Huttons Ambo

11:18am Saturday 3rd May 2008

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HUTTONS Ambo is of two parts, Low Hutton and High Hutton, and ambo is Latin for both. It has three bridges and the blue York to Scarborough train rumbled over one of red brick then another of black iron as we pulled on our boots.

The third is for pedestrians and it's an 1885 gem, a suspension from green wires stretching the 100 feet over the River Derwent. Feel it sway as you tread its wooden boards from the North Riding to the East. The kids will love it.

The Derwent was brown, Menethorpe Beck rippled clear, and this we followed on a path through a Countryside Stewardship Site yellow with celandine, dandelion and the last of the daffodils.

For the first walk this year we felt the charm of spring, and a kestrel hovered for its share. The Wolds make a horizon, gentle and barely above mid-distance trees.

Near Menethorpe Hall is a splendid black Dutch Barn. This is arable country, fields flat and fast for the hare, shaped as a very shallow valley. The soil is light tan and, if you squeeze and roll a bit between the fingers, there's the roughness of sand and the stickiness of clay.

The crops were well advanced, obscuring footpath lines, routes devoid of waymarks, but no problem, just a modification here and there is required to follow the field margins.

But watch out, brace yourself hereabouts because on the line of the public footpath, at one end of a length of freestanding hedge, we passed within a yard or two of a bird-scarer, one of those powered by a gas cylinder. On the end of its long barrel one read the words Warning Keep Clear'. Naughty.

At Manor Farm the new sheds are pale. This is another good looking spot, the old and new, neat stacks of big bales and a small stack of small bales with a sign reading Danger Bale Stack' that didn't bother the dozing cat.

Here there are horses, a menage which is one of those squares for drilling and dressage, and a cross-country course that the walk crosses.

The next farm has a modern shed coloured grass green. Horsechest-nuts had candles grown an inch so far and a deer bounced into a rhododendron wood.

Carthagena is the last farm. Carthagena in Spain is fortified and has an arsenal. The Yorkshire namesake was defended by another bird-scarer near the footpath. You'll really know about it if one of these goes off when you stroll by oblivious.

We survived and re-entered the valley we walked to start with, a parallel route, the blackthorn flowering white on its leaf bare branches, the hawthorn green and yet to flower. It had been peaceful and pleasant.

Fact file

Distance: Four-and-a-half miles.

General location: Near Malton.

Start: Low Hutton in Huttons Ambo.

Right of way: Public and permissive. The permissive access ends September 1, 2011, but the walk is doable without.

Map: Drawn from OS Explorer 300 Howardian Hills and Malton.

Dogs: Legal.

Date walked: April 2008.

Road route: From the A64, signed.

Car parking: Roadside in village or small parking area near footbridge down Derwent Avenue.

Lavatories: None.

Refreshments: None.

Tourist and public transport information: Malton TIC 01653 600048.

Terrain: Low and flat.

Points of interest: The suspension bridge is Grade 2 Listed.

Difficulty: Quite easy.

Please observe the Country Code and park sensibly. While every effort is made to provide accurate information, walkers set out at their own risk.

Directions

When in doubt look at the map. Check your position at each point.

Keep straight on unless otherwise directed.

1. Down Derwent Avenue to footbridge over River Derwent, snickelgate and stile into field. Stile and fieldgate and right to road, 50 yards, left to road for 50 yards then track (sign).

2. Cattlegrid near farmhouse and grass path across field, rejoin track at red fieldgate, pass house, fieldedge path to right of hedge.

3. From this point we had to leave the right of way to avoid crops. Right at end of field, ten yards, left to fieldedge path so hedge to your left. Cross grassy track, keep by hedge.

4. Where hedge ends, right for 100 yards then left to rejoin public right of way along a strip of hedge 100 yards long keeping hedge to right, cross field. Fieldgate (sign).

5. Left to road, 200 yards, fieldgate on right (sign), grassy track by fence, pass farm, join track out. Cross road, 50 yards across hard standing, fieldgate to track (waymark), 100 yards to left-hand fieldgate (waymark), fieldgate (waymark).

6. Fieldgate into grounds (waymark), cross grass, left to drive and pass bungalow.

7. Left to road, 200 yards, path on right by ditch (fingerpost). Through hedge gap at field end and fieldedge path with hedge to right.

8. Fieldgate by pylon and left to track (waymark), gateway, keep by hedge on your left until it turns a corner then diagonally left downhill to field corner, right within field to grassy track.

9. Fieldgate by pylon and end of shelter belt (waymark). Fieldgate and left to road. On right-hand bend, path on right (fingerpost Centenary Way).

Map of the walk>>