For the Easter weekend, we drove down to Yorkshire. Ali and I both have family roots in Yorkshire, and some family members still live there. It's probably the county that feels most like home for both of us, even though we've both spent a lot of time living in other places. We started our weekend with a visit to Haworth, the historic village famously once home to the Brontë family. I didn't take many photos there this time, apart from a few details of old buildings.
When leaving Haworth, we realised there was a steam train about to arrive at the heritage railway station. So we stopped to have a look.
Our next stop was the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. We go there on most of our trips to Yorkshire. It combines two of my favourite things, art and walking in natural landscapes, and covers quite a large area, so it's easy to spend a couple of hours wandering around, taking photos and looking at sculptures. There are also galleries hosting temporary exhibitions, and a couple of cafés.
In the middle of the lake at YSP there's an island, which we realised is also a heronry, with seemingly a dozen or so heron nests isolated from human footfall, and surrounded by places to go fishing. There are also a couple of highland cattle and a fair few sheep and lambs.
After YSP, we drove northeast over the moors to Whitby. The weather was a bit grey, wet and windy, so we abandoned the idea of a coastal walk. Instead, we poked around the shops, climbed the steps to the Abbey, and when the rain subsided, walked out on the West Cliff beach.
The traditional kipper smokehouse, which has been there for as long as I can remember, was open and serving customers when we walked past in the morning. I think it might be the first time I've seen it open. I was tempted to buy a kipper, even though I'd have nothing to do with it.
The views from the Abbey steps never get old. Looking down at the houses below, it seems they were built in whatever place, shape, angle and size they could fit. It's part of the charm.
As the rain lifted, the mist softly lingered over the town and its beaches. A small flock of turnstones was scooting around on the west pier as we walked down it. Some were running around too fast to be photographed, but I found a couple sitting on a wall which didn't fly away when I approached. A few hardy people were out in the sea, swimming or surfing. Not for me.
On the drive back to Edinburgh, we stopped at Saltburn-by-the-Sea, not far north from Whitby. There's a historic funicular railway leading from the clifftop town to the beach and amusements below, though it's not functional now. I came here in 2010 doing work experience with the landscape photographer Joe Cornish. I have fond memories of carrying bags and watching Joe set up his photographs as the sun was setting, while a (possibly drunk) man shouted down to us on the beach from the pier above, asking what we were doing. I think Simon Roberts also photographed this pier for his Pierdom project. There has been a pier here since 1869, though it has been damaged and rebuilt at various points in its history. With the tide in, it was quite unnerving to watch large waves approaching head-on from the end of it.
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