When Janie Dee was a child in the Buckinghamshire village of Dorney, her parents took her on walks to the River Thames, and she can remember thinking: what's the point? There was even a walking holiday in the Chilterns that had to be abandoned after a day because she and her three sisters moaned so much.
Nowadays, her attitude is different, and she dates it to six years ago when she was doing Shakespeare in Stratford-upon-Avon and met her husband Rupert. He had always been a walker, and their outings together became a vital part of their courtship. Walking, it seems, can be sexy.
The habit continued in Scarborough, where she worked with Alan Ayckbourn at the Stephen Joseph Theatre for three years and had the Yorkshire coastline and the North Yorkshire Moors on her doorstep. Her favourite walk is a circuit she's only done once: the Bridestones, at the edge of the Dalby Forest.
"I remember driving through the forest," she says, "and I was feeling very anti because it was grey and misty and my daughter Matilda was still in one of those carrying things. We parked the car by the stream, and the sound of running water was lovely, and it wasn't quite as cold or foggy as it had seemed.
"As we walked uphill through the forest, the mist started to subside, and there were lots of little bushes with nuts on them, and Matilda said 'nut' for the first time - in fact, I think she might even have said 'hazelnut'.
"Then we came out of the forest and up towards the stones, these amazing limestone shapes coming out of the landscape. It was this bare, rather barren, quiet place, and I just remember walking from one of the Bridestones to another, looking at them against the sky. They'd be magical at any time, but with that subsiding mist it was like coming into another world. It was very dramatic, very mysterious.
"The way back was down a little valley, which was very smooth and warm and somehow English. The walk only lasts about an hour and a half, but I remember saying how special it was because I hadn't wanted to do it and had ended up loving it. As ever, Rupert had insisted and, as ever, I was pleased that he had."
The Best Actress Olivier Award for her performance in Ackybourn's Comic Potential in the West End is the latest of Dee's string of prizes. She plays Jacie Thriplethree, a robot "actoid" of the future who becomes increasingly human when a real man falls in love with her.
It's a demanding role, likely to last until September. Then she'll probably be back in Scarborough and might give Matilda, who's now three, the chance to walk to the Bridestones under her own steam: "A day up there is 24 hours, whereas down here in London it seems about four, it goes so quickly.
"If I don't get out for a long walk every so often, I miss it and start getting withdrawal symptoms, like a drug addict. I prefer company, and when I'm with Rupert we have arguments about the route, but there's that lovely turnaround point when you start to laugh about it.
"On a basic human level, I always feel better afterwards than before, spiritually, mentally and physically. It's never made me feel worse and it's wonderful to be able to rely on that. And because it clears your mind, it's also really good for learning lines."
Mysteries of the Moors
There are several sites called Bridestones on the North York Moors, and some guidebooks suggest they were used in the Bronze Age for fertility rites and sacrifice.
Blaise Vyner, a consultant archaeologist, pours cold water on this kind of folklore: "Standing stones seem to have been the focus of activities of one kind or another, but there's no evidence that it was fertility rituals, or anything else. I suspect some of these stories are about as old as last weekend."
The Bridestones near Dalby Forest are different from the other groups because they are natural limestone outcrops whose different layers have eroded at varying rates. The other Bridestones, on Nab End Moor and Sleights Moor, for example, are standing stones erected by man.
The Moors have important archaeological remains ranging from the Stone Age to Victorian times. Some of the standing stones are Bronze Age, says Vyner, but others are waymarks put up by medieval Christian pilgrims or boundary stones from the 18th and 19th centuries.
The most revealing Bronze Age relics are the burial mounds, he says. Many have a complex stone construction and contain urns with cremated human remains. Sometimes there are jet buttons and beads there as well, but few bronze objects.
The unique feature of the Moors is their evidence of jet mining, and there are important remains of glass- and iron-making from the 16th century and earlier. Vyner recommends Levisham Moor, three miles west of the Bridestones at Dalby Forest: it's accessible to the public and contains Iron Age enclosures, Bronze Age burial mounds and medieval farming systems.
The practicals
Stations at Thirsk, Malton, Scarborough and a dozen Esk valley villages on the Middlesbrough to Whitby line. The North York Moors National Park runs Moorsbus in the summer, designed to link villages and help walkers leave the car behind.
Details, walking booklets and and local accommodation list from the Park Authority, tel: 01439 770657, website:www.northyorkmoors-npa.gov.uk
