Georgiana

Newcastle’s Town Moor covers around 400 hectares, close to a thousand acres of open grass right beside the city centre, and the city’s freemen still have the right to graze cattle on it. That right is believed to be roughly a thousand years old, which makes the cows the longest-standing residents on your dog walk.

The coast here moves. The Holderness shoreline between Bridlington and Withernsea is often described as among the fastest-eroding in Europe, so the beach you walked last year may not be quite where you remember it. Inland, the East Riding is a different world of chalk wolds, flat farmland and long skies, with footpaths that often

Cambridgeshire is famously flat, which makes the big skies easy to enjoy and a dog’s mid-walk sprint easy to follow. At Wicken Fen, one of the best-known spots in the county, Konik ponies and Highland cattle graze Adventurers’ Fen, and dogs under close control are welcome on the reserve paths. It’s a good place to

Climb to Old Pale in Delamere Forest on a clear day and the view takes in twelve counties and metropolitan boroughs across England and Wales. Delamere is the largest area of woodland in Cheshire, at around 2,400 acres, and it’s a good reminder that this county is far more than its flat plain suggests, whichever

On Crosby Beach, a hundred cast-iron figures stand looking out to sea, and every dog that passes seems to give them a suspicious sniff. It’s a good symbol of Merseyside: a coastal, city-meets-sand county, where a walk can be sea air one day and a park in the city the next. Our coverage here is

Dovedale’s stepping stones, the Derwent valley reservoirs, the gritstone edges above the Hope Valley: Derbyshire has more Peak District than most counties could dream of. It’s a walker’s county, and a dog owner’s too, provided you know the rules of the land and keep one eye on the sheep. Derby is the only place here

Bradgate Park is the sort of place that makes you forget you’re a short drive from Leicester: deer roam the open parkland, and the rocky outcrops of Charnwood Forest rise behind them. Leicestershire is much more than its city, with plenty of countryside to match, and a good few long walks to wear out a

Port Meadow in Oxford has horses and cattle grazing on it all year round, and the Thames running alongside. It’s a lovely place for a dog walk, as long as yours understands that the large animals on the meadow have right of way. Beyond Oxford, the county runs out into the Cotswolds, the Chilterns and

Sherwood Forest and its famous Major Oak are the first things most people think of in Nottinghamshire, but the dog-walking is broader than Robin Hood country. Wollaton Park in Nottingham has deer, the Trent runs through the middle of the county, and there’s open farmland in between, so a Nottinghamshire dog can have a very

Sheffield is built on hills, and the Peak District starts almost at the city’s edge. That makes South Yorkshire unusual for a county with so much industrial history: you can be among woodland or on moorland edge within a short drive of the centre, which suits dogs who like a bit of variety. One quirk