Yorkshire Dales
Yorkshire folk tend to think they're pretty blessed in the first place – God's own country and all that – but with the sternly sublime Yorkshire Dales you begin to suspect they may have a point. It's the north of England's go-to destination for weekend breaks, whether it's for the region's rustic pubs with rooms or country inns serving great food, its fabulous boutique hotels set among rolling fields or in old stone villages, or the charming B&Bs you'll find all over. And with the towns and cities of West Yorkshire on the doorstep, and even Manchester only 50 miles away, it's an easy visit for a fair chunk of the UK's urban population. If you've not been before, think "outdoors with attitude" – this is definitely not your affectedly trendy Range-Rover-and-wax-jacket countryside of the south, but rather a traditional farming landscape of drystone walls, green lanes, cobbled tracks and ancient fields grazed by sheep and cattle. The "dales" themselves are the region's characteristic valleys, some very well-known (like Wensleydale, home of the cheese), some obscure, all wonderfully attractive and packed with interest, from caverns, streams and waterfalls to limestone crags, high moorland and vast open fells with nary another soul or building to be seen. Photogenic it certainly is – you'll have seen the best parts of the Dales in Calendar Girls, Harry Potter, Wuthering Heights and many other films – while it's the only truly wild region of England that you can access directly by a regular scheduled train service, namely the incomparable Settle–Carlisle Railway. What are you waiting for? Go and see what all Yorkshire already knows – the Dales are simply grand.
The word "dale" comes from the Viking word for "valley", with most of the dales themselves (half a dozen main ones, and around 40 in total) named after their rivers (Wharfedale, Ribblesdale etc). People have lived here for thousands of years, while the main villages and the pastoral landscape have been established since early medieval times – today, there are around 20,000 permanent inhabitants and up to eight million visitors a year. It's been a national park since 1954, covering around 680 square miles of Pennine upland countryside, which mostly falls in North Yorkshire, though some western parts (to the chagrin of many locals) are technically in Cumbria, next county along. All that's by the by to most visitors though, as is the fact that some of the nicest parts of the Dales aren't in the national park at all – like bucolic Nidderdale to the east and the region's most historic town, Richmond, to the north.

The Yorkshire Dales
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Fawcett Mill
Gaisgill, Orton, Near Penrith, Cumbria, CA10 3UB.
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YHA Grinton Lodge
Grinton Swaledale North Yorkshire DL11 6HS
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Stow House
Aysgarth Leyburn North Yorkshire DL8 3SR
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Low Mill Guest House
Bainbridge Leyburn North Yorkshire DL8 3EF
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YHA Malham
Malham North Yorkshire BD23 4DB
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YHA Hawes
Lancaster Terrace Hawes DL8 3LQ
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Rowan Lodge
Hudswell Lane Richmond North Yorkshire DL11 6BD
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Millgate House
3 Millgate Richmond North Yorkshire DL10 4JN
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The Angel Inn at Hetton
Hetton Near Skipton North Yorkshire BD23 6LT
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The Angel Inn at Hetton
Hetton Near Skipton North Yorkshire BD23 6LT
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Malham Cove
Malham North Yorkshire
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Aysgarth Falls
Aysgarth North Yorkshire DL8 3TH
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Devonshire Arms
Bolton Abbey Skipton North Yorkshire BD23 6AJ
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Reeth Bakery
5 Silver Street Reeth North Yorkshire DL11 6SP
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Bolton Abbey
Bolton Abbey North Yorkshire BD23 6EX
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Dalesbridge
Austwick near Settle North Yorkshire LA2 8AZ
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Cavendish Pavilion
Bolton Abbey BD23 6AN
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Millgate House Garden
3 Millgate Richmond North Yorkshire DL10 4JN
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Tudor House
Bell Busk Malham North Yorkshire BD23 4DT
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The Black Swan
Ravenstonedale Kirkby Stephen Cumbria CA17 4NG
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Bolton Castle
Bolton Castle near Leyburn North Yorkshire DL8 4ET
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Devonshire Fell
Burnsall North Yorkshire BD23 6BT
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Queen's Arms
Litton BD23 5QJ
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Reeth
Reeth North Yorkshire
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Ribblehead Viaduct
Ribblehead Ribblesdale North Yorkshire
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The Barefoot Shepherdess
Shacklabank Farm Firbank Sedburgh Cumbria LA10 5EL
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Brimham Rocks
Brimham Rocks Road off B6265 North Yorkshire HG3 4DW
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Dales Countryside Museum
Station Yard Hawes North Yorkshire DL8 3NT
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Emporio Italia
3a Mill Bridge Skipton North Yorkshire BD23 1NJ
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Malham
Malhamdale North Yorkshire BD23 4DA
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The Narrow Boat
36–38 Victoria Street Skipton North Yorkshire BD23 1JE
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Queen's Arms
Litton North Yorkshire BD23 5QJ