Europe Adventure: Day Six, Part One- York

On Sunday morning, April 10th, we woke up in our wonderful little B&B. 

I took some more pictures of the garden from our window. 

We could hear all the little birds singing. It was lovely. 

 

I got a picture of Jennifer Rain for Maddy. 

Then we went down to have our included breakfast. The dining room was lovely and there was a good selection of fruit, juice, and cereal. While we waited to be served our hot breakfast we both enjoyed some of the best fruit I have ever had.

Then a server brought us our traditional Yorkshire breakfast. 

It was.... well, I wasn't a fan. 

I tried everything except the mushrooms since I already know that I don't like mushrooms. 

The beans tasted like beans usually do... not my favorite. 

The toast and eggs were like any toast and eggs- good. 

I tried the sausage and bacon and the first bites tasted good but then the second ones not so much. 

The tomatoes were good. 

So overall, I ate most of the eggs, toast and tomatoes and then stuck to the fruit. 

I am so glad we tried it though. 

After breakfast we loaded up the car. They told us we could leave it there even if we were not back from the town center by check out time. We just had to check out before leaving. 

We walked down to the town center which was about a twenty minute walk, some down hill. 

Then we finally reached the York entrance. 

We walked through the small roads and just enjoyed looking all around us at the shops. There were very few people out. 

We got a bit lost in the alleyways but soon saw the York Minster, our main destination, looming above us. 

This cathedral was MASSIVE.

We walked around it for a few minutes trying to get a picture that would do it justice. 

Finally I tried a panoramic shot. It didn't do it perfectly.. but at least got all of this side of it in one shot. 

We thought about going to Sunday services here but because we didn't get to see any of York the night before (because of the time crunch after going to Highclere) and needing to be all the way over in the Lake District by night... we knew we didn't have much time to see York. 

If I could do it again, we would definitely spend a lot more time in York but we knew we had about half a day here and so we had to make a list of what we felt were the most important things for us to see. 

The York Minster was number one our list but we knew if we stayed for a service it would make it hard to do some of the other things. 

We did go in but when we saw that it had not started yet.. and that others were walking around admiring we decided to do the same. 

It was absolutely breathtaking. We were able to see all of the main parts before the service started so we decided just to leave at that point. 

The cathedrals really cannot be explained. They cannot have a picture taken that can convey the way you feel when you are standing in them. They are so incredibly huge and intricate and you feel so small and yet so inspired when walking around in them. 

I will never forget how it felt to stand in these places and look up. 

I took a little video outside.

After the Minster we wanted to walk at least part of the York Wall.
We walked around the square a bit and made our way to one of the entrances. 

A Roman pillar found when doing some construction...

(it was not standing up when found obviously)

Going up to the wall...

The Roman wall goes all around this part of York but we just walked one section of it. 

It was such a fun walk with great views of the Minster and some really beautiful homes/ Inns around it. 

Looking the other direction through one of the wall's lookouts. 

In the above picture I was looking out.. then I looked down. 

I had to take a picture of this because it was so England to me. 

Everywhere we went there were wild yellow daffodils growing alongside the road.
They were such a part of our daily view that they have become one of my very favorite flowers and I now have some artificial ones in a vase in my library to remind me of England every time I look at them. 

When we came down off the wall we were back outside of the walled part of York, which we didn't want, so we went back to another gate and went back inside in search of the few remaining things we had to do. 

It was such a pretty city. 

We found the birthplace of Guy Fawkes. We weren't even looking for it. Just walked by and noticed it!

Then we found Betty's Cafe and Tea Rooms which was a place that had been recommended to me. 

We stopped in for a scone!

The scone we got here is called the Fat Rascal. 

Somehow I didn't get a picture of it but you can see it on their website here.

It was the BEST scone I have ever had. 

The next place I wanted to see while in York we had a hard time finding. 

We wandered around for a long time looking for the Shambles and Little Shambles alleys... but we finally found them!

Walking down this alley felt like walking through Diagon Alley.

It has kind of a gross history. The houses all jut out a bit on the top. 

We were told that this was where the butchers were. They had the houses built that way to keep it shady and keep the meat from spoiling. 

Also, there are gutters down the middle of the walkway for the blood to have run down. 

You can still see the hooks where the meat hung on a lot of the little shop fronts. 

After seeing the Shambles we walked back to our B&B and got our car to make our way to our next stop.