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Few British landscapes come alive in winter. Our mountains are bleak and austere and our fields are a drab and leafless shadow of their summer selves. But the Somerset Levels have a mid-winter makeover that fills the skies with flickering life, and draws great bedsheets of water over the land.

Until a thousand years ago, the whole area from Yeovil to the Bristol Channel was a permanent infiltration of sea. The local high tides - the second highest in the world - surged at will across these flats, creating salt marshes and lakes.

In those days the inhabitants were lake dwellers, catching eels from dug-out canoes, living in villages raised on platforms, and making summer tracks from wood and willow to lay through the marshes.

Then, in the 13th century, the land started to be reclaimed, funded by the powerful abbeys at Glastonbury, Muchelney and Athelney. Sea walls were built, drainage ditches dug, and primitive wind pumps began work amongst a tessellation of rhynes (ditches) and droves (tracks) broken by marching rows of pollarded willows, interrupted occasionally by clusters of houses on rising swirls of land - the basic skeleton of the Levels today.

The distant tide still sends rapiers right upriver as far as Langport, but these days its power is contained by the Drainage Boards, whose personnel stomp around in wellies opening and closing sluices. Drainage was originally intended for the benefit of farmers, but that has changed, particularly since the Levels have been designated an Environmentally Sensitive Area, and financial incentives have halted its slide into agricultural prairie.

These days there's more money in conservation than in farming, and increasing pressure to let the water table rise, thereby improving the habitat for over-wintering wetland birds. There's even talk, ultimately, of relinquishing all flood control, and letting parts of the Levels return to the marshland they used to be.


Where to go, what to see

The Levels incorporate 140,000 acres of floodplains of the rivers Axe, Brue, Huntspill, Parrett and King's Sedgemoor Drain. The most interesting section - where the traditional flatlands border with lovely ham-stone villages - is within a 10-miles circle from Langport, once an important commercial centre but now struggling with through traffic.

ABBEY ISLANDS

If you go nowhere else, then Muchelney, a collection of ancient buildings on an island of land, is where the spirit of the medieval Levels lives on. The once-powerful abbey that stood here fell dramatically into debt before the Dissolution and only the foundations and the Abbott's house remain (open April to September, + 44 1458 250664), but the church has a lovely painted ceiling, and across the lane is an immaculate thatched medieval priest's house (open Sundays and Mondays, +44 1458 252621). At times of high water Muchelney becomes an island again, and locals relocate their cars on higher ground, reaching them by tractor.

Nothing at all remains of the abbey on the former island of Athelney, where a distracted King Alfred was supposed to have let the farmer's wife's cakes burn. More rewarding just nearby is Burrow Mump, an 80ft conical hill reminiscent of Glastonbury Tor and topped by a ruined church. This is a dramatic place to be in time of flood.

ARTS AND CRAFTS

Many artists have settled the Levels. Amongst the most celebrated is John Leach, grandson of potter Bernard Leach, a jolly, shaggy Breughel-like figure, who has been fashioning his blushing pots at Mulcheney Pottery (+44 1458 250324) for 35 years. "There's a serenity here that attracts artists" says Leach, who has a shop on site and regular open days.

The Somerset Guild of Craftsmen had a gallery in Yandles woodyard; the gallery has now moved to The Courthouse, Market Place, West Street, Somerton, TA11 7LX; Tel: 01458 274653.) The work of potters, silversmiths, silk painters, wood turners etc is on display here; they also sell the more unusual work of Michael Burton, silver and goldsmith - find his workshop in the Yandles woodyard. The whiskery Burton (+44 1935 822362) is splendidly eccentric, massively enthusiastic and highly skilled - but only really works on commission, so you'd need to come prepared with an idea.

GARDENS

Two well-known gardens lie on the Levels' southern fringe. Margery Fish created the concept of "cottage gardening" at the Grade I listed East Lambrook Manor Gardens (+44 1460 240328, open all year), semi-wild and pretty, with a wistful Bloomsbury atmosphere, it comes as no surprise to learn that Vita Sackville West was one of her regular correspondents.

By contrast, the gardens at Barrington Court (+44 1460 241938, March to October) are formal and extremely well groomed, with a walled kitchen garden bursting with well ordered fruit and vegetables. The house was the very first property taken on by the National Trust, back in 1907, and was leased to the Lyle family (as in Tate & Lyle). Its interiors are a curious mixture of original features and expert imitations, which are for sale.


LOCAL PRODUCE

In season, there's farm-door produce available down almost every lane in this part of Somerset, but chief amongst them is the Burrow Hill Cider Farm (+44 1460 240782) at Stembridge near Martock. The orchard-walled yard is like a scene out of Thomas Hardy, with piles of apples, huge wooden barrels, rootling chickens and cats. The cider comes from 40 varieties of apples, and the yard also sells cider brandy made from the only cider still to be licensed in this country since 1688.


HERITAGE AND INDUSTRY

Two traditional industries of the Levels, willow growing and peat extraction, are alive and well. The village of Stoke St Gregory is at the centre of the withy (willow) beds. Here the Willows and Wetland Visitor Centre (+44 1823 490249) has a shop, guided tour of the willow making area and a good small museum and exhibition related to the industry and the Levels. It is also worth seeking out the English Hurdle Company (+44 1823 698418), a mile to the northeast, which turns out hurdles for embankments and garden use, including the living willow fence: erect it in your garden, and it takes root and grows.

Peat extraction focuses around the more northerly Levels by the River Brue, where the treacherous ground still buckles the roads. This also the venue for the Peat Moors Visitor Centre at Westhay (+44 1458 860697), with its interpretation of the pre-drainage Levels. From the outside, the centre looks like a clutch of garden sheds, but the recreation of Lake Village life, with marsh tracks and thatched roundhouses, is atmospheric, particularly on a wintry day.


The Parrett Trail

The River Parrett starts as a trickle and ends as a flood, and the essence of that transition lies in just a day's easy walking.

Begin near Martock, at the Parrett Works (a former iron foundry), where the South Petherton road crosses the river. The path is waymarked with little yellow arrows, and described in detail in the innovative Parrett Trail handbook, an excellent all-round introduction to the Levels.

It's an hour's walk across pastoral fields to Kingsbury Episcopi, along a Parrett still in its adolesence, with all the momentum of recent rain. Keep an eye out for artworks placed by bridges and stiles - and for cattle; you may find yourself wondering nervously whether bulls are more dangerous with or without cows.

Kingsbury Episcopi is a quiet, handsome place with an excellent pub (The Wyndham Arms - see where to drink) favoured by walkers, and a large church, although that didn't mean, said the man in the post office, that the Episcopalians were particularly god-fearing. "We're all trying hard to get bad reputations - it's far more interesting".

Beyond Kingsbury you enter the Levels, the land spreads and the river quickly turns lugubrious. Thorney Mill, mentioned in the Domesday Book, was still working until 1966, and is now the home and studio of sculptor Evelyn Body.

The route from here to Muchelney lies along a raised towpath, above fields subject to flooding, and coots, herons, buzzards and kestrels warning each other of your coming. Stop to admire the ruins of Muchelney abbey, and for a well-earned tea and cake in the Stables tea-room.

The Trail threads through Langport and returns to the river under the railway bridge. From Oath Lock onwards the river is still tidal, despite being 20-odd miles from the sea. In the distance up ahead you should be able to pick out the silhouette of Burrow Mump, rising above the Levels.

Stathe bridge is marked with curious tall cones sculpted by artist Clare Wilks out of living willow, and already well on their way to becoming trees.

This is journey's end. If you haven't positioned a car here, then call a cab from the phone box (Joy's Taxi +44 1458 252098). If you feel in need of reward and refreshment, then the Rose & Crown at Lyng, three miles away, does good food and has a well-kept garden.

Read more travel writing by Andrew Eames