Dunsop Bridge and Middle Knoll

A day off work yesterday, and the absence of any sign of rain for what must be the 7th day running, gave us a chance to take a trip out to Bowland and try out a walk from Dunsop Bridge. The spot always seems to be the subject to "sunday stroll" write-ups, but it's not a place we've visted before.

Our route took us from the small car park in the centre of the village, past the post office and right up the tarmacked track on the east side of the river. The route ran through fields full of sheep, so it was leads all the way and a chance to put recent heelwork training in to practice.

After half a mile or so we reached a small bridge across the river, and joined the road leading past various water treatment works to the foot of Middle Knoll. Here, we turned left and followed a footpath round the base of the Knoll and down to Whitendale. The route was boggy at times and more than once the dog found himself being dragged out of belly deep smelly black mud before being allowed to paddle in the ice cold Whitendale River in a vain effort to clean him up again.

After some lunch we followed the river back to the water treatment works and returned by the same route back to Dunsop bridge. The fact that that the dog was on the flexi-lead all the way did give us the chance to perfect his "downs" from a distance and by the time we reached the end of the road I could almost get him to drop when carrying his ball - no mean feat!

All in all, this was a nice walk albeit without any off-lead opportunities because of the many sheep and upland birds nesting. I'm sure the dog didn't begrudge the lack of total freedom and we did stop off at Spring Woods (see next post) for a good run on the way back.

Doggy rating 6/10