York...still beautiful in February

Initially Miss M was planning to travel to York by herself but I couldn't let her do that.....I do love York and I wanted to go back to Whitby as well as I had such a great day there with my son and wanted to experience it with her too. Another chance to relive my childhood.

So we BOTH got up really early on a Monday morning to catch the train from Kings Cross Station. It was almost 7am when we got there but still dark outside so the lights were on inside the station concourse. I just loved the effect of the modern roof structure.

For the most part, I love to travel by train and we had reserved seats with plenty of room around us non-stop to York which made it an enjoyable 2 1/2 hour journey. I learnt my lesson this time and made sure we had accommodation close to the city centre and once we had dropped off our luggage it was time to start exploring.

Although there was alot of rain in South West England, I was surprised to find the River Ouse looking so dangerously swollen. See how it is creeping up the side of the windows and overflowing the riverside walk on the lower left of the picture. Maybe I would need those wellington boots some of you had advised me to pack.

We walked through town, without getting our feet too wet, towards Cliffords Tower. I find it so interesting visiting a familiar place at a different time of year.  No leafy trees this time and although the mound was covered in daffodils, as I hoped it would be, they were not blooming yet.

We then visited the Jorvik Viking Centre in York which is a very informative display of how the vikings settled in this area.  There is a viking village to explore complete with residents going about their everyday business and a museum showcasing many artifacts found around the York area.

 Afterwards we walked through the Shambles and past numerous old buildings through the centre of town. York is rather well known for all its haunted buildings and I am told that the pub photographed above is one of the most haunted in all the land!  I am easily frightened by such things so we did not go on any ghost hunts.

There were plenty of lovely old buildings to look at though and some of them you just wonder how they stayed up for so many years as the walls were very crooked and windows at a slant. It all just adds to the quaintness of this lovely historical town.

And then we found Betty's Tearoom.  This is such a popular venue and we had to queue (even in February) for about 10 minutes for a table. Although I would have loved a table on street level, we were hungry and so opted for one in the basement space.  Just look at the stainglass windows, even down here.

We had the most exquisite lunch here and copious cups of tea served from a silver service and vowed to come back and have a proper afternoon tea with little sandwiches and cakes too. If you EVER find yourself in York, you have to go to Betty's Tearoom (not far from the Minster)

With time to spare we headed over to the Museum Gardens and the ruins of St Mary's Abbey

You can see by this photo that although it was really cold, even in my books, we had some lovely sunshine aswell.  If only it would stay like this.  To find out if it did, look out for my next post.