Sir – Having attended Wharfedale Rugby Club's successful away fixture at Loughborough Students, I was gratified to read their programme and its comments about our club.

These included, and I quote, “The Yorkshire Dales is an area of great natural beauty, known for its green rolling hills, its limestone scars, its fell-walking, its potholing, its extreme rock-climbing – and its rugby.”

“For Grassington (or to be more accurate its sister village Threshfield) is home to Wharfedale rugby club. “Nothing exceptional about a Yorkshire village having its own rugby team, except that Wharfedale rugby club plies its trade in National Division One, in the top 40 clubs in England and is about to commence its 18th season at that level.

“To have remained in National One for 17 consecutive seasons is an incredible achievement and speaks volumes about this club.”

That these comments are in the programme of a university which has produced 16 British and Irish Lions, 25 English Internationals and 20 Irish, Scottish and Welsh Internationals is a feather in the cap of Dales rugby and should not be underestimated.

We are firmly on the map, helped by two Olympic gold medallists, even before the Tour de France shows the world what a fabulous area we live in.

It is easy to take our good fortune for granted. Sometimes, when reading the letters in the Craven Herald, it seems that there are too many moaners in our midst. We should start 2014 with a feeling of optimism.

John Clark, Burnsall