Captain's Log

York

It seemed like a long train journey to York. A woman sitting behind me  discussed work with her colleague. I was trying to read a book, but her high volume diatribe was too much of a distraction and I gave up and just listened. By the end of the journey, I knew everything about what was happening at her current place of work, as well as what had happened at her previous employers. I now had a deep understanding of everybody in her team including their strengths and weaknesses. I had to admire her diligence. Thinking back on my train travel at work, I usually caught up falling asleep, whether I was with a colleague or not. I thought that when I stepped off the train at York,  I’d escaped her concerns about some weekend work that was going to take place, but she followed me along the platform and to the station’s exit. She then disappeared with the throng of commuters towards York city centre. I enjoyed the silence for a few moments.

I think today’s walk might be the first city centre walk that I’ve logged in Nun’s Walks. It would be a four mile patrol of the York city walls. I’d not walked them before and so I was quite looking forward to it. On completion of the circuit, I intended to take a wander around the city centre itself. Earlier, I'd tried to book a ticket to have a look inside York Minster, but their online payment system kicked me out for some reason. This divine intervention turned out to be a good thing since I wouldn’t really have had much time to make a full exploration of the Minster and at £26 (inclusive of a trip to the higher levels), it would be better to spend a whole day to get my money's worth. Touring the external perimeter of the Minster is free and so that would have to suffice after I'd completed the circuit of the walls.        

At least the start of the walk was obvious. From the entrance to the railway station,  I could see the city wall on the other side of the road. I set off towards it.

The Wall

Much of York’s city wall is still intact and it is possible to walk along the top of it. There are stretches where it no longer exists and one area near the River Foss where it had never existed at all. The natural defences were good enough in that particular area. The wall’s elevated position actually gives you a good view over the city which makes it an ideal walk. The top of the wall can be quite narrow in places making it a bit of a squeeze when other walkers pass the other way. The inner city side of the wall is mostly unprotected and care is needed so that you don’t fall off. There is usually not a massive drop, but certainly enough to potentially cause damage. Surprisingly, there were a couple of spots where I ‘lost’ the wall due to all the other nearby ancient structures. I didn’t find the route particularly well signed in some places. The signage was there, but it seemed to get lost with all the other signs and information boards. 

The wall dates back to the Romans (71 AD), but the current stone structure is 13th century. There are four main bars (Bootham, Fishergate, Micklegate and Monk) and three minor gateways. The River Ouse bisects the city centre and the walls. 

Although I could see the wall from in front of the railway station, getting on to it was another thing. There were no obvious steps up to it and so I followed the road along its base. After 200 metres, this breached the wall and I found some steps to take me up on to the top.  The banks leading up to the walls had been sown with wild flowers giving a spectacular splatter of colour to the proceedings.  I found these floral treats on several parts of the walk. 

River Ouse And The Museum Gardens

Having got on top of the wall, it wasn’t long before I was off it again. I’d reached the River Ouse and needed to cross Lendal Bridge to the other side. Two stone towers, Barker and Lendal,  still exist on either side of the river. Every night a great chain, stored in the Lendal Tower was stretched across the bridge to the Barker Tower. The chain prevented boatmen from entering the city without paying tolls and also protected the city in times of trouble or war. The function of Lendal Tower changed over time and it ended up housing a steam engine to provide water to the city. Looking at the murky River Ouse today, I’m not sure I’d want to be drinking it. 

On the other side of the river I entered the Museum Gardens. I have a clear memory of coming here on a school trip when I must have been 6 or 7 years old. Most memorable was a beef burger sandwich that my mother had packed up for my lunch. The burger was of the budget variety, very rubbery and so cold that the fat had congealed into a lardy layer. After eating it, the burger repeated on me for the rest of the trip. In fact I can still taste remnants of that awful burger taste even now. The Museum Gardens are quite large and I worked my way around to the ruins of St Mary’s Abbey. This was a huge monastery founded by William the Conqueror.  It didn’t survive Henry VIII’s attention during the Reformation. That was a shame since it must have been a spectacular building. I went to visit the remains of the nearby St Leonard’s hospital. These weren’t the same as hospitals as in the modern sense. You could book an appointment and see a doctor on the same day, in those days. They also looked after the spiritual as well as the physical wellbeing. They tended to the poor, infirm and elderly. The hospital was near the Multangular Tower. The tower is the best example of standing Roman remains in York. It is quite impressive and may have been over 10m high. 

We have to thank the Yorkshire Philosophical Society for the Museum Gardens and the Yorkshire Museum itself. The chin scratchers bought the land and opened the museum in 1830 making it one one of the longest established museums in England. A long line of school kids were lined up outside the entrance and they seemed eager to get inside and look at the fossils. I wondered if any of them had cold, budget beef burger sarnies packed up for their lunch. I sat down on a bench in front of the museum and started eating my lunch. It was a lovely spot. Well it was for two minutes until one of the many walking tours of York positioned themselves directly in front of me. At least I got a free lecture on Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries.   

After lunch I found myself in a part of the Museum Gardens at the back of the Art Gallery where I found yet more of the wonderful floral meadows. It was certainly worth spending time walking around the Museum Gardens on my York city wall walk.

York Minster And Monk Bar

I climbed back up to the top of the wall again and continued my journey. I now had great views across the gardens and roofs of some rather posh houses to the magnificent York Minster. The sheer scale of the building made it an almost unbelievable sight. The top of the wall was quite narrow at this point and so I spent a fair proportion of my time watching my footing and squeezing past other walkers. York is a flat landscape and so it was possible to see quite far, both inside and outside the walls.
‘Are you fly fishing?’ The question came from an American lady who was walking in the opposite direction. I’d actually been admiring the profile of York Minster for the umpteenth time. The question was so bizarre and so specific that I didn’t really know how to reply.
‘No. I’m just admiring York Minster’ was the best that I could muster. She seemed satisfied with my response and walked on. 

I dropped down to the pavement at Monk Bar and this delivered me to the Monk Bar Model Shop. In my teenage years I spent many hours building all sorts of Airfix plastic models from military machinery to the Starship Enterprise. I looked at the prices of the models on display in the window and was aghast. Back in my teenage years, I had enough pocket money to buy an Airfix kit at the weekend, and enough change left over to buy a Beano. The prices today looked incredible. A Spitfire  for £54.99! It wasn’t even very big. The Acro Vulcan looked better value at £19.99, but it still seemed expensive to me. A Lancaster bomber was £175.50! How on earth did kids of today afford these sorts of prices. It did make me wonder about the age groups of the shop’s customers; maybe it was still my generation that were keeping this shop in business. I was glad I gave up that particular hobby.

River Foss

I climbed back up to the top of the wall and continued along the circuit. It wasn’t long before I dropped back down to the road again and I joined the River Foss. The stretch along the river had never had a wall. This was because it had been a swamp area and was impassable to any attackers. Over time, the swamp silted up and the Foss Islands were formed. The river was converted into a canal in the 18th century. There were plenty of water lilies in the canal, but it also supported a layer of electric green algae. A busy road ran alongside it. On the other side of the road was a tall brick chimney. This was part of an old incinerator.  There had been a power station there too with its one cooling tower on the other side of the canal. An information board showed an aerial photograph of these visual abominations positioned only a few hundred metres away from York Minster. 

The wall restarted further along the road at Red Tower. This particular tower was made from bricks (hence the name). Apparently it caused bad feelings between the stonemasons and the brickies. Somebody had put a cardboard box containing a dozen potatoes outside the door of the tower. ‘Free!’ announced the message scribbled on an accompanying piece of cardboard. 

Walmgate Bar, Fishergate Bar, Fishergate Tower, Clifford's Castle And Baile Hill

I made good progress along the wall and reached Walmgate Bar. An information board told me that it had a Barbican. I’d never really understood what these were. It turns out they were an extension in front of the Bar that could trap attackers between two sets of gates so that they could then be easily killed. 

The walk turned into a bit of a ‘bar crawl’ since my next stopping point was Fishergate Bar. This particular building had been used as a defence structure, a prison and even a place to incarcerate lunatics.     

As might be expected, Fishergate Tower was a taller structure. There was a garderobe on one side of the tower that used to emit the contents of the medieval toilet onto the street below. This was the first public toilet I’d seen in York since I arrived. I tried the door of the tower, but it was locked. Typical!     

 A nearby Wetherspoons tempted me to enter, especially since it had a nice outside seating area next to the River Foss. Time was pressing though, and so I motored on. Before crossing the River Ouse again, I made a short detour to have a look at Clifford’s Tower which sat on a large mound. It is the largest remaining part of York Castle. The timber tower was burned down in 1190 when York’s Jewish community was besieged there by a mob. Rather than submit to the mob, the 150 Jews committed mass suicide.   

I crossed the River Ouse and re-joined the wall at Baile Hill. The hill is the only thing that remains of the motte and bailey castle. This castle and Cliifford’s Tower protected the city from attacks along the River Ouse.    

I continued along the wall and before I knew it I was looking down at the front of the Railway Station. The four mile wall walk had taken me just under 4 hours to complete. Admittedly, I’d had plenty of stops along the way for food, drinks and information board consumption.    

Now that I’d completed the city wall circuit, my next objective was to have a wander around the inner city itself. York Minster was back in view again and was an obvious target. I started heading towards it. 

York Minster

I’ve not documented a specific route for my wanderings around York, since I drifted off in any direction that attracted my curiosity. It didn’t actually take me that long to reach York Minster. There were plenty of people mooching around the base of the two western towers. It was certainly an imposing sight. Buildings have encroached right up to the minster on its western, southern and eastern side. Dean’s Park was a lovely grassy open area on its northern side and it offered good views along the cathedral. I wandered around the perimeter of the park until I reached the Treasurer's House. This is a gorgeous National Trust property. Although you have to pay to get into the house, I was able to walk around its garden with nobody asking to see my National Trust card. There was a tremendous view of the minster from the garden. The house was bought in 1897 by Frank Green, the grandson of a wealthy industrialist and he transformed it into an elaborately decorated town house. I left the garden and headed for the eastern end of the cathedral. The whole face of the building was dominated by that huge window. There was significant building work going off on the northern side of the minster. A lot of the building was cordoned off and scaffolding erected. In the secured storage area at ground level, I admired some of the new stone sculptures that would eventually find their place at some point on the building. They were totally bizarre with one figure having a frog crawling out of his mouth. I wondered if these were like-for-like replacements or whether the modern sculptors were allowed some input into the design. 

York Minster was incredibly impressive from the outside. I was now quite glad that the online ticket system had failed me this morning since looking around the interior of the building would be at least half a day job. I will return at a later date. I’d only just over an hour before my train home and so I headed off southwards into York’s narrow streets. 

The Shambles

Near the Trembling Madness Apartments I came across the remains of a XII century house. An information board declared: ‘It is without doubt the oldest dwelling house of which any substantial remains still stand in situ in the City. 

I wandered aimlessly along the narrow streets. I sniggered at the Kathe Wohlfahrt shop as though I was a member of the Carry On York cast. Somehow I managed to stumble on the Shambles Market and I entered its domain. I had a quick look around the stalls and a lot of it appeared to be normal market fayre. A plaque told me that The Shambles actually takes its name from the word ‘Shamel’ meaning the stalls or benches on which meat being sold was displayed.   

It felt a bit claustrophobic in the narrow streets and it was busy too. Time was up with my day out in York and I headed back to the Railway station.     

The train was busy with commuters on the return journey, but thankfully the carriage was fairly quiet and I could make good progress with my book.      

It had been an excellent day out in York, with an interesting trip around its city walls and then a spectacular circuit of its Minster. I definitely want to have a look inside the cathedral at some point in the future. The Yorkshire Museum looked worth a visit too. There’s also the Railway Museum to consider. Yes, I will definitely be revisiting York. .