Sunday 17 July 2011

North Yorkshire Moors.

84.8 Miles. Now at Beechwood Grange Club site at York.

It rained and it poured and it rained and it poured. What a miserable start to the day. Had we still been on the boat it would have definitely been a no go day. There was no way that we could stay on as the whole site had been booked by the Young farmers Club for a rally including live entertainment. About 9.30am a huge 6 axle articulated truck arrived and deposited the curtain side trailer across the end of the site. This was going to be the stage for tonight's entertainment. It was at this point that we thought that we had better get out of there smartly before the crowds started to arrive.

We set off with the intention of heading for Filey but unknown to the driver the navigator had set the Sat Nav for Mondays destination of York by mistake. We knew that part of our journey was to be across the North Yorkshire Moors so we were unaware to start off with that anything was amiss. It was when we were directed to turn right towards Castleton that the navigator started to become concerned. As we headed higher up onto the moors the weather started to close in, by the time we were on the top of the moors at Yan Brow we had barely 150 yards visibility. With lights on and a top speed of no more than 30MPH it was tricky looking for white sheep wandering on the road or cyclists and hikers just appearing out of the gloom. Those wearing Hi Vis jackets were easy to spot but these were in the minority. These conditions lasted for the best part of half an hour until we started to drop in altitude. Conditions improved by the time we reached Hutton le Hole and we were able to relax a little although wandering sheep were still a problem.

It was as we turned off from the moors and signs for York started to appear that we knew we had made a directional error. It wasn’t worth turning back towards Filey so we drove to the York camp site hoping that we could get in 2 days ahead of schedule. Luck was on our side, due to the atrocious weather conditions the camp had received several cancellations so we were able to get a pitch. A quick phone call to the site at Filey with the humblest of apologies for cancelling at a late moment was cheerfully accepted.

Now we will have to find ways of spending 4 days in York, now that shouldn’t be hard should it? No photos today due to the atrocious conditions, sorry.

A total of 4026 miles, since 5 March 2011

2 comments:

Lesley NB Caxton said...

CASTLE MUSEUM, a MUST!!
XX Lesley

Derek and Dot said...

Hi Lesley
Thanks for that it is the 2nd time today that has been said to us, so guess where we are off to tomorrow. :-)
Happy cruising and planning for your new boat.