We currently have no car, for reasons I won’t go into here – that’s the subject of another post. So with the bank holiday weekend looming, and both Pete and myself desperately in need of a break, I did a bit of Googling and a bit of organising, and we took ourselves to Scarborough on the train. It’s dead easy from Hull – no changes, and £18 odd for a 5 day open return. So we picked up the 9.47 on Saturday morning, having collected coffee from the station shop to accompany the scones I’d brought for breakfast, and chugged our way north.
When we arrived, we checked into the Admiral guest house in West Square, just opposite the station. The proprietor put us in a room on the top floor – a long way up, with pigeons scuttling and scrabbling; quite Hitchcockian. But clean, comfortable, and £49 a night B’n’B. And an excellent breakfast to boot, and free wifi.
Then we caught a bus to Whitby – £6.90 return each. The double decker struggled with some of the hills, to the point where we wondered whether we might all have to get out and push, but we made it. We wandered all over the town (but not up to the Abbey because of my Knees), had a toasted sandwich in the George, while we wanted the last half of the Hull promotion excitement, had (well, *I* had), gin and lavender ice cream (yes, it was; it was sublime), and generally a good time. Then we caught the bus back, had Greek food in the George Michael in Scarborough (I kid you not) and a bottle of red, and then wandered down to the harbour, and had quite a lot more to drink in the Golden Ball. Which meant that I floated back up all the steps on a cloud of red wine 🙂
On Sunday, we had planned to take the train to Filey and walk back, but my stomach threw one of it’s very occasional wobbles (down to medication, I think), and decided that being too far from a loo was less than optimal. And that walk is 10 miles … So we ambled around Filey, had coffee in the Bronte Vinery, ate a Trek flapjack for lunch, and then I felt a bit better, so we decided to try the walk. But I only managed about 4km before exhaustion overcame me, so we walked across Blue Dolphin caravan park and called a taxi. Which took ages, but arrived eventually.
Went back to the hotel and had a couple of hours kip, then we went to the Hong Kong chinese restaurant, which looked like a throw back to the 80s, but whose food was surprisingly nice. Lamb in yellow bean sauce, salt and pepper pork, and 8 way duck. And then a very early night, as we were both exhausted.
Monday was Scarborough day – we walked about 8 miles, and my Fitbit says we climbed 60 flights. All the way from the station to North Bay, up the hill to the castle, and round said castle (well worth a fiver, believe me), then down through old town, fish and chips on the sea front (which was *heaving*, then down to South Bay about as far as you can go before you leave the town and back up the hill again.
4.30 train home, which was busy from Scarborough, but Bridlington station was awash with travellers – cannot understand why Northern Rail didn’t put another carriage on, as lots of people had to stand. And a taxi back to the house, because we could. Absolutely lovely weekend.
So a few days without the car were, in fact, better than with, given where we were. Scarborough parking is difficult to find, and expensive, and public transport round there is reasonably plentiful and not too expensive. But I wouldn’t like to be without a car all the time – roll on next week.
However, we will be investigating various rail options for future weekends away, because, to be honest, I’d rather sit on a train than in a car these days, and it makes you think about what to do and where to go.
More photos here at Flickr.
