Wensleydale Creamery

Cheese has been made in Wensleydale since Cistercian monks brought the method, and the Hawes creamery was founded in 1897 to use local milk. Dairy Crest closed it in 1992, and eleven former managers bought it back within months and restarted production. Sales were still weak until Wallace and Gromit, whose creator gave Wallace a stated fondness for Wensleydale, drove demand up sharply through the 1990s, and the company later licensed the characters directly. The cheese is a crumbly, mild white, made in open vats with the curd cut and milled by hand; Yorkshire Wensleydale gained protected geographical status in 2013, limiting the name to cheese made in the dale. Visitors watch production from a gallery on making days and taste across the range in the shop.

What you actually see

• The making gallery - open vats and hand-milled curd viewed from above.
• The buyout story - a creamery closed in 1992 and restarted by its own managers.
• The protected name - Yorkshire Wensleydale restricted to the dale since 2013.
• The tasting counter - the full range sampled free in the shop.

When to go

Year-round; cheesemaking happens on most weekday mornings but not every day, so the making gallery is worth checking before travelling. The shop and museum are open daily.

Honest expectations

On non-making days the gallery looks onto an empty room, which is a common complaint. The visitor experience is modest for the ticket price; the shop and tastings are free. Hawes is remote and the roads in are narrow.

Nearby

Hardraw Force and Aysgarth Falls are close; the Settle-Carlisle line runs nearby.