Helsby Hill

(S/E) From the front door of the White Lion, facing the church, cross the road and turn right past the lynch gate. Before the first house on the left, turn left and follow the field edge to a kissing gate on your right. Pass briefly between hedge and fence, then turn right across the field on your right. Go through a gap and follow the right-hand edge of the next field.

(1) On reaching a kissing gate (on your right) at a junction of paths, turn 90 degrees left (ignoring a path leading diagonally left to a stile). Walk across to the projecting corner of the fence and continue ahead (with the fence on your right) towards the thatched farmhouse of Commonside Farm. Cross a stile and continue to the corner of a riding menage, where the path goes through a metal hand-gate and skirts to the right of the garden to emerge through a final kissing gate into a road. Take a few steps to your left and then turn right by a wooden kissing gate.

Follow the path straight across a field and then walk to the left of a wooded area. Turn half-right through a hedge to descend an overgrown field dotted with rabbit holes. After a wooden kissing gate, bear right then left round the edge of a field. Turn right over a footbridge and follow the path out to another road. Turn left and walk downhill until the road bends right.

(2) Take a path on the left that follows a ditch on your right. At a junction of paths, turn right to cross a footbridge, then left to reach a road.

(3) Turn right, then left into Bates Lane. Follow the road for 500 yards then turn left into Hill Road North. Follow the road uphill for 200 yards then turn right into a driveway with a footpath sign. Beyond the house, follow a level path until you pass a couple of gates and reach a path junction; cross the stile on your left.

(4) Take the higher path (signposted to “Hill Top”). Climb up through the trees until you emerge in an open area above the crags of Helsby Hill. Having admired the view, pass the trig point and follow the path above the cliff edge which passes below a field then drops down into the trees and starts to descend. When you reach the top of a road, go through the gate and descend to the road junction.

(5) Turn left past the car park for Helsby Quarry and follow the road past Alvanley House. Keep on along past The Paddock, Alvanley Drive and Nemos Close.

(6) Keep straight on along Helsby Road at the junction with Back Lane. After a stretch with no footway, pass the end of Primrose Lane as you approach Alvanley. When you meet the B5393, turn right and pass the Primary School on your way back to the White Lion.(S/E)

Some moderate ascents and descents, uneven surfaces and steep drops. Some road walking.

The views from craggy Helsby Hill (1413) stretch from the Clwydian mountains in the west to the cathedrals of Liverpool to the north. Recent additions to the view are the windfarm on Frodsham Marsh, which came into operation in February 2017, and the Mersey Gateway bridge, which opened in October 2017. Also visible are the M56 motorway (opened 1971) and the Manchester Ship Canal (opened 1894).

Jacob's Ladder is a short scramble up a sandstone cliff. Although not part of the route as described, enterprising walkers can try it out, returning via Baker's Dozen steps on the Sandstone Trail. The scramble starts at the junction of the Trail with the Carriage Drive above Netherton.

The Sandstone Trail is a 34-mile long-distance footpath from Frodsham to Whitchurch the wooded Mid-Cheshire Ridge, offering some of the most scenic walking in the country and fine views from the numerous sandstone edges.