Bolton Abbey is 18 miles from Beck Hall and is a lovely drive along small roads. There are walks galore, and guided tours of the ruined Abbey. Beck Hall used to belong to Bolton Abbey, so you can appreciate the scope of the Abbey's influence before the Reformation.

Skipton and its 900 year old castle is 15 minutes or 9 miles from Beck Hall and has lovely shops, a Market in 3 days of the week and the Leeds/Liverpool Canal running through it. There are delightful walks again along the canal towpath, perhaps finished with Fish&Chips at the award winning Bizzie Lizzies.

Starting in Settle (6 miles, 15 minutes) trains run on a regular schedule to Carlisle, over the world famous Settle-Carlisle Railway. The railway's most well known feature, the Ribbleshead Viaduct, is located 20 miles North of Settle. There are occaisonal Steam Days, but sadly most of the rolling stock these days are unimpressive diesel thingies.

The Embsay and Bolton Abbey Steam Railway on the other hand runs impressive steam hauled trips up and down their line most weekends and school holidays.

For people who like visiting gardens we love recommending Harrogate's RHS Harlow Court (18 miles, 45 minutes) as it takes a whole weekend to see all the displays.

Ingleborough Caves and Stump Cross Caverns are a fantastic day out at any time of the year, but can be a real lifesaver when the weather turns poor.

Brimham Rocks is 20 miles or 45 minutes away, past Harrogate and Pateley Bridge, and is a fantastic giants playground of boulders as large of houses. Guaranteed to make every child weary by the end of a day rock climbing.

There are swimming pools at Skipton and Settle, both of which are open all week.

Haworth, home of the Bronte Sister's is 22 miles or 45 minutes drive away from us. There are a multitude of small shops, and the sister's Parsonage home is now open as a museum.

The number one thing that visitors come to Malham for is the stunning scenery and huge variety of walks literally from our doorstep. The Pennine Way runs past us, from Lothersdale/Cowling to the South, and then North to Horton-In-Ribblesdale. There are also the favourite walks to Malham Cove (30 minutes, 1 mile) and Gordale Scar and Janet's Foss (45 minutes, 2 miles). Or the Malham circular encompassing all three natural features along with Malham Tarn, which takes half a day and covers 3 1/2 miles or 7 miles depending on route. Here is an adobe acrobat map of the walks around Malham. There are also ramble's to Settle, Hanlith Weets Top, Grassington, Arncliffe and Kilnsey Crag. This link describes the geological features around Malham and has some great pictures and diagrams.

We are also lucky to have a Visitor's Petting Farm in the village, where children and adults can feed the animals in a farmyard setting. They even have a wallaby!

Bike Hire is available in the village for £15 a day, and if you bring your own bike we have lockable storage behind Beck Hall.

Horse Riding and pony trekking is available in Malham at the Yorkshire Dales Trekking Center. Zana has made a huge success of this venture, so early booking is essential. At Elite Carriages you can ride in horse drawn carriage.

Chris Pighill our local mechanic offers very muddy off-road 4WD lessons using his own Land-Rovers.

The Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority have also documented many ancient ruins and archaeology sites, the list is at www.outofoblivion.org.uk

Fishing is available nearby, either at Coniston Cold or at Malham Tarn via the National Trust. Sadly our little beck plays host to a fish every so often, but with herons in situ, and further downstream gosling ducks and mink about we don't get many fishy visitors these days.

There is serious climbing fun to be had at Gordale Scar and at Malham Cove.

Between March and early August the RSPB run a daily service at the Cove where you can watch the Peregrine Falcons' using the provided high power telescopes. This year (2005) we are hoping for a breeding pair much like we had last year. The Peregrine Falcon has been described as the Ferrari of the air, reaching speeds of 200mph!

For more information on things to see and do in Malhamdale, please do click onto the excellent malhamdale.com website. If you need to book hotel's for other nights, then we quite like TripAdvisor which has rated hotel's and B&Bs worldwide or Yorkshire Dales B&B Guest Houses, iknow-yorkshire.co.uk