Yetholm and Currburn Circular

This grand circular follows St Cuthbert’s Way (one of Scotland’s Great Trails) in part and the Pennine Way; with an option to follow a higher or lower route.

A good walk that offers great views of the surrounding hills. The Schil hill is just over 1.5km south of Corbie Craig (crow crag) along the Pennine Way and well worth a traverse to its rocky summit.

1. Leave the village green in Yetholm by heading downhill, past the Youth Hostel, on St Cuthbert’s Way. Leave the village by crossing Yetholm Haugh towards the steps at the Bowmont bridge leading back into Town Yetholm. Cross the bridge, turn left and follow St Cuthbert’s Way upstream on the Bowmont Water as the path turns into a track and reaches a tarmac road.

2. Turn right opposite the cemetery gates, following the road for 75m until reaching the road junction. Turn left and follow the road until you reach the junction on your left, signed to Belford on Bowmont and Cocklawfoot. Turn left and follow the road downhill for 80m to Primsidemill crossroads where you should turn left and follow the road, with a dyke on your left and wood on your right, leading to Clifton on Bowmont.

3. At the farm cross the cattle grid and continue up the concrete road past the shepherd’s cottage on your left until it reaches a fork where the road turns to a track. Take the right fork here and continue on, crossing the burn, then take the left fork heading for the gate and cattle grid by the wood.

4. At the trees cross the cattle grid and go through the gate ahead. Follow the now tarmaced road until a cattle grid where it turns back to a rough track and you will see a barn on your right where the track forks. Go left here and continue on up the track, crossing the burn again as the hills open out around you, and head for the field gate adjacent to the shelter belt on your right.

5. Pass through the gate, across the cattle grid (alternatively the gate in the dyke just 20m up the hill on your left) and follow the well made track through the open hill side for almost 1km, passing over another two cattle grids, until you reach Currburn.

6. Follow the track round to the left and pass through the gate in front of you, under the electricity pylon, through another gate and turn sharp right, heading along the dyke above the farm, through another gate, past the shelterbelt and handling pens on your right into the open countryside.

7. Continue following the burn upstream on a trodden grass track. Pass through a gate after 500m as the path sweeps round to the left traversing uphill between Latchly Hill and The Curr. In 450m you reach a fingerpost marking the Pennine Way.

8. Follow the grassy track as it swings round to the right, signposted “Pennine Way”, uphill for almost 1km until reaching a hunt gate. Pass through the hunt gate, follow the track for another 300m until reaching a fingerpost pointing you sharp left for the “Pennine Way” high level route.

9. Follow the path with the fence on your right for 350m, before passing through a third hunt gate. Follow the path, keeping the fence on your right, for 2km along Steer Rig, down through the saddle, and up to the peak of White Law. Ignoring the gates through the fence, follow the fence line as it follows the ridge round to the left, downhill towards Whitelaw Nick.

10. A fingerpost points you sharp right over a dyke using either the ladder stile or through two hunt gates. Follow the path downhill then back up the other side of the small valley, roughly keeping the line of the dyke for 675m. On reaching a fingerpost at the crest of the hill, ignore the field gate in the dyke on your right. Turn left downhill, on the grassy track signed the Pennine Way. Follow the waypost leading you right at the fork in the track, round the contour of the hill, until meeting a dyke on your right which the path follows downhill to the burn.

11. Cross the bridge on the burn, turn right at the fingerpost on the tarmac road and follow it for almost 1.5km over the hill to Kirk Yetholm.