Having celebrated my birthday (thanks for the bubbly Rachel!)
we headed towards Harrogate, staying at the great little campsite at the Yorkshire Show Ground. A perfect place to explore the town (I think the last time I was in Harrogate was with choir, youth choir, so a while ago!), sample the delights of Betty’s - the dirty rascal was amazing!
And catch up with Helen and Danny It’s been four years since I’d seen Helen and she'd done something wonderful for at what was a difficult time for me so it was great to catch up and meet Danny. Thanks for a wonderful evening Helen.
Having looked at what we could do on a rainy day, I realised we could hop on a train and visit another of my childhood holiday locations and apparently now very trendy location - Hebden Bridge. So we did!
It rained a lot, but it was lovely to visit. It certainly doesn’t look anything like the run down mill town I remember, but was full of trendy artisan coffee shops and shops with lots of crystals and rocks. We spotted a sign for an independent book shop - always somewhere to make a beeline for and in we went. Only it wasn’t what I was expecting! I should have realised having seen all the other shops, this one seems to only stock books on spells, witchcraft and magic. Not the books I was looking for, but very much in keeping with the other little shops we saw.
I did however manage to purchase some trousers (at a significantly reduced price) that I am hoping to use on our next adventure, so it was a positive day out all round.
Whenever we head north there is one stop we always have to make, wiggling dates to make sure it works. A trip in Agy to northern England just isn’t worth doing unless it features time with Kate and David. Somehow, it’s as if we've been chatting five minutes ago, just picking up where we left off. It is always full of current affairs debate, travel talk and interesting trips - and this visit didn’t disappoint!
I’d never heard of Salt Mill before we visited, but Kate and David suggested it, so off we went, it was a fascinating place. The Mill is a former textiles mill (I am guessing similar to the ones my ancestors worked in) and was the largest industrial building in the world when it was built in the 1850’s. It was built and owned by Sir Titus Salt who was disappointed by the poor working and housing conditions of mill workers in other mills. Deciding to do something about this, he built the mill along with a whole village, providing housing and beautiful green spaces for his workers. It is of course a mill town, but it provided dramatically better conditions than other mills.
Today the mill is a hub for creativity, there’s a David Hockney exhibition, a small museum about the mill, a fabulous bookshop ( they type we love) and rather randomly, The Peace museum, documenting the history and activity of the peace movement across the world. It’s a wonderful place to visit and felt quintessentially Yorkshire to me. A mill, terraced stone housing, and a cricket match. Well worth a visit.
We also managed to squeeze in a trip into York to support an upcoming family event for Kate and David, a wander through the Shambles and not getting lost (if you know, you know.. Mum had a legendary trip to the Shambles on another family holiday that still makes my sister and I giggle), followed by a delicious lunch.
It's always too soon when we leave Kate and David, but we also know we will be back!
Continuing the theme of memories, I remember visiting Castle Howard when we were visiting grandparents as part of our holidays when I was little, so I wanted to go back. The house is beautiful and there are plenty of grounds to wander around, but for some reason, it didn’t do it for me this time. Maybe I wasn’t in the mood, maybe my childhood memories were rose coloured. I know they do incredible Christmas events but this time it didn’t feel great value for money, so I don’t think we will return.
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