= \"51201418515 looking back to West Allen Valley from stony lane climbing to Mohope Moor 2\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201418515_90c64e720f_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199639087_39f4b128bc_z.jpg\" title= \"51199639087 stony lane climbing to Mohope Moor\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199639087_39f4b128bc_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200352321_7ebfd6219e_z.jpg\" title= \"51200352321 looking back to West Allen Valley from stony lane climbing to Mohope Moor 3\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200352321_7ebfd6219e_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199639382_96bf494a5c_z.jpg\" title= \"51199639382 stony lane climbing to Mohope Moor 2\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199639382_96bf494a5c_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200352611_aa7f1a1343_z.jpg\" title= \"51200352611 stony lane climbing to Mohope Moor 3\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200352611_aa7f1a1343_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201132179_2f65fba5df_z.jpg\" title= \"51201132179 stony lane climbing to Mohope Moor 4\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201132179_2f65fba5df_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200353201_14bb30f85e_z.jpg\" title= \"51200353201 green lane into West Allen Valley\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200353201_14bb30f85e_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201133029_9c91e869b8_z.jpg\" title= \"51201133029 West Allen Valley from Mohope Moor\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201133029_9c91e869b8_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201419605_3922c41fe7_z.jpg\" title= \"51201419605 amazing lichen in the lane to West Allen Valley\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51201419605_3922c41fe7_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199640597_0134b75b30_z.jpg\" title= \"51199640597 curlew egg on Mohope Moor\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51199640597_0134b75b30_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200560663_f7faf1092d_z.jpg\" title= \"51200560663 Malakoff Bridge\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/farm66.static.flickr.com\/65535\/51200560663_f7faf1092d_s.jpg\" alt=\"picture\" \/><\/a><br \/>\nFacebook Link: <script src=\"http:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"><\/script><fb:like href=\"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/wordpress\/?p=2275\" layout=\"button_count\" show_faces=\"true\" width=\"200\" colorscheme=\"dark\"><\/fb:like><br \/>\n<a href=\"javascript:pwindow=window.open('\/Walks\/prn.php?f=2275','pwin','height=700,width=1000,resizable=yes,scrollbars=yes');\" title=\"Click for printable version\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/Walks\/print.gif\" align=\"right\"><\/a><br \/>\nA cold and brilliant Northumberland morning, the sky blue over West Allen Dale, the light as clear and sharp as glass. Fat lambs in the pastures by the Mohope Burn went bouncing around; so did the hares, jumping and lolloping in close company.<\/p>\n<p>We climbed the lane past the old lead-mining hamlet of Keirsleywell Row, its grassed-over spoil heaps as prominent as Viking burial mounds, then on up toward Mohope Moor on a broad rubbly track between stone walls. All around the land lay open under the sun, green inbye fields striped with walls and dotted with handsome pale stone farms rising to darker moor tops that rolled away out of sight.<\/p>\n<p>Sycamores flanked the lane. These trees, so often sad urban droopers full of blight and insect wounds, were properly grown out here, with limbs stretched to the full. From the sedgy fields came the calls of curlew. Their silvery trilling song, and the abrupt whistling alarm call cur-leek! cur-leek!, seem the very soul of these northern moors.<\/p>\n<p>A cold wind blew out of the southwest into our faces as we reached an old sheep dip flanked by square stone sheep passes in the lane walls. A boggy track led away south across the long upland waste of Mohope Moor, its line indicated by waymark posts among the peat and moss.<\/p>\n<p>The broken shell of a curlew egg, its olive surface scribbled with tarry streaks for camouflage, lay by the way. Nearby two large pellets, ejected by some raptor with a mixed diet, were a clotted mass of fur, feathers, small bones and fragments of marine shells.<\/p>\n<p>At the black trickling stream of Low Blackish Clough we turned back towards the West Allen Valley, tramping through rushes and down a grassy walled lane to find the homeward path along the pebbly flood meadows of the Mohope Burn.<\/p>\n<p>Beyond Malakoff Bridge flashes of silver showed along the river bank. Sand martins were flicking through the air like a shoal of eager fish, darting into and out of their nesting cavities in the overhang of the bank. Their young stood like impatient Deliveroo customers at the threshold of each hole, squeaking as they waited for the next beakful of nutritious insects to be delivered to their doorstep.<\/p>\n<p>How hard is it? 5\u00bd miles; moderate; some rough, boggy moorland walking. Take binoculars to spot waymark posts on Mohope Moor.<\/p>\n<p>Start: Ninebanks Bridge, Chapel Bank, Hexham NE47 8DB (OS ref NY 782524)<\/p>\n<p>Getting there: Ninebanks is signed off A686, Alston-Haydon Bridge. Half a mile beyond Ninebanks, fork right (\u2018Mohope\u2019); park just beyond bridge.<\/p>\n<p>Walk (OS Explorer OL 43, 31): Take road signed \u2018Mohope\u2019. In \u00be mile at left bend, keep ahead (774518, \u2018Isaac\u2019s Tea Trail, Long Cross\u2019); climb stony lane for 1 mile to stile at sheep dip (763508, \u2018Welcome to the Moor\u2019 signboard). In 100m track bends right; keep ahead here, over stile, then follow waymarked posts (yellow arrows\/YA) across moor. In \u00be mile, the sixth post (2 YAs) stands on far bank of Low Blackish Cleugh stream (759497); don\u2019t cross stream, but turn left, aiming a little left of farm on distant slope. In 300m you\u2019ll see line of posts ahead; follow to wall corner (765499); walled green lane to road at Fairplay (769506). Ahead; in 300m, sharp right (771510). In 450m on right bend, keep ahead (774507, \u2018Redheugh, Malakoff Bridge\u2019); follow waymarked path for 1 mile to Malakoff Bridge (782518); left on road to car.<\/p>\n<p>Lunch: Picnic<\/p>\n<p>Accommodation: Ninebanks Hostel, Keirsleywell Row, near Hexham NE47 8DQ (01434-345288, <a href=\"http:\/\/ninebanks.org.uk\">ninebanks.org.uk<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>Info: Hexham TIC (01670-620450); <a href=\"http:\/\/visitnorthumberland.com\">visitnorthumberland.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A cold and brilliant Northumberland morning, the sky blue over West Allen Dale, the light as clear and sharp as glass. Fat lambs in the pastures by the Mohope Burn went bouncing around; so did the hares, jumping and lolloping in close company.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2276,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-walks","category-3-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophersomerville.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}