Cat Hole Cottages

16/12/2024

Nettlebed is still available for New Year. Unrivalled views, sleeps 6, cosy with open fire, dogs welcome, big garden. Book online at Classic Cottages (note, better photos on Classic!).

15/11/2024

So up on Classic Cottages, alongside The Haven, are now Nettlebed and The Old Stable. Looking great!

29/10/2024

It is with mixed emotions I announce my retirement and the sale of Cat Hole Cottages to Classic Cottages. I (and husband Martin) set up Cat Hole in 2008 and while the journey has sometimes been tough, the vast majority of the time, I was really appreciative of the lovely guests who have stayed in the various cottages over the years. I especially loved the guests who took the time to email me after a stay to say how much they had enjoyed their holiday, it's really great to get that type of communication, it has made it all worthwhile. I'll still be working for Classic for three months, liaising re the handover, so it's not as if I'll just fall off the edge, but I expect to gradually wind down, and find more time to visit grandchildren. Fyi, I'm expecting these cottages to be with Classic going forwards, although it's not set in stone as yet: The Haven, Fell View, Low Shaw Farmhouse, Joe House, Nettlebed, The Old Stable and Low Rigg, so if those are your favourite cottages, you can find them with Classic. Those regular guests (you know who you are), I've loved talking with you over the years and thank-you for your loyalty and friendship. Thanks also to lovely owners. I'm so lucky to be living in such a lovely part of the world, and having been able to share it with others and never forget, while the Yorkshire Dales is a grand part of the uk, it's Swaledale that's the most beautiful! Thank-you, Judith Dower

11/08/2024

Maggie Farmer, my sister!

25/07/2024

Yes, I've often wondered why this field is shaped like this. It's just outside Satron, towards Gunnerside.

Does this win the prize for seemingly most random dry stone wall? The walls are one of the Yorkshire Dales' most distinctive features, and are some of the oldest man-made landscape features. It's believed there are over 5000 miles (8000 km) of dry stone walls in the Yorkshire Dales. Not all of them are in tip-top condition but most are well maintained.

One of the first questions any visitor asks is "why are they there"? The very first dry stones walls were probably created centuries ago when early farmers were clearing the land for cultivation. Some walls are really thicker than might seem necessary, just because they were built in very stony areas. Most walls are built to mark field boundaries or mark land ownership, and limit movement by sheep and cows.

Tom Lord of Lower Winskill Farm, Langcliffe has over seven miles of dry-stone walls on his farm, some of which date back to the 13th century and are believed to have been built to deter wolves! When on a tour of his farm farm in Wensleydale, Adrian Thornton-Berry showed me some very straight walls rising up the hill near Swinithwaite and said they were built around 200 years ago by French prisoners of war taken from Napoleaon's army. Nearby are some large block foundations to a wall that dates back to the times of the Knights Templar. There's plenty of hidden history in those miles and miles of walls!

If you see very large stones being used as the base of the wall, that's often an indication of a wall that may date back to medieval times. Straight walls and fields that seem more uniform may date back from the Enclose period of the late 18th and early 19th century.

Dry stone walls are 'dry' because they are made without mortar, simply relying on their complex structure to stay up. They take time to build. Whenever I write about this, there's an argument about how long. Some say 6 metres of wall a day, others 8. A good dry stone waller never picks up a piece of stone twice but is able to look at a pile of walling stone and pick up the right size and shape of stone every time. A well built wall should easily last for more than 100 years, with minimal maintenance.

The foundation course usually consists of larger stones, upon which two wall faces are built, forming a cavity which is filled will smaller stones. Walls are finished or capped with large stones laid at an angle or on edge. Through stones bind the two wall faces together. If you look at walls in different parts of the Dales, you'll notice small differences in their construction. If you compare the Dales dry stone walls to those in Devon and Cornwall and you'll notice a very different style.

You can see demonstrations of dry stone walling at agricultural shows through out the Dales during the Summer months, and learn more about thurles, batter and smoots, cripple holes, sheep creeps & throughs.

12/07/2024

𝐏𝐮𝐛 𝐓𝐞𝐧𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐖𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐝

The Muker Community Benefit Society are pleased to be in a position to advertise for a tenant for when the Society complete the purchase of the Farmers Arms. Enquiries should be e-mailed to [email protected] and not to the pub address. Thanks and please share.

08/07/2024

27/06/2024

Ever tried to unlock the 'code' of different place names in the Yorkshire Dales, or worked out why we say 'Massam' not "mash-em'? With thousands of years of history and Roman, Celts, Saxon, Viking, Norman and other settlers, it’s no surprise that place names give us an insight into how they've evolved.

I still remember my history teacher, Mr. Milner telling me this over forty years ago, and thinking he'd just given us the key to a secret code! You don't need to know that many words to get a good handle on who lived here before us and why.

First came the Brigantes, a Celtic tribe. Some of the names from this time remain, sounding a bit Welsh perhaps.

An example is anywhere with pen in the name, meaning ‘hill’. For example, Penhill, (so good they named it twice?!) and Pen-y-ghent.

Anglo Saxon was the next influence. Look out for names ending in ham or ton (eventually leading to town) which meant a farmstead. The name before –ton or –ham was often either the name of a person who owned that land, geographic feature or a trade carried on there.

Masham was the farmstead owned by the Saxon chief, Massa so it was Massa’s ham. This is why it’s pronounced Mass-ham not Mash-em! Skipton originally meant sheep farm! It’s hard to imagine that once woods and forests covered much of the Dales. Ley meant ‘clearing in the woods’ e.g. Wensley.

The Vikings contributed to our language in a really significant way. They gave us suffixes like thwaite meaning ‘clearing’, keld meaning ‘spring’, foss or force for ‘waterfall’, and gill or ghyll meaning ‘ravine’.

Many landscape features still use names from the time of the Danelaw:
Beck – stream
Cam – bank or ridge
Carr – wetland
Fell - mountain
Garth – enclosed grass paddock by a farmstead
Ling – heather
Mire – a pool e.g Redmire would have been a reed pool
Moss – boggy land
Nab – outcrop
Scar – steep rock face
Sett or seat – upland fields, often summer pastures
Syke – gully
Tarn – upland lake
Thorpe - settlement
Whin – thorny bushes

You may have noticed some more fanciful French-sounding names like Jervaulx which came from the Norman. Richmond was originally a strong hill, Richemont, which makes sense when you see the castle!

In the Dales we’re used to the importance of rivers in naming places – most dales are named after their river e.g. Wharfedale, Ribblesdale. A valley is called a dale, although in some areas you might see words like dean instead, and the valley bottom was called… bottom! Lots of place names end in ford, as in a shallow river crossing. Kirk was the Scandinavian word for church. Kirkby would have meant church by…

​Maybe now when you look at the map or drive around the Dales, you'll also see it through the eyes of those ancient settlers. They're long gone, but the names remain.

20/06/2024

Scroll down t 4 September, Muker Show!

What do you have planned for the next couple of months? There are so many events happening all over the Yorkshire Dales, you might need to plan some extra trips? Here's a selection of them. Please do add any others - or tag the events you've involved in or enjoy going to:
Skipton Sheep Day: 30th June
Great Yorkshire Show: 9th – 12th July
Settle Flowerpot Festival: 13 July - 1 September
Masham Steam Rally: 20 & 21 July
Ingleton Gala: 20th July
Ripley Show: 11th August
Art in the Pen: 17-18 August
Kettlewell Scarecrow Festival: 10 – 18 August
Gargrave Show: 17th August
Burnsall Sports: 24th August
Malham Show: 24 August
Wensleydale Agricultural Show: 24 August
Reeth Show: 26 August
Hebden Sports: 26th August
Kilnsey Show: 27 August
Muker Show: 4 September
Medieval Music in the Dales: 13 – 15 September
Bentham Agricultural Show: 7 September
Horton in Ribblesdale Show: 7th September
Nidderdale Show: 22 September
Grassington 1940s Weekend: 20 -22 September
Richmond Walking & Book Festival: 20 - 29 September
Yarndale: 28 – 29 September
Masham Sheep Fair: 28 - 29 September
Yorkshire Dales Cheese Festival, Celebrating Local Produce: 11 to 14 October

Which events have I missed? What are your favourite events? Any photos to share?
Image by Stephen Garnett Photography.

15/06/2024