A Walk of Contrasts

In my last post, I showed you the Kilburn White Horse as seen from the village, and from the car park where the foot path starts that leads up to the top of Sutton Bank.

The climb up there is steep, but not so much that anyone of normal walking fitness can't make it. The path is well maintained and has good steps. Also, it offers some interesting views of the horse; from the path, you wouldn't guess that the whiteish area (it is not as white as it appears from afar) has the shape of a horse.
How the horse was made and what happened with it during WWII is described here on wikipedia.

Once you're up, you have a combination of great views and wide open spaces. It is said to be one of the finest views in England.
While I agree that the views from there really are great, I feel there are other views around Yorkshire much dearer to my heart. For instance, there aren't the dry stone walls and typical barns dotted across the hills which I so like and associate with Yorkshire. Still, I was duly impressed and took more pictures than you'll ever want to see.

Sutton Bank is the perfect location for gliding, and so it is not surprising that the Yorkshire Gliding Club is based on the top plateau. On the day of our visit, there was always at least one glider and one plane in the air above us.

To get back down to the car park, we chose a different path than the one we had climbed on the way up. It was such a contrast: From the windswept open spaces into a green tunnel of branches and leaves. That woodland was certainly enchanted and enchanting!
It was a walk I won't forget, but the day was not yet over.

Our next stop was Helmsley, where I'd been only once before, more than 10 years ago with Steve.

Mice and a Horse

If you have seen my previous post and read Graham's comment and my reply, you'll know that there was a mouse in the post, and at a "Mouseman" was hinted. What's all this about, then?

After we had admired Coxwold's beautiful Old Hall from the outside, we got back to the car and drove the short distance to Kilburn, the next village.
"Kil" and "burn" have nothing to do with killing and burning anything or anyone. Instead, at the root of this unusual place name are the Old English words "ciele burna", meaning "cool stream".
At a population of less than 200, in spite of it being a picturesque place, I doubt many people would know Kilburn at all, were it not for two things: The White Horse and The Mouseman.

Let's talk first about the latter. In 1919, the then 43 year old Robert Thompson, a furniture-maker, talked to his colleague while they were both working on a screen for a church. Someone said something about being as poor as a church mouse, and that inspired Mr. Thompson to carve a little mouse into the cornice he was working on at that moment.

From then on, mice were (more or less well hidden) part of nearly every piece that left Thompson's workshop. They even feature on wooden candlesticks in London's  Westminster Abbey.

The descendants of Robert Thompson still work the same craft as he did, still at the same premises in Kilburn. But one of the buildings is now a visitor centre with a shop and a café, and another one houses a museum. 
 

Lovely lavender

One of the buildings belonging to the company

View from the visitor centre's garden towards the White Horse at the top of Sutton Bank

The same view, zoomed in

The White Horse, seen from the car park

While I do admire everyone who is good at their craft and so skilled with their hands, none of the items for sale would look good in my flat - or be good to my wallet. To be honest, I found everything rather pricey. A dresser for over 11.000 pounds? A breadboard for 80 quid? Sorry, folks - but if I had 80 quid to spend on something like a breadboard, I guess I'd pay maybe a tenner for the board, if it was a really good one. Of the other 70 quid, I'd use 50 to buy bread and cheese for myself for several weeks, and donate 20 to someone less fortunate so that they could enjoy some bread and cheese once in a while, too.

Still, it is an interesting place to visit and stop for a cup of tea and a snack before tackling the White Horse - which will (you guessed it) be the subject of its own post tomorrow, apart from what you can already see here and read on the stone tablet.

Unknown Territory

Up until now, everywhere I'd been on this year's Yorkshire Holiday was familiar, always allowing of course for the changes that occur within a year.
But on the 21st of August, J and B suggested we go and have a look at the White Horse on Sutton Bank. I'd only heard of it, but never been there, and since the day looked promising with the prospect of a good walk/hike, off we went.

Our first stop was the handsome village of Coxwold:

We walked up the hill from where we had parked the car and took a closer look at St. Michael's Church. According to wikipedia (see the link above, clicking on the word "Coxwold" will take you there), a church has been at this place since the year 700. The building you can see now is from 1420; its tower is unusual in that it is octagonal.

Inside, there was much detail to take in, but little chance of getting good photos with it being so dark in there. Nonetheless, I managed to take this one of a face on the ceiling of the church's entrance porch, and one of four mice hidden in various places around the chancel and a side chapel of the church. (It was too dark, we only found two, I think.)

Outside, I found the view across the churchyard so beautiful, with the mixture of melancholy and reassurance of life's continuity I always feel when looking at old tombstones.

Maybe you have heard of (or even read) the 18th century novel "Tristram Shandy". Its author, Laurence Stern, lived at Shandy Hall in Coxwold, and was buried here.

Across the road from the church, we couldn't help but admire this beautiful old building. What had it been originally, we were wondering? We looked it up on the internet when we got home that night, and learned that the building is from 1603, when Sir John Harte founded a grammar school here. 
John grew up in the neighbouring village of Kilburn (which was to be our next stop). He went to London as an apprentice grocer. Later, he married his master's daughter, and made it to Lord Mayor of London. He never forgot where he came from, though. The school he founded in 1603 was only closed nearly 300 years later, in 1894.

How we would have loved to go inside the building and have a good look around! But it is now a private residence and not open to the public.

Never mind, the day had more Good Things for us in store, as you will see in my next post.

Studley Once More

The day after the rainy interlude at Harewood was so sunny and warm, we decided to turn it into a Very Lazy Day spent mostly in our garden. But first, we started with a shopping trip through our favourite shops in Ripon, all within a few minutes walking distance from our cottage.

A shop I had on my mental list of "must visit" has, sadly, closed since last year. It was a shop for vintage clothes, and I bought this dress there.
But don't worry - I did not go home without two lovely dresses, excellent finds at Dorothy Perkins'! Summer sales were in full swing, and one of the dresses was only 8 quid, the other one 22. Of course, they will appear as Fashion Posts on this blog in due time.

All our other favourite shops were still there, and we spent a pleasant morning browsing and buying, also briefly visiting the Cathedral. There was a lot going on, apparently preparations for a concert, and so we did not stay long. Also, the day was far too nice to stay indoors.

We had a snack in the garden and then spent all afternoon there, reading, sunbathing and having coffee and tea. A wonderful lazy day, just like a holiday is supposed to be!

On Thursday, we decided to walk once again to Studley Royal. Believe it or not, the reason we did this was to buy napkins... and a most wonderful blanket of lambswool we had spotted at the National Trust shop at the entrance to Fountains Abbey, which was just perfect for my sister's living room.

This time, we approached Studley on a different path. And we did not pay admission to walk around the abbey this time; we really just wanted to walk in the sun (which we did) and make our purchases (which we did, too).

 
In the evening, my uncle and aunt, J & B, arrived in Ripon. We had an excellent meal at The Royal Oak, a pub I can highly recommend. Afterwards, we watched the Hornblower set the watch, as I have already described a few posts back.

For the next day, we had a great day out planned with J & B. You'll find out where we went in my next post.

On a Rainy Day...

...you can either stay home and curl up with a book in front of the fire place, or you can go shopping, visit a museum or a big house where you can spend hours indoors.
We did the latter, but still came home wet through and shivering with cold - after all, we still had to adjust to the change in climate from the heat wave in Germany to what passes for summer in Yorkshire.

Ripon has good bus services; they are not cheap, but take you places too far away to walk to. We do not have a car when we're in England, so we depend on public transport.

On Tuesday, August 18, we woke up to grey skies and rain that wouldn't stop all day except for a minute here and there. We decided to take the 36 bus to Harewood and visit Harewood House.

You can find a lot of information on the official website; here are just a few bits: Building began in 1759. The owner, Edwin Lascelles, had enough money to ensure the best people of that time would be working for him: Thomas Chippendale made the furniture, Capability Brown did the landscaping, and Robert Adams designed the interiors. The architect of the building itself was a man from York, John Carr.

I did not take many pictures from the outside, because I did not want my camera to get wet. Inside, I could not take many pictures in the state rooms because there were either too many people about or it was too dark. Still, here are a few.

Although the state rooms were very beautiful, we were most impressed with the world below stairs: The huge kitchen with its rows and rows of polished copper pots and pans, a (what was then) high tech kitchen range, the scullery, the larder, the dairy room and the still room; the (yet again high tech) system of bells for each room so that the small army of servants always knew where they were wanted, and the information given about what life was like back then when the house was still inhabited by a family. It was a largely self-contained world on its own, constantly busy with providing meals, fresh clothing and bedding as well as clean rooms not only for the family, but also for the numerous people employed here.
Garden, house and kitchen staff were housed in different parts of the building and grounds. They were not supposed to mix, something I found a bit strange; wouldn't it be productive to have all the employees feel like one team, working towards the same goal?
Two girls who came from the same nearby village and had been best friends already were, as an exception, allowed to share a room, in spite of one of them working in the kitchen and the other one in the house.
Gardeners pretty much did their own thing; they took turns in cooking for each other and were not under as close observation and strict rules as the staff living in the house.

Speaking of the garden - the grounds of Harewood House are very beautiful, and we would have loved to explore them more thoroughly. But because of the incessant rain and rather chilly wind, we limited ourselves to a short walk about half way around the lake. 
The Himalayan garden was the most wonderful part: There was nobody about, and it was a place that felt like a secret garden you've stumbled upon quite by magic.

Waiting for the bus back to Ripon, I took this picture of the other side of the road. Not that many phone booths are left in England, are they. This one added some colour to a mostly grey day.

At the cottage, we felt so cold we huddled around our (electric) fire with mugs of steaming hot tea and blankets.
This was, however, the only day that was like this; the rest of our stay was much more like summer.