Ten quiet spots in the Yorkshire Dales

The Dales pulls two kinds of visitor: those who come for the obvious — Malham Cove, Aysgarth Falls, the Herriot country of Wensleydale — and those who've learned to look sideways. The second group camps better.

Here are ten pitches and areas that reward a map, a bit of patience, and a willingness to leave the main road.

**1. Walden, upper Coverdale.** Coverdale is bypassed entirely by most visitors heading for Wensleydale. That's the point. Walden Beck runs through meadow that barely changes through lambing. Small family-run sites operate from farmland. Ask locally; the best aren't listed anywhere.

**2. Littondale.** Arncliffe is the village the Emmerdale titles were originally filmed in. The dale itself — a side-valley off Wharfedale — sees maybe a tenth of the footfall of its neighbour. Wild camping above the limestone benches at the head of the valley is feasible if you're self-sufficient.

**3. Garsdale Head.** Bleak in the good sense. The Settle–Carlisle line crosses here and the moors open out towards the Howgills. A handful of farms take tourers; none of them are on the booking platforms, which is exactly why they still have space in August.

**4. West Witton, Wensleydale.** Lower Wensleydale is busy. West Witton, a mile or two east of Aysgarth, is quieter than it should be. Access to the moor above is easy and the village pub (the Wensleydale Heifer) is the real draw.

**5. Semer Water.** The Dales' second-largest natural lake and somehow still overlooked. Sites nearby fill up, but less so than Malham or Hawes. Canoes, cold swimming, and evenings that go quiet at nine.

**6. Ingleborough's northern flanks.** Most people approach Ingleborough from Horton-in-Ribblesdale or Chapel-le-Dale. Coming from the north — via Ribble Head — the mountain looks bigger and the paths carry fewer boots. Disperse camping is possible with care on open fell.

**7. Keld, upper Swaledale.** Keld is where the Pennine Way and the Coast to Coast cross. In the morning, before the long-distance walkers stir, it's very still. A cluster of small sites operates around the village. The falls at Catrake Force are five minutes from your tent door.

**8. Dentdale.** Technically in Cumbria but in the Dales National Park. Dent village is unchanged since the 1970s; the dale running east from it is green, steep-sided and rarely busy. Sites here are small and farm-based.

**9. Bishopdale.** Another Wensleydale side-valley, running south from West Burton. About two miles long, very quiet, no café or shop. Bring food. The limestone is close to the surface and the walls are unusually old — some dating to enclosure in the eighteenth century.

**10. Halton Gill, Littondale.** At the end of a single-track road with no through route, Halton Gill is a hamlet of eight or nine farms. There's nowhere to go once you're there — which is the point. One or two farms take small numbers of campers. Check in advance; phone works intermittently at best.

The pattern across most of these: they require a call rather than an online booking, they don't appear in search results, and they have space when everywhere else is full. That's not a flaw in how they operate. It's the thing that keeps them the way they are.