Festival brings hope that time will be healer for Dales

The area has been hit hard by the foot-and-mouth crisis during the past 12 months and many businesses will be relying on the Easter break to turn their finances around.

The Yorkshire Dales Tracks of Time Festival has been arranged to help tempt tourists back to the countryside during the coming holiday now that 99 per cent of the national park's footpaths are back open. The programme begins on Saturday, March 23, when the Ermine Street Guard will be recreating the sights and sounds of a Roman army camp in the park, as well as encouraging visitors to experience what life was like for a legionnaire.

But, throughout the Easter period, a programme of guided walks, horse rides and mountain bike excursions have also been organised, all led by experienced national park volunteers familiar with the area's heritage routes.

The Dales Countryside Museum, in Hawes, will also be hosting an exhibition called Tracks in Time - A Celebration of Our Travelling Past.

The event - which runs until Sunday, April 7 - includes displays which explain the history of a number of the ancient routes which cross the Dales and the people who used them from the past to the present day.

The festival ends with an evening of poetry with Ian McMillan at the Octagon Theatre at Grassington Town Hall on Wednesday, April 10.

Co-ordinator, Karen Griffiths, said: "For hundreds of years, people have used the footpaths, bridleways and green lanes of the national park for pleasure, for work or even war.

"Our Tracks in Time Festival celebrates the area's great travelling heritage and gives visitors an extra reason to get back out into the countryside this year."

A copy of the Tracks in Time Festival programme is available by telephone on (01969) 667450, by email at info "This is very good news and a real tonic to all those involved in the area's tourism industry.

"Let's hope the trend continues and we can all enjoy a bumper season."