Want to feel better?

Spending time among the green scenery and fresh air of the Yorkshire Dales feels good, but what effect does it actually have on well-being?

​Scientific studies have shown the many positive benefits of being outdoors and enjoying nature.

If you need an excuse/reason to leave your desk or encourage your family to spend time in the Dales, here are a few to choose from! 


Researchers at the University of Essex found that after exercising outside:

• 3/4 people feel less miserable and tense
• 2/3 people are in a better mood
• 2/3 people have better self-esteem

A university of Michigan study found that people who spent time outside were more able to solve creative problems, and that the solutions were more practical. 

Stanford University researchers found that creativity improved by an average of 60% when walking.

Green spaces are good for human well-being. It's proven that you can reduce anxiety by gazing at pleasant scenery, enjoying the changing seasons and nature's small surprises. Turning to nature brings instant relief from the hustle and bustle of daily life. It helps still the mind, adds perspective and conveys a sense of wonder. 

It's been found that patients who have a nature view, such as a garden, stay in hospital for less time and require less medication. Natural sounds such as bird song have calming effects. 

Large scale surveys have found that spending time outdoors is particularly good for children: 
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• It's fun and helps children build secure and happy memories
• Doing simple things like building dens helps children problem solve and co-operate with each other. They learn to assess and understand risks, and overcome challenges
• Children can explore, and use all their senses to understand the natural world, As they see the seasons change and nature develop, they also become more comfortable with change. 
• There's a sense of freedom outdoors that can't be replicated inside, with endless opportunities for creativity, imagination and improved fitness. We tend to be less inhibited outside and more willing to join in activities. 
• When we play outside, however we do it, we become more absorbed, motivated, purposeful and positive.

For many, yellow is the colour of Spring. It's certainly the dominant colour for many of the spring flowers that start to flower at this time of year: Lesser Celandines, Aconites, Daffodils, Coltsfoot, Primroses and Dandelions are some of the most noticeable in the Dales. 

I wondered why so many Spring flowers are yellow and just discovered it's thought the colour helps the few pollinators that are around to find the sparse flowers in low light, and it also helps the plants absorb the weak sun. There's probably a more accurate, scientific explanation - that was my understanding...

I think there's something else very special about spring flowers: they're particularly good for mind, body and spirit. We all start to feel happy when we notice the first snowdrops and then the beginning of the yellows. Our spirits rise and we feel like we can slowly come out of our winter brain-fogged hibernation. Mindful walking may be seen as a modern trend but it's really what many country dwellers do naturally at this time of year, walking slowly loving the new scents, feeling the change in the air on our cheeks, and particularly noticing the different shoots, leaves and flowers all around us. 

Every Spring I make the same resolution: to make sure I notice when every new wild flower appears, to take a photo, identify and note the date and place when I saw it (a modern day version of the Edwardian Country Diary by Edith Holden). By May the flowers are appearing so thick and fast and I'm so happy to be outside I usually get behind and forget. A few years ago, my daughter and I did it the old fashioned way, carefully taking one flower and pressing it before adding it to a flower collection book. We focused on a half acre field that isn't used for anything, where wild flowers and grasses have been left to self-seed.Through that one Spring and early Summer we were amazed to collect over 40 different species of wild flower and grass from just that one field. 

Apart from the odd trendy restaurant that picks wild garlic or nettles for soup, few of us use the fauna around us, Yet when you research it, it's noticeable just how many uses there are for Spring flowers, just as everyone is surfacing from a Winter of coughs, colds and ailments. The name for Coltsfoot apparently comes from 'tussis ago' - drive away a cough - its leaves and flowers can be dried to make tea for relief from coughs and congestion. Lesser Celandine is also known as Pilewort, supposedly because its tubers resemble haemorrhoids and were therefore seen as a suitable cure. You could also use its leaves to prevent scurvy as they contain plenty of vitamin C. 

Dandelions are much maligned when they appear in the middle of the lawn but they're so much more than (very stubborn) weeds. Look up 'health benefits of dandelions' and you'll wonder why we even need the NHS. When I see the first ones in Spring, several memories flood back to me at once - blowing the seed head 'clocks' to tell the time (I was a child in a much simpler time...!), gathering the leaves to feed to my pet rabbit, occasionally eating them tentatively in a salad (they're really good so long as you don't get the ones near the dog's favourite patch of grass...).

My strongest memory took place on the 5th May. That was the date my Uncle Syd declared was always the best day of the year for gathering flowers when they were at their best to make dandelion wine. I have such lovely memories of gathering armfuls of dandelion with my family, Uncle Syd and Auntie Doris - I think of it every 5th May. I have another dandelion memory but it's not quite as strong, somewhat blurred you might say.

​It was weeks later when we all tasted the dandelion wine. My sister and I sat on Auntie Doris' sofa, dangling our skinny short legs in fallen-down socks as we slurped the wine. It was known as 'country wine' so it never seemed to occur to anyone to stop us from drinking it, and yet the blurred vision and headache afterwards was surely due to the alcohol! Cheers to the Spring yellows. 

As the sun unexpectedly shone, we joined the other visitors at Aysgarth Falls today. Some visitors glance at the falls over the bridge on the bend in the road, and some walk to see the Upper Falls from the car park. Most visitors miss out if they just gaze at the waterfalls - there's a real treasure nearby that many miss. 

It's said that Wordsworth visited Aysgarth Falls and Turner sketched the Falls. Today's visitors certainly flock there to photograph them. Most take similar views, but it's very easy to move on and see the Falls from different angles. There's one area just above the upper Falls where the River Ure is broad, calmer and easily accessible so you can easily paddle or swim in Summer (or Winter if you're Stuart Gledhill)

The three steps of the Falls are made from limestone rock sandwiched with shale. The steps were formed as water eroded the softer shale. Sometimes the limestone rock breaks and forms big steps over which the water tumbles. The Yorkshire Dales may be quite a distance from the sea now but 300 million years ago the area around Aysgarth Falls was under a tropical sea, filled with creatures. If you go into the small Yorkshire Dales National Park Centre by the car park you can learn about the fossils and even coral to be found by the Falls. 

Close by is Freeholders' Wood Millennium Trail where artist Vivien Mousdell created four carved art works - there are easy paths to wander along in the woods. They're particularly pretty in Spring when the primroses and wood anemones flower. You might want to suggest young children walk through extra quietly in case they can see the roe deer. There's also a thriving dormice population here but they're nocturnal so you're unlikely to see them. ​

We were fortunate to meet the farmer whose fields adjoin the churchyard and he very enthusiastically pointed out some of the church's features. The mural on the back wall as you enter the church is pretty impressive but there's yet more.

​The brightly coloured (make sure you switch on the light) carved wooden Rood Screen was apparently carried by 20 monks the 12 miles from Jervaulx abbey at the time of the Dissolution of the Abbeys. Look carefully and you'll see some fascinating details. Such paintings and carvings were used at a time when most of the population was illiterate, and tell a story, warning of the dangers of sin. 

This beautiful and imposing piece commands most of your attention but look to your left and you'll see an ornate reredos in pale Caen stone, with a carving of the Last Supper. The detail on this is incredible - each finger nail, fold of the table cloth, Judas' money bag.

I hope if you visit you also get to meet the Friendly Farmer (he was telling too many stories for me to ask his name), a lovely man who told of being taken by surprise by the birth of some extra lambs this week, the spot in the graveyard he and his wife have reserved, and how an auspicious thunderstorm determined the location of the new loos. He oozed contentment with life, and love for his local church. Thank you to him. ​

If you look at a map of the Yorkshire Dales, you’ll see masses of rivers and streams disappearing into the hillside, and roads that apparently lead to nowhere. Small lanes meander through the countryside, getting thinner and thinner, then just stop as if the effort of finding somewhere to go just wasn’t worth it any more.
 
I take a not-so-secret delight in turning off ‘main’ roads in favour of the smaller lanes, particularly if they’re preceded by a dead end sign. ‘Dead end’ sounds so final: I can’t help but push against the boundaries and follow to the end of the road, just to see how and why it stops. There’s usually a moment when fields give way to moors, when a decent road surface gets bumpier and bumpier. Sometimes the road just stops, sometimes it ends with an isolated farm stead, where the cows always look relieved to get some form of entertainment as you perform a 23-point-turn around.  

Dead end roads really should have a nicer name. They all have certain things in common. First, just as you’re driving along wondering when was the last time anyone ever drove down there, a farm vehicle will come out of nowhere and head in your direction. It will be bigger and uglier than your car. You'll feel slightly guilty at enjoying the whimsical freedom of wandering down dead ends with no particular aim while a farmer toils, so you’ll start to reverse without a thought as to that whiplash injury and how easy it actually is to reverse round narrow winding roads for miles on end. When you've eventually passed the tractor, you’ll realise there was a big lay-by just behind the tractor when you first saw it. 
 
Second, there will be something at the end of the road that just seems improbable in today’s modern world. It could be a working phone box. Or a small post box mounted at a jaunty angle on a falling down fence, which displays current times for pick ups and is still in use. Or it might be an incredibly beautiful fence, wall, bridge or some other structure seemingly without purpose and which barely anyone will see. I always feel it's only fair to stand and admire it for a while. 
 
Today’s dead end road ended with a flourish. A small bridge with no obvious purpose on the left, a track leading uphill to a wonderful walk, a red phone box, and a working post box, a second bridge, on the left, this time with a proper use (to get to the other side of the stream), and a solid house with an attractive garden and a dramatic, beautiful ford across the stream as part of its main access. Had I been in possession of one of those wonderful little I-Spy books we had as children, I'd have scored plenty of bonus points. 
 
It’s bizarre – none of these things are very remarkable and yet because it was a dead end, they all felt like wonderful prizes in the lottery of the end of the road.

It's been a beautiful afternoon at the end of a long tiring week so maybe I'm feeling more philosophical than usual. Perhaps the end of the road isn’t always the end of the road – sometimes there’s an extra bridge, track or cosy safe harbour where you least expect it? Or at the very least a few cows and a farmer waiting for you to entertain them. 

Have you ever seen a kingfisher?

Catching even a glimpse of their incredibly bright plumage is an up-lifting treat: it feels like such a thrill should somehow be on a prescription for anyone feeling a bit gloomy and pessimistic about life.

I've already written about the benefits of our house being flooded - one of them is that the morning after a greedy kingfisher always makes an appearance, tucking into the glut of small fish in the mill pond. 

We're lucky enough to see it quite regularly: he seems to have spates of showing up a few days running at almost exactly 11.00 am, then disappearing and changing its regular appearance just to make sure we're being observant. Every time when we see it, we feel the need to point out to anyone around 'ooh, there's the kingfisher!' If it's on a work day I'm often on the phone, so client conversations are punctuated with these words - irrelevant to them, but meaning I'm slightly distracted as I watch. I'm sure some think I'm fibbing because it's such an unreal sight. 

I haven't yet discovered where its nest is but it's presumably quite near by. They create a nest burrow in sandy soil on a vertical bank without any vegetation, making a tunnel where the eggs are laid. A while ago, dedicated wildlife artist Robert E. Fuller investigated and filmed kingfishers as they nested.

Kingfishers are flashy, their colours impossibly glamorous on a dull Dales day. If humans dressed so well in the Dales, everyone would ask where they were going. I love their lush colours but also admire their equality.

Unlike some bird species where the female looks dowdy and ground down by the daily effort of being a female, male and female kingfishers are almost identical except for their beak - the female looks a little like she's wearing lipstick. The male and female create the burrow together, and it's used two or three times in quick succession - once you've seen the work involved, you'll understand why they make full use of it! And they both share in incubating the birds. The chicks have lovely manners in the nest: they're fed in rotation and then go to the back of the nest to digest their fish, letting the other chicks move to the front of the queue. 

They're not quite so pleasant once they fledge. After kingfishers have swooped into the water for fish they perch somewhere hard and repeatedly strike the fish. Sometimes I've watched them and been quite sure the fish was dead but they always seem to give it an extra strike for good measure. They prefer to eat small fish such as sticklebacks (doesn't the very name conjure up childhood memories?) and minnows but will also help themselves to 'my' frogspawn too. Speaking of which, I've normally found some by now but not sighted it in the mill pond yet. 

I love a good farm shop. Some say they're farm shops but then just turn out to be a bit of a box room with a few sad vegetables but in the Dales we have some terrific farm shops. One of my favourites is Town End Farm shop at Airton near Malham, run by the effervescent and ever-enthusiastic Chris Wildman. 

You may have seen Town End Farm Shop on TV when it was the venue for the Top of the Shop programme with Tom Kerridge. The drive to the shop through the stunning Malhamdale countryside and mellow lanes builds anticipation, and there's a reassuringly large car park. The entrance to the cafe goes through the farm shop, which initially seems relatively small. However, it's crammed full of really interesting produce. There are vegetables, meat and dairy products from the local area, alongside practically every condiment, cooking sauce, and food treat you can think of. 

This is a genuine farm shop: Chris breeds and rear his own grass-fed lamb, traditional breed cattle and rare breed pork on his farm, and sells it in the shop. He's a fifth generation butcher and is justly proud of his Yorkshire chorizo, salami and dry-cured bacon. 

The cafe is cosy, welcoming to muddy-booted walkers and locals alike, with a fantastic range of meals and excellent cakes and coffee. Chris is truly passionate about food and makes sure everything is of good quality. Upstairs is a range of gifts and locally made items. 

Town End Farm Shop has another claim to fame - Chris claims to have the World's Largest Choice of Yorkshire Gins! And if that's not enough, you can also learn butchery skills and how to make salami with him!

At this time of year there are two trees outside my house that I start to look at more carefully than usual. One is a huge, old oak tree and the other a beautiful ash tree, and I'm watching their buds very slowly appear and start to unfurl.

An old weather-forecasting adage goes: "Oak before Ash, we're in for a splash. Ash before Oak, we're in for a soak". It's too early for me to tell you what kind of Summer we're likely to have. Anyway every year I look but then forget which way round it was! 

Looking at today's largely bare Yorkshire Dales, it's hard to imagine that woodland once covered much of the hills. There are some good woodlands left - Hackfall, Freeholders Wood in Wensleydale and on the Bolton Abbey Estate. Ash woodland is the most widespread. Before felling there were more oak trees but not so many remain.

The majestic oak I walk past several times a day with my dogs feels like a family friend - strong, reliable, kindly and smiling down on us all.

Oaks are incredibly valuable as a wildlife habitat: one single oak tree can support up to 284 species of insects - and there are hundred of different species of oak in England. 

Watching the oak tree through the seasons never fails to make me feel more optimistic and reassured - no matter how bad life might be, the oak tree keeps growing and creating new life. It's resilient and uncomplaining, always there. I don't quite know why I feel the need to describe its personality but I'd say if it had a voice, it would be deep and always reasonable, offering good advice (only when asked), always ready to comfort and with a dry wit. 

The ash tree feels a bit more fanciful, it's upper branches slightly less substantial and ready with a flamboyant flourish when it's time for its keys to grow and wave in the breeze. A bit, 'hello, I'm here. Look at me!'

We really need trees in our lives. We need them because they're up-lifting and beautiful. We need them because they help combat climate change by removing excess CO2 from the atmosphere. We need them because they help stop soil erosion and reduce flooding. There's an easy way to help plant trees in the Yorkshire Dales, and name them after loved ones if you wish - Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust have so far planted around £1.4 million trees in the Dales. Take a look at their website to see how you can plant a tree as a gift or in memory of some-one, or just because you want to talk to a tree. 

Did you know there are over 40 Richmonds in the world? Of course the original, and best Richmond is in Swaledale, North Yorkshire! 

Richmond Castle is very much at the centre of the town by the river Swale. You can enjoy a beautiful walk around the Castle walls, but it's really worth going inside to discover more about the history of the castle and to enjoy wonderful sweeping views over the Yorkshire Dales from the castle keep. The Castle is now managed by English Heritage. 

Richmond Castle was built around 1071 after the Norman Conquest in 1066 - the earliest parts of the castle are the long curtain wall and great archway in the keep. It's said that Richmond Castle is the best preserved castle of this scale and age in England.

​For some time in the 19th century, it was an army barracks presided over by the Duke of Richmond. The Castle became the Northern headquarters of the Territorial Army in 1908. During the First World War sixteen conscientious objectors were held in the castle, kept in cells in what used to be the reserve amoury by the castle gate. Look inside the small cells and you'll see their really touching graffiti on the walls.

Outside the Cockpit Garden is a lovely picnic spot. When viewed from above you can really appreciate its formal layout. It was created in 2000 by Neil Swanson who wanted to create a garden that also reflected the castle's turbulent history. 

Once you've walked around the inside of the Castle, take some time to wander around the outside walls, to wander by the Swale and enjoy Richmond's cobbled streets. Every time I do, I'm surprised Richmond isn't busier - there are so many lovely streets and beautiful buildings to discover.

If you're looking for somewhere to stay, I recommend Cordilleras House B&B or Holiday at Homes' excellent range of self-catering properties and lodges. 

Is it possible to cross the 60 Bolton Abbey stepping stones across the River Wharfe without smiling and then cheering as you arrive dry-footed at the other side? Those who choose the less risky route on the nearby foot bridge can't help but look down and smile at the stepping stone crossers, usually with a wry 'they're mad' shake of the head.

The stones were once an essential crossing point for workers at the nearby Priory, which is at the heart of the Bolton Abbey Estate (and often referred to as the Abbey). 

Established in the 12th century, the Priory community grew and prospered, attracting wealthy patrons, enabling investment in local farms and mills which in turn funded the development of the Priory. The Priory was added to over the centuries, and even had to be temporarily abandoned in the early 14th century when Scottish raiders threatened, and some damage was done to the priory. Restoration and building work were still underway until 1539 when King Henry VIII seized the assets of monasteries across the land.  

The Priory was luckier than monasteries in other areas. It was the only church in the area - the nave survived and has continued its use as a parish church. More building work took place during Victorian times including installation of stained glass windows designed by Pugin. 

The church was almost closed due to financial difficulties and a declining congregation in the 1970s but a forward-thinking new priest managed to reverse its fortunes, and a major restoration took place in the 1980s, securing the building for the future. 

The Priory's setting in a bend of the River Wharfe is idyllic, and the ruins are extensive enough for visitors to easily be able to imagine the grandeur of the former building. Ruskin, Turner and Wordsworth were all  inspired by the beauty of the Abbey and surrounding landscape. It continues to inspire modern-day artists, writers and photographers. A very blurred photo was even used on the cover of The Cure's Faith album!