Walks: Middleton One Row (From Living Northeast)

Walks: Middleton One Row

12:02pm Tuesday 20th October 2009

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A few miles west of Yarm is the village of Middleton One Row, starting point for a walk along the river with Charlie Emmett.

FROM the Devonport Hotel, cross the road and follow the path which descends diagonally to the River Tees. Continue upstream, crossing a bridge with a single handrail to join Pountey’s Lane. Continue past a car park on your right to Dinsdale Spa. Pass the spa, keeping on the clear woodland path. Cross two brick bridges and descend to the edge of the wood. Continue across the field ahead aiming for a clearly seen electricity pole and Low Dinsdale.

Leave the field through a kissing gate on to a minor road. A detour left along the road, which leads to Over Dinsdale Hall, will be rewarded with good views of the River Tees.

Those not making the detour should turn right along the road past Dinsdale Manor on the right. The house is called Siward because in Norman times the Siward family settled there. Being French and living beside the Tees, they called themselves Sur Tees, and Surtees is a well known family name in County Durham today.

A row of chestnut trees enhances Siward, while Manor Farm opposite owes much of its charm to some stone water troughs and a strangely weather-beaten garden wall.

Turn right at a footpath sign under an ash tree and follow a clear path that edges and goes above the woods you have just come through. From here Dinsdale School and Middleton One Row can be seen and, on clear days, the North York Moors and the Cleveland Hills are visible.

The walk now goes between the greens of a golf course to reach a surfaced road. Turn right, passing between the buildings of Dinsdale Park, a special residential school run by the county council. Avoid the gardens of Bath Villa and regain the outward route to Dinsdale Spa. Turn left briefly and left again along Pountey’s Lane. Turn right along Church Lane, going past St Laurence’s Church with its Saxon sundial, to return to Middleton One Row.

POINTS OF INTEREST

Pountey’s Lane: The name comes from the Roman Pons Tesie. The site of Pountey’s Bridge is just below the car park. A mound on Tower Hill, to the right of the line of the walk as the small bridge is crossed, may have been built to defend the bridge. In 1789, men looking for coal sources along the banks of the River Tees broke through a layer of rock and released a stream of sulphurous water. At that time mineral springs were thought to be a cure for all ailments.

Although never as fashionable as Buxton or Bath, Dinsdale Spa was thought by the Darlington Railway Company to have potential and they built Dinsdale Station to accommodate the anticipated passenger traffic.

Middleton One Row and Low Dinsdale

Distance: 4¼ miles (7km)

Map: OS Landranger 93 : Pathfinder NZ 21/31

Terrain: Plenty of woodland and riverside walking

Start: The Devonport Hotel, Middleton One Row.

Refreshments: The Devonport Hotel, Middleton One Row

Tel: 01325-332255

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