Another lovely weekend ! A couple of weekends ago, but all on my own due to family having other commitments I thought, “What have I to do this weekend?” I had the opportunity to have a completely selfish weekend and some very important ‘me’ time.
It might be my inner introvert, or my age, but I’m easily pleased in terms of ‘me’ time. Friday night (the night before my little Whitby adventure) was gorgeous. End of the working week, I arrived home, put my PJs on, and sat in my own house, in peace and quiet, background music on, latest book in hand, munching on chocolate covered peanuts and raisins with a cup of Yorkshire tea in hand……….enjoying the solitude. No “Mum can you this”, “Mum can you that”.” Just reading, snacking and planning my little weekend of adventure. Bliss!
And sometimes you don’t have to go too far for an adventure! You can spend that much time travelling here, there and everywhere that you fail to see the beauty on your doorstep. Well, not exactly on my doorstep but in beautiful Yorkshire! I decided to go on a seaside adventure to the Yorkshire coast for two days……….to the town of Whitby to be precise. I hadn’t visited Whitby since the boys were small and I’d forgotten how beautiful it was. It has it all…………….history, gorgeous views, pretty cobblestone streets, culture, good food, bustling harbour…………………it’s a beautiful little seaside town and a must visit on any trip to Yorkshire. I’ll tell you all about it, and then decide for yourself.
I set off very early in Calvin the Corsa, just as the sun was rising, because I wanted to get to Whitby before 10am to enjoy the day, as I knew there was lots I wanted to see.
Whitby is positioned on the east coast of England, in Yorkshire, towards the north of the country. It is a town of two halves, split right down the middle by the river Esk and its estuary. On a sunny winter’s day it is picture postcard gorgeous.
Until this day I had not realised what an important town it had been, and still is, in terms of seafaring, or just how much history there was to the town. As I said, the last time I came was with the boys when they were little, and when you come with children to the seaside it’s a completely different trip. All the history and culture of the place I’d completely overlooked before. On the last trip my youngest was around 4 years old and the oldest was 6. The youngest always was (and still is) a bit of a loose cannon as we say…………….”a bull in a china shop” as my Grandma would have said. 😆
He was more mischievous in a nice way than a naughty, horrible way. He was like a missile, travelling at the speed of light and leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. He has absolutely no fear, and memories of the last trip to Whitby include clutching his coat hood to stop him launching himself into the harbour, running after him down the beach as he charged headlong into the icy cold North Sea, and keeping him away from the seagulls as he tried to terrorise them without realising they’d probably counter attack! 🤣 He was always very well behaved in restaurants, I could take him anywhere, but get him in the great outdoors and he turned feral……………you needed eyes in the back of your head. You did not get chance to look at anything for yourself, or take in any of the history. Your entire time was spent protecting him from catastrophe ……………… and give him candy floss, seaside rock or anything with sugar and additives in and you were in for a thoroughly anxiety inducing day trip!😆 So this time around I thought I’d have a look at the ‘real’ Whitby that I didn’t get chance to see before, and I was quite amazed.
I parked up on the West Cliff and decided to walk into town along the promenade. The first thing I saw took me back to memories of childhood seaside holidays when I was little. Most English seaside towns that were popular in Victorian times (I’m not that old) such as Brighton, Blackpool, Margate, Eastbourne, Bournemouth, Scarborough and Whitby, had Victorian beach shelters on the promenade where the Victorians, with all their respiratory ailments from life in the industrial cities, used to come and convalesce and ‘take the air’. This simply involved walking up and down the promenade with the occasional rest in one of these shelters. They are adorned with the most beautiful wrought ironwork and under their sheltered roof they have wooden benches and windbreaks………..so you sit on whichever one is protected from the wind and admire the view. They are a really pretty relic from the Victorian age and it was so lovely to see one so well looked after.
All along the West Cliff promenade there are a number of wire sculptures installed, with an information plaque for each one. My little spongelike brain learnt so much that I did not know before by looking at these. The first one is of a man with a telescope looking out to sea. It transpires he is William Scoresby Senior. He was from Whitby and was an arctic explorer, whaler and inventor of the ‘Crows Nest’ which is the thing that he’s stood in that was mounted on the mast of ships as a lookout point. He was the inspiration for the character Lee Scoresby in Phillip Pullman’s ‘His Dark Materials’ trilogy, only Whitby’s Scoresby was a real life arctic explorer and hero. How cool!
The next sculpture I liked lots……………………….this one is Skipper Dora! Could she have been the inspiration for Dora the Explorer? Who knows! I have a little bit of ‘Dora the Explorer’ in me so I could resonate with this one. Born in 1890, Dora Walker of Whitby was the first female fishing boat skipper! She was a remarkable, trailblazer of a woman. She had bronchial problems and was told to ‘take the air’. Not happy to sit in a beach shelter on the promenade Dora had built her own small fishing boat the ‘Good Faith’ and spent her days exploring in her fishing boat. What a lady!
Carry on walking on the West Cliff and the most glorious view opens up in front of you. From high up above you get a lovely view over the red roofs of the quaint fishing town of Whitby, over the harbour, and all the way up the Esk estuary. Over on the East Cliff stands the ruin of medieval Whitby Abbey, which I’ll come to in a minute. Before you cross the estuary there are a few more things to see on the West Cliff. First of all a statue and a sign post to some far flung places all over the world. The statue is of Captain James Cook, who is from a small village close to Whitby. He was an extremely courageous and well known British explorer and cartographer. He was famous for 3 of his voyages which took place between 1768 and 1779. He made the first recorded European contact with the eastern coastline of Australia, the Hawaiian islands and the first recorded circumnavigation of New Zealand.
Just a little further along you come to the ‘Whalebone Arch’………which is just that! Two 20 foot high, real whale jawbones, in an arch formation. It was here that I met a lovely couple all the way from Brisbane, Australia, who were kind enough to take my photo for me and vice versa. They were on a tour of the UK and had been told not to miss Yorkshire and Whitby. The first whalebones were positioned here in 1853 and frame the view of the town and abbey. In the 18th and 19th century Whitby was the main centre for the British whaling and fishing industry. Dozens of whaling boats set sail from here on a regular basis to hunt in the arctic waters off Greenland, with many crew members being lost . Whaling brought great wealth but also great danger. When crews returned from a successful hunt they would tie a whalebone atop the mast to signal that it was a successful trip with no loss of crew. The whalebone arch was put here to recognise that tradition. The original set of whale bones was replaced in 1963 with a new set gifted to the UK by Norway. By the 1990’s these too had started to crumble, and in 2003 the current pair of whalebones were erected. These are the jawbones from a Bowhead whale which was legally killed and gifted to the whaling town of Whitby by the Alaskan Inuit community, who the town have close links with.
I was still on the West Cliff, I hadn’t even got to the lighthouse, and I’d learnt so much already. I was really enjoying my blue sky winter day at the Yorkshire seaside. Down on the harbourside there are some more wire sculptures depicting the contribution of women to the fishing industry. Their roles mainly involved sorting and preparing the fish once it had been landed, and the repairing of nets.
At the end of the harbour wall is Whitby’s still very operational lighthouse…………….it’s huge when you stand at the bottom. From the lighthouse you can walk right out to the far side of the harbour on a raised pier of wooden boards to two smaller automated lighthouses, one red, one green, on each side of the harbour entrance. They help to guide the ships in safely in poor visibility. I walked along for a little while and it made me a little disorientated. The pier is quite high above the sea and there are big gaps in the boards and the whole thing moves a little in the wind. When you look down you can see the white foam of the tops of the crashing waves swirling below you, and by the time I got back on solid ground I had ‘sea legs’ somewhat, when you are perfectly still but feel like you are still swaying with the waves.
It was time to have a look around the harbour, and there is so much to see here too. It’s both the best and worst part of Whitby. It’s very busy, lined by tacky souvenir shops, candy stalls, rock shops, slot machines and amusement arcades, like a lot of UK seaside towns are. If that’s what you like, then this is the area of Whitby to be. However, if you turn your back to the rows of amusements, you are in front of one of the most beautiful harbours in the UK. It is very much a working fishing harbour. Whitby is the home to one of the UK’s three fish processing companies. Millions of tonnes of cod, haddock, whiting, scallops, crabs, and lobster are landed at Whitby each year, in addition to smaller numbers of mackerel, pollock and seabass.
It’s such a colourful harbour……….. little red, yellow, and blue fishing boats bobbing about on the water. Lobster pots and fishing nets piled high on the harbour side. And it just has that lovely ‘sound’ of a working harbour……..chugging boats, gulls, church bells in the distance, and the smell of boat diesel drifting in the air.
At the side of the harbour is a memorial to all the fishermen and whalers lost at sea, which seems to also be a perch for some of Whitby’s most famous residents………….the seagulls. The Whitby seagulls have to be the most ferocious sub species of gull known to man. 😂 They are huge! They attack without warning and there are signs to warn you about this. It comes from people feeding them, so they now have no fear and believe anything you are eating is theirs by entitlement too. I challenge you to eat fish and chips outside and not be dive bombed, clawed, and have your lunch ripped from your hands before you’ve got it into your mouth. This is why I kept a tight hold of the youngest on the last visit……………..his game of chase the seagull was not going to end well……………..a four year old would be no match for a ferocious Whitby seagull. I know who would have come off worse! 😂
Time to cross over the river to the other side of town………..but not without a little delay. The bridge was open for shipping traffic, so I took the opportunity to nip inside a café for a buttered scone and coffee refuel while I waited for the bridge to open again.
Whitby is home to a quaint little swing bridge that crosses the Esk Estuary. There has been a swing bridge here since 1835. It is manned for shipping traffic and opened on the hour and every half hour for two hours on either side of high tide. If you miss this, you are stuck in the harbour, and if you want to cross the bridge in a vehicle or as a pedestrian, you have to bear this timetable in mind!
The old town on the far side of the bridge is a beautiful maze of little cobbled streets and alleyways. There are a lot of shops specialising in and selling Whitby Jet made into all sorts of jewellery and trinkets. Whitby Jet is a semi-precious organic gemstone that is highly polished to a glossy deep black. It comes from the fossilised remains of the Monkey Puzzle tree of the Araucaria conifer genus. It comes in a fossilised seam, and you can find the remains of the old jet mines all along the coast between Robin Hood’s Bay and Whitby. Jet can also be found in Asturias, Utah, Turkey, China, Germany, and Russia, but Whitby Jet is superior in quality, being less susceptible to fade or crack………………………..and just because it’s from Yorkshire of course, that alone makes it superior!🤭. You don’t have to look far for your own little piece of jet. Visit the beach after a storm, and there will often be pieces of jet washed up on the shore.
Also in the old town are old fashioned sweet shops (I got some lovely soft liquorice), little bookshops, and an abundance of fishmongers selling the day’s catch of fresh fish, dressed crabs and lobsters.
There’s also the aptly named ‘Arguments Yard’ which I guess is the place to go if you want to have an argument!🤭
Next place to visit is the 199 steps………………………so called because the steps are 199 in number. They are Grade I listed and have been here since at least 1370. They lead up to St Mary’s church and Whitby Abbey and were put there to measure the determination of pilgrims to the abbey. I can see why……………….by the time they deposited me in the churchyard of St Mary’s I was well and truly out of breath. However, it was worth it for the fantastic view over Whitby. The church bells were ringing, it was blowing a gale, but it was beautiful.
I had decided for the first time ever I was going to visit the Abbey ruins, now that I had time to appreciate them. The Abbey is very imposing, atmospheric, and quite eerie in a way. It was the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and I can see why. It was a 7th century monastery and Benedictine Abbey until its possessions were confiscated by Henry VIII in 1538, during the ‘Dissolution of the Monasteries’. It was further ruined in World War I when it was heavily shelled by two German battlecruisers, and what remains is basically what you see today.
It’s really nice for a walk around, and you can get a lovely view of the Abbey from different angles. Walk around the Abbey pond to get a view of the whole of the Esk estuary. The Abbey is really quite a sharp, imposing contrast against the bright colours of the blue sky and green grass.
By this time I was hungry, and you absolutely cannot visit Whitby without having traditional British ‘Fish and Chips’! Whitby has so many fish and chip shops, but there are two that stand out head and shoulders above the rest, and both have been named the UK’s top fish and chip shop in the recent past. When you return from Whitby, the question is always, “Did you go to The Magpie or Trenchers?” Now, I’m in the Trenchers camp, but they are both extremely good. The Magpie probably has more variety if you are straying from ‘traditional’ on the fish front, but if you want Haddock or Cod, for me, Trenchers have the slight edge. You can sit inside at both of them, or you can get them to take away, which is less expensive. I sit inside for no other reason than seagulls. 😂 I didn’t need the menu, I’m a bit of a traditional girl…………..it has to be battered Cod, chips, mushy peas, wedge of lemon, and a pot of Yorkshire Tea. With salt and vinegar they are delicious.
We have a really good fish and chip shop 5 minutes from home, and the fish usually has been landed at Whitby, but I have never had Cod like that in Trenchers at Whitby. Just really thick, pure white, meaty flakes in the lightest crispy batter. It’s 100% worth the premium that you pay to have fish and chips here, and the staff are lovely too. I was well and truly full to the brim when I had finished!
By now, it was cold, dark and damp, so I made my way to the B&B, which was a short drive away, the Falcon Inn at Cloughton. It’s an old coaching inn in the middle of nowhere, but not too far from Whitby, on the North Yorkshire Moors.
It has really comfy, good value rooms, with breakfast. The hospitality tray got top marks…………………..Yorkshire Tea! Which you will be pleased to know I have now discovered can be bought in a sack of 1040 tea bags. Why have 1 when you can have 1040 of the little sachets of joy!😂
I had a little nap and then went down to the bar for a quick little drink, to catch up on a few things on my laptop, then returned to my room for my own little hospitality tray tea party…………..I know how to rock and roll on a Saturday night! 😆 The food in the pub looked divine……………….there was some seriously good-looking belly pork coming from the kitchen, so I perhaps need to return for dinner one weekend!
The bed was so comfy!! There is nothing like having a whole bed to yourself. 😂 It’s one of life’s simple pleasures…………………….spreading out like a starfish and taking the whole bed up. Yes, I sort of miss having something to place my cold feet upon, but I do like to spread out, snore to my hearts content (I only have a little snore 🤭), and not have to share the duvet!
I awoke bright and early to a dusting of snow in the car park. The breakfast down in the pub was delicious. The log fire was roaring, and the early morning view from the breakfast table, over the garden wall, and across the moors was lovely.
Sunday is usually long run morning so I’d decided this is what it would still be. I love a long run early on a morning and I usually still do it when I’m on holiday. You see the ‘real’ town and get a completely different picture of a place when you run around the outskirts and centre before the rest of the town has woken up and ventured out. There’s the smell of freshly baked bread and pastries, golden sunlight, sparkling clean streets as the refuse collectors and street cleaners finish their night shift and the chirping of the birds as they wake up. They are the highlights of my early morning holiday runs, when the town slowly wakes up from slumber and there is no-one else around.
I’d decided on a 14 mile route so thought I’d better have a big breakfast to fuel. By the time I’d packed, checked out and driven to the start of the run route I would have digested most of it. It was delicious: yoghurt, fruit, a pastry………. followed by the full English, fresh ground coffee and toast and marmalade. Well, not the ‘full’ English. I omitted the black pudding and baked beans. I’m not too bothered about black pudding and although I love baked beans I don’t like them on my English Breakfast. For me, baked beans are a comfort food all on their own. They are the winter feast of a dinner on fresh buttered toast when you are home alone and can’t be bothered to cook!
It was freezing cold and windy outside, so it was on with the bobble hat, gloves, buff, winter longs, windproof jacket and running pack for the short drive to the start point of the run at Robin Hood’s Bay. I had initially thought I’d catch the bus to Whitby and then just run the 8 miles back to Robin Hood’s Bay. But as usual I didn’t want to sit on a bus, I got carried away in the beauty and adventure of it all, and decided to run out and back on a circular route, just over 14 miles. I did have a map but I thought surely I can’t get lost or get up to too much mischief on this one…………I just need to keep the sea on my right to Whitby, and then the sea on my left on the way back! Simple!
The way out was quite straightforward, and I was in Whitby, six and a half miles and one hour later, having taken the Cinder Track. This is an old disused steam railway track which ran from Scarborough to Whitby. It had a few gentle ups and downs, a couple of road crossings, but generally was quite a steady run.
There were a couple of glimpses of the coast, like at the lovely Bay Ness, but in general on the way out you are a little further from the coast. It’s really well signed. I saw the first signs of Spring in some lovely snowdrops…………………….
…………………………a lovely little cake tuckshop with honesty box run by a lady called Jo. It was lovely, albeit not as picturesque as the coastal path.
I had a quick warm up in ‘Hope and Beans’ coffee shop at Whitby with a coffee, feeling quite pleased to have arrived without mishap, before starting the return journey……………………..which is where the fun began.
I’d decided to run back along the Cleveland Way Coastal Path. This clings to the cliff edge between Whitby and Robin Hood’s Bay and in its entirety it is a 109 mile path which runs from Helmsley to Filey, both in Yorkshire. The first challenge was Whitby’s 199 steps!! Yes, I didn’t realise I’d have to run up them to get on the coastal path. 😆
At home I am renowned for not being ‘mountain ready’ i.e. prepared for survival. When I get ready to go on an adventure the boys always say…….”Are you mountain ready Mum?” and then they roll about laughing. You see they know the answer is “No” and this is why I come unstuck. I always have lip balm, and I always have money for cake and coffee, but as long as I’ve not got sore lips and I can buy cake I’m all good. I’m always under-prepared and I hadn’t really thought about the return route or conditions.
The sea might be flat but believe me when I say the coastal path IS NOT FLAT!!! and I can’t reiterate that enough. It was a full-on gale force headwind, ankle deep mud and so many steps up and down……………………….and I had eight miles of it! Don’t get me wrong…….it was gorgeous. The coastal views were fantastic, beautiful views back to the abbey, cliffs full of sea birds …………….. but absolutely nothing in the way of civilisation between Whitby and Robin Hood’s Bay. So go prepared.
At one point the wind got so strong and I was so tired I had a little lie down in the grass because I thought it might blow me off my feet. One mile from Robin Hood’s Bay I had a full on melt down. I was so frustrated because it was unrunnable……..it was a battle through mud………….and I was so glad when Robin Hood’s Bay appeared in view. I took a bit of windswept video but you can’t hear me speak……….it was wild, but the sentiment was “I’ve had enough now”, “I need this to end” and “I need cake”. All quite well used phrases by me when I’m out on a run!🤣
By the time I got into the bay it was a full on storm. I shot inside Brambles tea room, shivering and shaking, to be revived with ………………yes you guessed it………………a pot of Yorkshire tea and raspberry and orange Victoria Sponge.
Just time for a very quick wander around beautiful Robin Hood’s Bay on the way back to the car. It’s a shame the weather had turned because Robin Hood’s Bay is a gorgeous little fishing bay clung to the cliffs. It was the haunt of many a pirate in days gone by and really is a special little place. But not on a day like today, it was wild. That adventure and tale will have to wait for another day. So the lesson from this weekend of adventure is I need to be more ‘mountain ready’ …………….. a lip balm and cake money is not enough in all situations. I need to research my route before setting off. 😂 But it confirmed that Whitby is an amazing little town and definitely one of Yorkshire’s top places to visit.
That’s it now for a few weeks. I’m off on a little five day solo trip abroad this next week, which I will of course update you on in a few weeks when I get chance! This weekend I’ve been at home, but I’ve been very, very busy being creative in the absence of everyone else, and transforming some spaces. I think I may have got myself into a little teeny weeny bit of trouble by being a little too over creative without first consulting other inhabitants of the house, but more on that later! You see I can even get up to mischief when I stay at home!🤭🤣
I have though, found what I think might be my new favourite cake shop. I had to make a little trip a few miles from home, for half an hour, to try on a new pair of mountain running shoes in my favourite, friendly, family run, independent, local running store. I came out and spotted a sign which said ‘Coffee and Doughnuts’…….my eyes lit up (obviously 😂). Eve Kitchen looked a lovely unpretentious little coffee shop, and I thought “I could just drink a flat white, I’ll just grab a quick coffee because I’m being good today, I’m not having cake!”. The coffee was divine!
However, I confess………………I was not good. The doughnuts looked delicious but I can actually leave a doughnut, they are not my favourite. However, I like pretty things, and there was another little sign that said ‘Mini Berry Cream Filled Brioche with Chocolate Ganache’……………and they were topped with chocolate flakes and real flowers……….rose petals and violas that you could eat………………they were like a bun in a fairytale! They were too pretty to leave on the counter and one just found its way onto a plate in front of me!!! Honestly, I have no idea how it happened!🤣 Oh goodness…………….I can’t tell you how good this was. I thought the brioche was going to be ‘mini’ but I think the title was referring to the mini berries, the brioche was quite large………..served on a pretty blue and white china plate. It was a cake fit for a Princess. 🤭
However, it could become quite a problem as it’s only 15 minutes from home! And I have to go and collect the shoes next weekend…………and there are lots of cakes to try! 🤭