THIS walk explores the Rusland valley, a quiet area of gentle rolling fells, moorland, woodland, fields and wetlands, with farms, hamlets and small villages. It then ascends to Rusland Heights using little trodden paths to see the seldom visited Boretree Tarn. As in some of my other walks, we are again in Arthur Ransome country, this time near his last home and final resting point in Rusland churchyard.

Start at the information board to Border Moss Wood (grid reference SD 3471 8664), 1.8 miles from the A590 near Haverthwaite. To drive there, leave the A590 onto the road signed Bouth 1.5 miles, turn right at the junction signed Finsthwaite and keep left towards Grizedale. Border Moss Wood is where the meadow on your left ends. Note that there is only space to park one or two cars.

Information

Distance: 8.5 miles (plus and optional extra of one mile).

Total Ascent: 1,000 feet

Time: 4.5 hours

Terrain: Footpaths and quiet roads.

Map: OS Explorer OL7

Route

1 From the entrance to Border Moss Wood follow the path through the woods to Rusland Pool which you cross by the footbridge 100 yards on the left. Recent construction of boardwalks has made exploring the area much more enjoyable. After crossing the bridge go to the right uphill to Crook Farm then along the quiet tarmacked lane.

2 At the end of the lane turn right then left and left again into Bouth. Before what is now the A590 opened in 1829 this quiet village was on the Ireleth to Kendal turnpike road. The turnpike was the only good dry road north of the River Leven Estuary. After the ‘new’ road was built, Bouth became a sleepy backwater until 1860 when the Dickson family opened a gunpowder works at Black Beck, employing 70 people and providing work for the next 68 years. Black Beck suffered 10 fatal accidents in which 33 workers lost their lives before the works closed in 1928. The site is now Black Beck Caravan Park. After the gunpowder works closed, employment was found in woodland industries such as swill and beesom making, coppicing and farm labouring, and the nearby Bobbin mills at Spark Bridge and Stott Park (now a working museum) and the Blue mills and Ironworks at Backbarrow. Some of the tools and implements from these industries can be seen in the 17th Century White Hart. The village once had two other pubs: the Commercial and the Stock Bird Head.

While in Bouth you may like to visit Old Hall Farm (south of the village), but check they are open before you set off. Old Hall Farm is worked using 19th Century methods to grow its crops and harvest the land. Horse power alongside steam and early vintage tractors and their implements are the way the farm is operated. The historic buildings house stock and a steam driven dairy. The farm is mostly self sufficient growing its own feed and produce and rearing its replacement stock. They also have a tea room and shop.

3 Turn right in front of the White Hart heading north along the road signed Longmire, Oxen Park and Force Forge. Go along the road for a third of a mile to Burn Knott where you keep straight on for the lane signed Hay Bridge Only. This quiet, pretty lane meanders gently past pastures and ponds to Hay Bridge Natural History Study Centre. Go down the lane by the centre past a white cottage and along the path over Hulleter Moss and Rusland Moss nature reserve.

Rusland Moss is the northern part of one of the few remaining raised mires (peat bogs) in the country. Sphagnum (bog) mosses dominate the uncut areas of the moss, with purple moorgrass in the cut areas and fen and woodland at the edges. Drainage enabled trees and rhododendron to colonise the Moss and they are currently being removed to allow the peat-forming vegetation to recover. Rare invertebrates found at the site include the large heath butterfly and money spider.

4 Cross Rusland Pool Bridge on your right to meet the road near Rusland Cross hall. Keep left, and after 200 yards where the road bends left, go right. After 400 yards turn right onto the footpath across fields. You could continue along the road for a quartet of a mile, visit Rusland Church, then return to this point. Arthur Ransome and his wife Evgenia are buried together between a yew and pine tree in the churchyard.

5 When you reach the road turn left then right up the lane to Crosslands. Where the lane reaches a wooded area turn right onto a path which follows Little Mire Beck then ascends to the edge of the woods of Great Green Hows. Turn at the finger post signed Rusland Heights and Rusland Woods. Follow the white topped waymarker posts. At the highest point, views of Morecambe Bay open up in front and there are some craggy rocks on your left. Leave the waymarked path, past the crags on your left and across a hollow where there is a small lily covered pond. Soon you will reach a splendid viewpoint of the hidden Boretree Tarn. The name bore tree probably relates to an old name for the elder, a flat-topped tree which has masses of creamy-white, fragrant blossoms, then drooping bunches of purplish-black, juicy berries. There were probably three small tarns here in the 17th Century. A dam was built to enlarge them into one during the late 18th Century, as a water supply for the village of Finsthwaite. More recently in 1985, Mr Chaplin from Finsthwaite applied for a licence to abstract 67,800 gallons per day of water from the tarn.

6 Return to the waymarked path and continue as it meanders past a pond then down steeply through woods. You meet the road close to Hill Top, Arthur Ransome’s last home from 1960 until he died in 1967. He lived in it for only two years (from November 1963, following completion of extensive renovations and modifications, until he went to hospital in October 1965). His wife, Evgenia continued to live there until she died in 1975.

Turn right to go down the hill, at the bottom of which turn sharp left to Border Moss Wood where the walk began.

NB: Restrictions on space mean that this article provides a general summary of the route. It is advisable for anyone who plans to follow the walk to take a copy of the relevant Ordnance Survey map.