On the Monday morning we checked out of the travel lodge and
got on the road to York. We planned to spend two nights there to make the most
of it. It takes about 40 minutes to get from Harrogate to York and there’s a
succession of roundabouts that you need to keep aware of as each one can send
you off in a different direction, but our GPS was pretty good though and we
made good time.
We arrived on the outskirts of York and made our way into
the central city. One of the characteristics of the city is that the inner city
area is surrounded by an ancient wall, used in roman times for defence and
later demolished and rebuilt by successive invaders and occupants. Towering
over the historic area is York Minster. The building is called a Minster not a
Cathedral, and according to Wikipedia “The title ‘minster’ is attributed to
churches established in the Anglo-Saxon period as missionary teaching churches,
and serves now as an honorific title. “
The inner city traffic was pretty slow near the city walls
and the traffic light sequences slowed everything down. So it took almost 20
minutes to travel a few hundred yards of road, however the wait was made more
pleasant by the many old historic buildings to look at.
We arrived at our Hotel about 30 minutes early at 11:30am and
we had paid for an early check in at 12pm, however the last place we tried
getting in early , before 12pm, was knocked back as they couldn’t put us in the
system before 12. So rather than go through all that again we decided to go
wander for 30 minutes into the historic city.
Our Hotel was well sited and it only took 5 minutes to get
to “Monk Gate” which is one of the entry points into the old area. Imagine my
delight (and Deb’s exasperation) when I found a well-stocked model shop right
next to the gate ! Brilliant! So I spent a few minutes in there (bought a few
things) and then we carried on.
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| Monkgate - to the left is a view of the wall section we later walked. |
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| Right next to Monk Gate , a model shop! |
York is a lovely city and being out of season, there were
enough people around but not so many that we were crowded by hordes, as we were
in London. Its also worth noting again that the air was bitterly cold ( three degrees
, feels like minus one was the most common temp) and the winter days were short , with sunrise about 8:30am and
sunset about 4pm with darkness in between those times. At darkness the air felt
even colder so we were going through packets of tissues like no tomorrow.
We made it into a few streets before going back to the Hotel
and checking in, warming up a bit then going out exploring again. As mentioned
our Hotel was well situated a few streets back from the city wall that defines
the old area, and was alongside the river Foss. We entered through the Monkgate
route. Most street names going into York city have –gate affixed, like
Deangate, Goodramgate, Petergate, Mickelgate etc, and I suppose reflect the
times there were physical gates barring entry to the city.
We came across the York Minster so decided to go in and look
around. Being mid-afternoon and a grey day, the interior was gloomy but still
magnificent with high vaulted ceilings and many small altars and chambers
around the perimeter. The Minster was first constructed in the 13th
century and suffered damage during the English civil war but restoration work
was carried out in the 18th century. However in the 19th
Century fire caused severe damage and in 1850 services were suspended, but in
1858 an effort was made to start restoration again.
In 1967 major structural work was done as it was found that
the central tower was close to collapse and £2 million was spent to
strengthen the towers, completing in 1972. During these works the remains of an old roman
fort were found that today can be viewed under the building.
There were few people around and that made for a much more
pleasant experience than jostling with crowds, and we were free to wander and
try to take photos that would do the experience justice (a forlorn hope).
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| York Minster |
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| Inside |
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| The Minster is the resting place for St William |
After the minster we continued our wandering and ended up in
a place known as the shambles. This is a narrow, confined street with building that
are so old they have bowed out in all sorts of directions and look close to
collapse , with wonky floors and windows, however they are still in use (no
earthquakes in York obviously!) and the meaning of ‘shambles’ was derived from
the chaotic nature of these streets. In fact the street gave inspiration to JK
Rowling for ‘Diagon Alley’ in the Harry Potter books and appropriately a number
of the shops in the shambles are now given over to Harry Potter merchandise.
The shambles in York:
The shops in the York CBD are an eclectic mix and you’ll
find high end art galleries and designer stores next to second hand bookshops
and charity shops but it all makes for a great days wandering.There's even an armoury shop!
Lunch was provided by the York Roast co. and their “Yorky Pud”
wrap – basically a giant Yorkshire pudding that contains a roast meal ( beef/pork/turkey/ham
with vege , gravy etc) – absolutely yum!
After having spent the day wandering round we decided to
call it quits and head back to recoup. We are finding with the short days that
even now our internal clock is ‘out’ and it often ‘feels’ later than what it is,
eg 4pm feels like 6pm or 7pm. The sun does not get very high in the sky and so
even at midday it feels like late afternoon.
Day 2 York
The following day we planned to take in a walk along the
city walls, get to Clifford Tower, and then the national railway museum, all
these activities having been recommended by our friend Fiona. We were lucky to
have a genuinely beautiful day, bright and sunny (and still perishing cold!)
First up was a visit to the Minster again. As the sun was
shining there would be a better opportunity to see the stained glass windows with
light shining through them. Our tickets are actually valid for a whole year so
we were able to get back in again easily. This time the Minster interior was
bathed in light and felt like an entirely different building. The stained glass
windows were wonderful and brightly lit as we had hoped they would be.
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| A lovely day to view the inside |
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| Bathed in daylight |
Then it was time to start walking the walls. We started back
at Monkgate and walked along a section to Peasholme Green, it felt like a long
way but in fact was a bare fraction of the distance, maybe a city block in
total. York has around 3.4 kms of wall around the city in various stages as
over time some parts have been demolished or fallen into ruin. What’s left
though is quite fascinating and the pathway is quite narrow. In some places old
roman ruins can be seen, and there is still evidence of the wide moat (now a
grass strip) in front of the wall. Firing slits for defence are dotted along
the length.
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| Example of the wall that surrounds part of the city |
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| Firing slits along the wall |
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| The walkway - normally another stone wall would be where the safety fence is |
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| The 'moat' area outside the wall |
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| Modern roads have been built to harmonise with the wall where possible |
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| Roman ruins are sometimes visible |
After exiting at Peasholme green we headed towards Clifford’s
Tower, needed frequent stops and map checks to confirm we were on the right
path.
Clifford’s Tower was the keep of what was York Castle. The
Castle was built 9 centuries ago and underwent much destruction and rebuilding
over the centuries but Clifford’s Tower was built mid 13th Century
by Henry III. In 1684 an explosion for a gunpowder magazine effectively
destroyed the roof an interior and it remained in that condition afterwards.
There’s a steep climb to the Tower as it’s placed on a high
hillock (it used to be surrounded by Moat) and there’s no lift. Once inside
there’s another very narrow spiral staircase to get to the top, essentially a
walkway around the circumference of the tower.
The views are spectacular though and we were lucky it was
such a good day, and we got some great panoramic views around the city , with
the Minster dominating the skyline.
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| Cliffords Tower |
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| The narrow staircase leading up to the viewing platform |
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| View of the city |
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| What the tower used to look like |
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| Steps up to the Tower |
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| How the tower (keep) used to look in relation to York Castle |
After that it was time to head to the National Railway
museum. We decided to walk still but it was about 15-20 minutes to get there
and by the time we arrived we were duly frozen and in need of warmth and sustenance.
Entry to the museum is free so we headed into the main hall and café where we
had a reasonable coffee and a lukewarm sausage roll (real railway food!).
The Main hall has several trains ranging from a replica of
Stevenson’s rocket up to modern Japanese Bullet trains and the Eurostar train
that traverses the channel tunnel , but my favourites were two superbly
streamlined 1930’s trains, the Duchess of Hamilton and “Mallard”. Another hall
contained a number of carriages used for Royalty including Queen Victoria’s carriage,
the opulence being quite remarkable and superbly restored.
There was also a hall that contained 10,000 items that have
been gathered over the years by the rail museum, these items being almost anything
you can imagine to do with trains (and some not). For example there are train
models, ship models, pieces of train equipment like signalling gear & radio’s,
crockery and silverware, even three policemen’s helmets!
Also included was a signalman’s training layout – this piece
of equipment was built in 1912 and only stopped being used in 1995. It was used
to train signalmen as it could replicate any scenario they were likely to encounter
in their work. It was restored and today is used for demonstrations.
There is also a restoration hall where you can look down
into the restoration area and see what’s being done and worked on currently.
Some pretty impressive machine tool in that workshop.
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| Duchess of Hamilton |
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| Mallard |
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| Japanese Bullet train |
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| The warehouse with 10,000 items |
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| Signalmens training layout |
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| Restoration Workshop |
After finishing here we decided to continue our walk of the
city’s walls and entered at Gillygate and were able to walk all the way around
back to Monkgate , and as we walked the sun began setting and we were treated
to some fine views of the Minster in late , low sun.
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| Part of the wall with both sides intact - very narrow. |
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| Towers of the Minster in the late afternoon sun |
That night it was back to the York Roast co. for another
Yorky Pud treat for dinner.
York Day 3.
Our last day in York. Today we head back to Harrogate to
position ourselves for a run at Manchester. I wanted to go to the Yorkshire Air
Museum at Elvington, about 10 minutes out of York. Its claim to fame is that it
has an intact example of a Handley Page Halifax , none of which exist in
complete form anywhere else. So after checking out we headed on our way.
Elvington used to house bomber squadrons during WW2 and so
many if the buildings are original, including the control tower. We arrived a
bit early (9:30am for a 10am opening) but after 20 minutes they let us in
early.
To say the air was even colder this morning would be an
understatement – after only a few minutes taking photos outside, I had to
retreat to the car (where Deb had wisely stayed in the warm) to borrow her
gloves and scarf. My fingers were hurting they were so cold.
Many of the modern jet aircraft are outside, and so are
being slowly degraded by time & weather , and the museum hopes to have a
new hangar built to get them housed, but currently most of the restored aircraft
are in one main hangar including the Halifax.
Their aircraft range was pretty impressive and included all
sorts of aircraft from WW1 biplanes to Jet Nuclear bombers , but it was
particularly nice to see the Halifax in all it’s glory.
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| English Electric Lightning |
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| Mirage IVa - France's nuclear strike aircraft |
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| Halifax - Friday the 13th |
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| Nimrod MR.2 |
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| Victor K.2 |
We were meeting our friend Fiona one more time for lunch so
I spent about an hour wandering around and then we headed back to Knaresborough.
We parked in a car park a short distance from the ruins of
Knaresborough castle
and as we had time in hand, , took a moment to enjoy the stunning views from
the hilltop where the castle was located.
Fiona took us to a place called the ‘Lavender Tea Rooms’
that were delightfully quaint. The roof line was very low and all the plaster
and wood were very very curvy, indeed there was barely a straight line in the
place. However we had a great lunch and soon bade farewell to Fiona (she works
from home so had to get back to the ‘office’)
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| Knaresborough Castle |
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| View from the Castle mount |
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| Fiona and Deb |
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| Lavender tea rooms |
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| Tea room stairs worn down over the years |
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| Tea Rooms |
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| Knaresborough Castle |
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| Tea Rooms |
We had a diversion back to York; on our first day we’d
bought a little sculpture of a pod of peas (all done in brass and very
detailed) but when we got back to the hotel room we found the paint had come
off one of the peas and it was a big chink so rather noticeable. So on day 2 we’d
gone back to the gallery who were very good and would make the effort to source
a replacement , this they did and today we got the text advising it had
arrived, so from York to Elvington, then Knaresborough and now back to York!
Traffic going into the city was as bad as the first day we’d encountered it, so
Deb jumped out while we were stopped and ran ahead to the gallery to pick it
up, and by the time she had done this I was able to find a park and meet her.
Then it was back on the road back to Harrogate , negotiating
all the school run traffic around the
ring road and finally getting into Harrogate late afternoon. Phew
