Waymarker's on't Yorkshire Moors

If you're a first-time visitor to the North York Moors; you will soon notice that the higher Moors are completely devoid of trees.

The Moors have been like this since at least Iron-age times!

The Yorkshire Moors are High, Flat, & Featureless. So it's Easy to get Lost!

And our ancestors needed some way of traversing the high, flat featureless plateau of the Moors without getting lost.

The solution of those ancient people was to erect our unique, iconic Waymarker Stones.

Waymarker Stone on Blakey Ridge Above Rosedale Abbey.

Waymarker Stones may seem relatively insignificant when compared with the great Castles to be found at Pickering or Helmsley; or the ancient Abbey's at Whitby or Rievaulx.

But our moorland Waymarker Stones are culturally important; and they're also listed structures.

In ancient times, Waymarker Stones provided a guide for travellers and defined the paths to follow across the high Moors.

And don't forget; in those days the Moors were home to both wolves and very deep bogs!

So getting lost could be a total disaster!

Thankfully, many of our ancient Waymarker Stones have survived into the modern era and you can still find them on the Moors above Rosedale Abbey.

In fact, many of the modern roads follow the same historic routes of the ancient Waymarkers.

Ancient Signpost. This Waymarker near Rosedale shows "Kirkby Road."

And in good news, the North York Moors National Park Authority is now even reinstating some of the Waymarkers that have previously been lost.

Local people are particularly keen to see them reinstated.

In winter when the snow covers the Moors they still show the line of the road to follow.

And that is as useful to drivers today as it was to ancient travellers all those years ago.

Snow Storm on the North York Moors.