Guides ·Day trips

Getting to Skipton

Skipton is on the Airedale line from Leeds, 45 minutes, roughly every half hour, about £11 return. From York the journey means changing at Leeds and takes around 90 minutes for £18 to £24. From Harrogate it is 50 minutes by car on the A59 through Blubberhouses, and there is no useful direct train. From Settle it is 25 minutes on the Settle to Carlisle line. Driving from York is about 55 miles and an hour and a quarter.

The station sits ten minutes' walk south-west of the High Street, past the canal basin. Parking in town is straightforward and cheap by county standards: the Coach Street and Cavendish Street car parks charge around £1.50 an hour or £6 for the day, and they fill up on market mornings, so arrive before 10:00 on a Saturday. Skipton is also the natural base for driving into Wharfedale, with Bolton Abbey 15 minutes east and Malham 25 minutes north.

Skipton Castle

Skipton Castle at the top of the High Street is the reason most people come. Built by the Normans from 1090 and rebuilt by the Cliffords, it survived a three-year Civil War siege, the longest in the north, and Lady Anne Clifford restored it from 1657 planting the yew that still stands in the Conduit Court. Admission is about £11.50 adult, £7 child, and it opens daily from 10:00, last entry 17:00 in summer and 16:00 in winter.

What makes it worth the money is completeness. Unlike most English castles, the roof is on. You walk through the banqueting hall, the kitchen, the bedchamber, the privy and down into the dungeon, all intact, with a free printed tour sheet rather than an audio guide. Allow 75 minutes, longer with children, who tend to love it. The adjoining Holy Trinity Church at the top of the High Street is free and holds Clifford tombs from the fourteenth century onward.

The market and the High Street

Skipton has held a market since a charter of 1204 and the stalls still run down the middle of the broad High Street on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, roughly 09:00 to 16:00. It is a working market, not a craft fair: fruit and veg, cheese, fabric, tools, plants, and a fish van. Prices run well below supermarket for produce. On the first Sunday of the month there is an additional artisan market with more food stalls.

The permanent shops behind the stalls are unusually good for a town of 15,000, with independent butchers, delis and outdoor gear specialists serving Dales walkers. Stanforth's pork pie shop on Mill Bridge has been baking since 1926 and its pies are about £2.50, which is the correct lunch. Bizzie Lizzie's on Swadford Street does fish and chips, takeaway around £9, sit-down £13 to £17. Pub lunches on the High Street run £12 to £18.

The canal, the steam railway and the water mill

The Leeds and Liverpool Canal runs straight through Skipton and the Springs Branch, a short arm cut in 1773 to carry limestone from the Clifford quarries, tucks in behind the castle through a rock gorge. Walking it takes fifteen minutes and it is the prettiest free thing in town. Pennine Cruisers on Coach Street runs half-hour trips from about £6 and hires self-drive day boats from roughly £120, which is a genuinely good way to spend a summer afternoon.

Two miles east at Embsay, the Embsay and Bolton Abbey Steam Railway runs preserved trains on a four-mile line, mostly Sundays plus Tuesdays and Saturdays in season, with an all-day rover about £16 adult. Skipton's High Corn Mill on Chapel Hill still has working waterwheels and is free to look at. None of these takes long, which is why Skipton works as a half-day paired with something in the Dales.

Pairing Skipton with the Dales

Bolton Abbey, fifteen minutes east on the B6160, is the standout addition. The Devonshire estate charges about £15 per car, which covers the ruined priory, the stepping stones across the Wharfe and the Strid, a terrifying narrow channel where the whole river squeezes between rocks. Do not attempt to jump it; people have drowned. The Cavendish Pavilion café does lunch around £10 to £14, and the riverside walk from the priory to the Strid and back is about three miles.

North instead, Malham is 25 minutes. Park in the village at roughly £5 and walk 20 minutes to Malham Cove, a 260-foot limestone amphitheatre with a famous pavement on top, reached by 400 steps. Gordale Scar is another mile east. Further up the Settle to Carlisle line, Ribblehead Viaduct is 40 minutes by car and free to walk under. Grassington, 20 minutes north-east, has cobbles, a Wednesday market and pubs with rooms from about £100.

Costs and when to go

A day in Skipton alone: £11 to £24 for rail, £11.50 for the castle, £2.50 for a pork pie or £13 for a pub lunch, £6 for a canal trip. Call it £35 to £55 per person. Add Bolton Abbey and it is £15 more per car. If you are driving up from York and back, the day is around eight hours door to door, which is comfortable.

Go on a market day, Monday, Wednesday, Friday or Saturday, because the High Street without stalls is a different and duller place. Saturday is busiest and best. Avoid the last fortnight of August if you can, when Dales traffic on the A59 and B6160 is heavy. Skipton also makes an excellent overnight base for the western Dales: rooms above High Street pubs run £95 to £130 with breakfast, and the Coniston and Grassington country hotels sit £130 to £190.

Frequently asked questions

What people ask before they set off on this one.

Rooms worth pairing with this guide.

Skipton Wren Lodge

4.0/5 See price

Skipton River View Cottage

4.0/5 See price

Skipton Otter Lodge

4.0/5 See price

24 with a full page

More guides to North Yorkshire

All guides

Itineraries · 9 min read 48 hours in North Yorkshire

Two days, one base, and roughly £250 to £400 for a couple including a decent room. Here is how to split a weekend between York, the coast and the Dales without spending it in the car.

Itineraries · 10 min read One week in North Yorkshire

Seven nights across three bases, covering the city, the Dales, the moors and the coast for roughly £900 to £1,400 for two including rooms. Here is the route that works.

Itineraries · 9 min read North Yorkshire in 3 days on a budget

Three days, two nights and a target of £180 per person all in, including a bed. The county has more free sights than almost anywhere in England if you know which doors not to pay at.

Find a hotel