7th of October, 2025 - Bishop Auckland to Goathland

 Although I was kinda sad to leave Brancepeth behind, I was also incredibly excited because today's the day I get back to my beloved North Yorkshire Moors. I have so many wonderful, wonderful memories of this place from 1994 when mum and dad and I stayed here and I have been itching to get back here, step out of the car amongst all the sheep poo and soak it all in.

I arrived in Whitby mid-morning so had most of the day to wander around this lovely seaside town and smell the fish (every second shop in Whitby is a fish n chip shop - and the others are all Bingo, Funhouse, Parlour places!). Considering Whitby is a major town it has a really cute little feel. There is one main road that winds its way through but all the off shoots are little cobbled laneways that are all pedestrianized and choc-a-block full of tourists!


I didn't go on the "Black Pearl Trip out to Sea - 25 minutes of Pirates and Pizazz" because I have to say, the Black Pearl didn't look particularly sea-worthy and that's fine when the Black Pearl is a ghost ship captained by Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean, but not so appealing when they're asking you to pay £40 to take you out into the ocean and then sink.


I also didn't do the Captain Cook Museum because, well, it looked a bit run down, so instead I climbed the 199 steps (I'm sure it was at least triple that) up to the ruins of Whiby Abbey and spent a couple of hours there because although it's actually quite small, and there's not actually any walls because it IS legitimately a ruin, I HAD climbed 199 steps and by God I was going to see and touch and sit on every last stone in that ruined Abbey.


Problem with going up 199 steps is that you then have to come down again, but I eventually made it in one piece and only bought 2 things in my day's wanderings so it was a good day!



Also, just as an aside - and it doesn't look it so much in this pic, but the seagulls here are BIG!


After Whitby I finally allowed myself to drive to wonderful, wonderful Goathland. For those that don't know, it's the village where they filmed the TV series Heartbeat and the little steam railway train station is also the Hogwarts train station in Harry Potter. It's also my home for the next 3 nights and I couldn't possibly be any happier. There's something about the moors that makes my heart sing and this gorgeous little village is just exactly as we left it in 1994 - and I mean exactly. Heartbeat may have finished filming here years ago, but they're still trading quite heavily on the fame it brought them! Everything is still called the "Aidensfield Garage" and "The Aidensfield Arms" even though it's the village of Goathland but I don't care. Time has stood still and I'm back in 1994, giving way to sheep in the middle of the road and staring out over the hills like I belong in some kind of Catherine Cookson romance novel.

I'll see you all in 3 days when this little bit of magic is over ♥

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