Sunday 24 June 2007

And the answer is....James Herriot, Wallace & Gromit and the Bronte Sisters

One of the highlights of the trip for me was the World of James Herriot in Thirsk. Only kidding! I told you it was raining all week!
I was a big fan of the All Creatures Great and Small books and tv show. Thirsk is the fictionalDarrowby of Herriot’s vet and a lovely town it is. We toured 23 Kirkgate where the real vet and author, Alfred Wight lived and worked. We had a nice audio tour of the 1940’s setting and took hilarious pictures with our hands up a plastic cow! (we kinda forced Carrie to do this!)

I knew Carrie has been a fan of Wallace and Gromit and Wensleydale Cheese so we surprised her with a visit to the Wenseleydale Creamery Cheese Experience ( I think cranberry cheese is her favourite). We had a goofy visit to the factory as we learned about Wallace and Gromit’s favourite snack and all about the cheese making process. Of course, in the shop we sampled many different types of wensleydale cheese and bought some to take home. Very exciting.

Our last act of tourism for this trip was the Bronte Parsonage Museum in Haworth. The Bronte Society has preserved a literary shrine to the Bronte family in a Georgian house on a steep cobblestone road. The museum pays tribute to the various family members and exhibits the work of Emily (Wuthering Heights, who died in 1848), Anne who dies at age 29 in 1849, Charlotte (Jane Eyre who died at age 38 in 1855) and their brother Branwell a painter and drunk who also dies in the house. Their father sadly survives all his children and dies at the age of 84. A very sad family story and the place felt creepy but these are great books and their authors deserve to be remembered.

About 7:30 pm we arrived at the Yorkshire Hotel in Harrogate to discover that we did not have a reservation. I had made a reservation through Expedia and showed the staff at the front desk the confirmation. They never processed it and had no rooms for us. Neither was there an acceptable room in Harrogate anywhere. I became so frustrated that we just decided to head back to London that night. We drove the 3 and half hours to Carrie and Dan’s House arriving about midnight pretty exhausted and slept peacefully!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

You write very well.