The Grand Old Duke Of York
It was a bit of a later start today (discounting of course our 2am wake up call from Spud who just rang to say hello – we appreciated the thought Spud, thanks!) and we had a few plumbing issues. I should clarify that those were in the bathroom in case you thought I was disclosing something a bit more personal! We couldn’t seem to get any hot water, which is not ideal given the weather conditions. Our friendly maintenance man, Stan, came to the rescue and we were steaming up in no time. Toby strolled out of the bathroom wearing a short-sleeved shirt and insisted that he would be “fine” because after all, he didn’t feel the cold as much as me. We had predicted that our third-born’s irrational aversion to jumpers would rear its ugly head on this trip but we really thought once the cold set in, we’d somehow overcome it. Sure enough, after much reasoning on my behalf and much stubbornness on his behalf, he left the building with his bare arms exposed to the 2°C arctic blast that was out the door. Luckily he’d been “persuaded” to bring his hoody along and after walking to the station and making his point, he put it on. I asked him to find me one other person in Manchester that morning wearing a t-shirt but he was definitely alone there!
Once again Ross suited up and caught the tram to his office in Manchester and Toby and I ventured down to the Visitors’ Centre for the heads up on some good day trips from Manchester. We were tossing up between York and Chester but decided we’d heard more about York and would give that a go. It was about an hour and a quarter on the train but that wasn’t too bad. We had things to read.
One of the things I’m loving about England is that all the signs and public announcements are so beautifully, politely and grammatically written, with much more detail than we’d ever get at home. For example, there’s a sign on the window in our hotel room that reads “for your safety and security, the initial opening of this window has been restricted to prevent any accidents. A fully open window presents a hazard and you must please exercise care.” I’m sure that at home it would just say “DO NOT OPEN.” The train on the platform next to us today was cancelled at the last minute and a lovely, well-spoken, quite plummy lady came over the PA to very apologetically let the passengers know what was happening. She said “for all those passengers boarding the train on Platform 1, your train has very unexpectedly been cancelled. We are just so terribly, terribly sorry and hope this really hasn’t inconvenienced anyone. We are so sorry. Please don’t worry, another train will be along shortly. Once again, we are truly sorry.” So polite! It was hilarious!
At the risk of talking more about the weather again, it was FREEZING in York! Total brass monkey weather. Icy! Our faces were stinging as we walked down the street. Toby gritted his teeth and carried on but eventually, out of necessity, succumbed to me buying him some woollen gloves later in the day. It was killing me not to say “I told you so.” We got on the York version of the hop-on-hop off bus and found it totally fascinating to drive around this amazing city, so incredibly rich in history. We learnt that York was populated by the Romans in 71AD! It’s hard to get your head around that kind of age. That city was populated only a short time after Jesus walked the earth. Amazing! We heard about the Romans, Anglo Saxons, Normans, Vikings and Scots who had all occupied the city at one time and were fascinated to see remnants of not only the Roman wall built in the first century AD, but also buildings still standing that were built by the Norman stone masons in the 11th Century and houses that are still occupied by local families that were built in the 1300s! We think a house is old if it was built in the early 20th century! We drove past one church, St Denys’, and there was part of the steeple missing. The bus driver told us it was blasted off by canon fire in 1610! It’s just so exciting seeing this kind of real-life history! I love it! We even heard about the real Grand Old Duke of York, who really did march his 10,000 men up to the top of the hill but sadly was defeated by the Scots and didn’t get to march them down again. I was singing that song in my head ALL day!
The bus rounded a corner and we caught sight of a part of the York castle that still stands at the top of a big green hill. It literally took my breath away! I grabbed Toby and we asked the bus driver to pull over and let us off. We had to see this up close. In my haste at getting outside though, I tripped on the gutter and had a spectacular stack, landing splattered over the footpath, right in front of all the passengers on the bus and plenty of passers-by! Tobes was laughing uncontrollably (it must’ve looked pretty funny! ) Once I regained my composure and realised I hadn’t hurt anything (except maybe a little pride) we both continued in hysterical laughter and wondered whether anyone on the bus had actually seen it happen.
There was a small fee for entering the castle – “Clifford’s Tower” – but boy was it worth it! There was a steep staircase leading up to the building, built in the mid-1200s on the orders of King Henry III, and we’d never seen anything like it! As we ascended the tight stone spiral staircase we thought of all the knights in their armour and the Vikings with their horned hats that had trodden these very stairs for hundreds of years before us (mind you, it would have been a bit tricky getting up those tight turns in a suit of armour!) It’s quite humbling.
At the top of the turret, while we were admiring the view of York, we were approached by a film crew from the British Historical Society that wanted us to be in one of their advertising brochures and tv ads! They wanted to photograph Tobes being photographed by me and they said they “didn’t want it to look too wintry!” Easier said than done! It was 3°C and we were being blasted by icy winds but we were obedient and took our gloves off and pretended we were warm and toasty. They took stacks of photos and made Toby wield a wooden sword around his head. It was actually really fun! They said they were really pleased with how they’d turned out and will forward us a copy when they’re done!
We did quite a bit of exploration of foot and fell in love with York and all its “pointy” buildings. We’ve noticed that English buildings do predominately have pointy bits. Even in the rural scenery we were passing on the train today, there were pointy bits poking up above the trees all over the place. It’s just something you don’t see in Australia.
We stumbled upon a gorgeous little laneway lined with wooden fronted shops and cobble stones and Toby said it was just how he imagined Diagon Alley to be. There were toffee shops, a leather shop, a chocolate shop and lots of tea rooms. We had lunch at “the Flax and Twine”, a gift shop and a very cute little tea room, with homemade cupcakes and scones, pretty bunting and mismatched floral upholstered chairs. After our “photo shoot” up on the roof of the castle we sure did need to thaw out and this was the perfect place to warm up on the outside and the inside.
We hailed the hop-on-hop-off bus to take us back to the train station and as soon as we stepped on, the bus driver could hardly contain his mirth and chuckled out loud saying “now you watch your step…and don’t fall over now!” Oh so I guess he did see my stack after all. Tobes and I cracked up too and then he really let loose telling us it was one of the funniest things he’d ever seen! Glad to be of service. After one more dig at me and some more warnings to “not fall over” before we disembarked, we left York with some very fond memories.
Toby and I both fell asleep on the train back to Manchester and then again when we got back to the hotel. Ross, who had caught up with a work mate after work, came home to both of us snoozing away! We ordered in room service and Toby still hasn’t risen to eat his. I guess it’s more important to get his body clock in order. He can just have a big brekky!
