Seven circular walks from Thornton-le-Dale

A short walk with a great deal of history in it. Turn right at the Priestman's Lane footbridge and All Saints Church is barely a hundred metres away, its churchyard sloping quietly above the beck. Look here for the grave of Matthew Grimes, reputedly one of the guards who watched over Napoleon in exile on St Helena, an unlikely thread running from a Yorkshire village to the South Atlantic. One corner of the churchyard is being deliberately let go and returned to a wildlife garden, so expect long grass and insects rather than mown edges.

From the church, walk back past the Hall to the bridge, then follow Brook Lane through to Whitbygate and back into the centre. It is the walk to do with someone who tires easily, or when the light is going and you still want to be outside.

This is the one that shows you the shape of the village. Climb the church steps and take the elevated path past the lychgate, where the roofs and the Hall lay themselves out below you and it becomes obvious how the settlement grew along the beck. The path then drops to Rectory Lane, which you follow as far as the junction with Dog Kennel Lane before a footpath brings you back to the car park.

One genuine word of warning on the descent: keep to the gravel path. There is a ha-ha alongside it, a concealed ditch, dug so that a view could be had without a fence in it, and by high summer the growth can hide the drop entirely. It is an easy thing to stumble into and a hard thing to laugh about afterwards.

Turn left at the footbridge and walk out along Priestman's Lane with the beck on your left. You pass the old mill and then the bowling green, often in use, always worth a moment, before the lane starts to climb. It is one gentle uphill, not a haul. Near the top a kissing gate on the left opens into China Garth, a narrow way threading between houses and gardens that feels like a shortcut you were let in on, and delivers you onto Brook Lane and back to the centre.

Step-free alternative: ignore the kissing gate, carry on up the hill, turn left at the top and come back down Whitbygate. That keeps the entire loop free of gates and steps, which is what makes the Blue Walk our recommendation for wheelchairs and larger pushchairs.

The Green Walk is the one to give an afternoon to. Follow the Blue route past the mill and the bowling green, then take the signed lane for Ellerburn, a quiet dead-end road with benches placed exactly where you would want them and long views up the valley. In spring it is lined with daffodils, with sheep and lambs in the fields on either side; in late summer it is all hedgerow and shade.

The lane brings you down to St Hilda's Church at Ellerburn, a small ancient church of Saxon origins and among the oldest in this part of Yorkshire, a genuinely remarkable thing to find at the end of a village lane. Its history, and the story of the bats in its roof, are on the St Hilda's Church, Ellerburn page. From the church, pick up the beckside footpath home, working through a series of gates (close each one) until you rejoin the Blue route at the mill.

It works with a smaller pushchair if you are willing to lift at the gates; otherwise simply walk down the lane and back the same way, which loses nothing.

If you reach St Hilda's with plenty of day left, this is where the walk turns into an expedition. Continue along the stream past the trout farm, then a stile and footpath take you up into Dalby Forest. The forest roads here are wide and shared with cyclists, so walk with half an ear out for mountain bikers coming down behind you.

The route drops to a footbridge over a stream and climbs to a forest track heading back towards Thornton-le-Dale, with the option of detouring to Dalby village and returning the same way if you want the extra mileage. Coming home you pass a bird hide near Sand Dale, worth sitting in for ten silent minutes, and a run of gates through grazing land: close them, there is livestock. Past the trout farm again to Ellerburn, and you are back on the Green Walk for the last stretch.

For the forest proper, trails, the Go Ape, the toll road and the cycling, see our cycling page and days out nearby, and yorkshiremoors.com for walks across the wider North York Moors.

The everyday walk, and the reason so many villagers have a dog. From the car park follow the entrance road with the playing field on your left, and slip into the woods just before the small bridge, two minutes from the car and already under trees. Expect mud from November to March; this is not a route for clean shoes.

Follow the stream, passing a field with sheep, chickens and a horse in it, until you reach a five-bar gate. Turn right and cross two footbridges, the stretch between them is the best paddling in the village for dogs and children alike, and there is a dog-waste bin between the two. Then head north on Maltongate back to the start. Do stop on the bridges on the way and look down: brown trout hold in the shade under them, quite still, until they are not.

In autumn, the conkers along this walk are the best in the village.

Start exactly as for Woods & Maltongate, into the woods and along the stream, but at the five-bar gate turn left along Bottons Lane. A kissing gate takes you into the fields, dog on a lead from here, and the path runs diagonally across with the old railway station away to your right, then up the hill. The lambs on this slope are famously unbothered by people and will often walk over to inspect you, which is worth the whole outing if you have children with you.

A third kissing gate puts you onto a quiet road: turn left and follow it past the allotments and the cemetery, where the views open out gloriously. Keep an eye on the front gardens along here for a bungalow with a full model village laid out in it, lit up at Christmas, as is the village itself, which is a proper occasion locally.

Come back either on the ha-ha footpath, keeping to the gravel, as on the Yellow Walk, or carry on along Peaslands and Dog Kennel Lane into the centre and reward yourself on the tea rooms and ice cream.