A week in Whitby
 

My husband and I have an apartment booked in Whitby for a week in May. What are the must see/do's, places to eat etc.

Jenny, it is a wonderful place.

I proposed there!

There are at least 3 other current threads with both myself and Morgana posting to suggest places of interest. It may be worth keeping an eye on those threads to follow their progress.

Also I can't give you any more info until I know what your interests are.
What I might love to do in and around Whitby may not be what you would like to spend time doing (I'd be out on the hills for a long walk with a picnic and then a very nice dinner somewhere in the evening for instance).
Plus (very important to know this) will you have a car?

Hello Morgana, Yes we will have a car and we are interestd in the countryside, scenic drives, history (being Australian, very interested in Captain Cook). Intend to go on the North Yorkshire Railway (Heartbeat fans!). Great places to eat for lunch or dinner are also a must. So any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Hi Jenny, we too will be in the North Yorkshire area early June, click on my name as Morgana & humpty hasve given me a lot of helpful ideas. I am one of the current threads going asking similar questions to yourself and an Aussie too!

Er that is have not hasve!

Hello Maudie, thanks for that!
We leave the 31st March and fly out of London on the 5th June. We have 4 days in London then train to Paris for 3 days, train to Nice where we have an apartment booked for a week then fly back to London where we pickup our car and head over to Blakeney in Gloucestershire for 3 weeks (mainly for family history reasons) we hope to see a bit of Devon/Cornwall and wales from here.

Then we head north to Derbyshire for 4 days (family history again) then over to Whitby for a week then its off accross the Dales to Windermere with 2 nights in both places (I visited Windermere last year so this is just for my husband to see some of the Lake district) then we have 7 days making our way up as far as Inverness and back down to Edinburgh (where we drop the car) through Braemar and St Andrews.

We have 4 days in Edinburgh (my 3rd visit the husbands 1st) before taking the train to London for our flight home via Singapore.

This will be my fourth time to the UK/France and my husbands first so we are getting very excited about it finally getting closer after planning for 12 months now!

If you go on the North Yorkshire Railway you might like to take the train from Goatland to Grosmont and walk back.
The walk takes you along a disused railway track, so it is easy walking and through beautiful countryside

Hi Jenny, thanks for your response to my question. Your trip sounds fantastic by the way. (Some of the ideas below you'll find on my responses to Maudie's questions but I've tried to list below mainly places that are pretty near Whitby itself).
You will obviously explore Whitby itself, and go on the NYM Railway. The railway does some trips that include a 3 course meal and these are very popular - the food is pretty good too. Something exciting about having a meal on a train I always think.
http://www.nymr.co.uk/food-and-drink...-diner-service
Some other places you might like to explore.
1) Robin Hood's Bay - picturesque fishing village, very steep road down to the sea (flat shoes)
2) Staithes - again a pretty village but also has Cook links.
http://www.staithes-town.info/histor...es_cook_rn.htm
3) Castle Howard - one of the most magnificent stately homes in England.
4)Dumcombe Park
www.duncombepark.com
5) Exploring not only the North york Moors National Park but also the Wolds and the Howardian Hills
6) York
www.visityork.org
7)Burton Agnes Hall
www.burtonagnes.com
8) Wheeldale Roman road - amazingly well preserved mile long stretch of Roman road in the middle of nowhere up on the Moors. Very atmospheric up there (I kept looking behind me as I walked along it!!!)
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/d...le-roman-road/
9) Scarborough - not to everyone's taste but I quite like the place. Castle, Anne Bronte's grave etc
For places to eat in Whitby I'd recommend the Magpie Cafe or Trenchers for fish and chips. www.magpiecafe.co.uk
www.trenchersrestaurant.co.uk
Greens is also very nice for an evening meal, and don't miss Elizabeth Botham's tearooms.
www.greensofwhitby.com
www.botham.co.uk
Other nice places to eat in the area -
Estbek House, Sandsend
www.estbekhouse.co.uk
Fox and Houses, Goldsborough
www.foxandhoundsgoldsborough.co.uk
Lastly, in Whitby itself I recommend you go to the Sutcliffe Gallery which is full of the wonderful old sepia photos taken by Frank Sutcliffe of Whitby and the surrounding area.
www.sutcliffe-gallery.co.uk

..................and how could I forget - the wonderful pie shop in Whitby.
www.humblepienmash.com

If you are interested in Joseph Banks or Matthew Flinders, you should swing by Lincolnshire on your way to Whitby.

Ah MissPrism I went on that line as a child! My Mum was most amused to hear the engine driver shouting down the platform to the guy clearly learning to drive a steam train 'eh lad, dn't lose all the puff!"

If you are into jewelry Whitby specializes in "jet" stones for earrings, pins etc. Some of the pieces are quite lovely.

We only spent an overnight there but can't wait to go back. We took the railway - it was winter so we wished we'd had more layers and another blanket!

Thanks Morgana for your great tips! Makes me wish we had a couple of extra weeks to spend in the area!

Any tips for somewhere just outside York to stay for a night. We will be coming up from Crich and have a night somewhere before we check in to our Whitby accommodation. I thought we might stay on the outskirts of York and catch a bus/train into the city.

Thanks for the tip mztery! Our daughter would enjoy some Whitby jewellery.

My friend and I are in London visiting friends for 10 days are are considering spending 3 days in Yorkshire. We thought maybe we'd take the train to York and spend 2 nights there and one night in Whitby (renting a car starting the second day in York to explore the area). Our English friend says it wouldn't be worth staying in Whitby as there's not much to it. It sounded interesting to me. Is she right? Should we stay 3 days in York instead?

Doriana, we LOVED Whitby. There is plenty to do, we had a week there and are planning on going back in 2013 for another week.

OH, yikes. I hate to put this in to the mix, but find it only fair. We spent two weeks in the north, mostly in the North Yorkshire Moors, and then in the lakes. Our least favorite place was Whitby.

I thought it suffered a bit in comparison with the rest of the places we visited, including all the coastal areas. I enjoyed the Abbey, but not as much as others visited on the trip. Fountains and Castle Howard were both a better day out for us, than our Whitby visit.

I thought Whitby was crowded, and had a bit of a tacky vibe. It wasn't really clean, and I was actually grossed out by my meal at The Magpie.

going in the summer might be very different. we mostly travel in the winter so to avoid crowed, which in Whitby could be substantial.

Tuscan, I totally agree with your comments! We loved Robin Hoods Bay and wish we had spent all day there rather than splitting it with Whitby. We didn't go into the Abbey but did walk around the church next door, really the view from there of Whitby was lovely but wish we had left it at that. Nice walk out on the pier, awful fish & chips from The Magpie, we threw most of it in the bin and the carnival atmosphere was super tacky, just not our scene at all.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

Maudie, you and I were in each other's footsteps, snd I'm not surprised we saw things the same way. I would have traded my time in Whitby for Robin Hood's Bay.

I have never finished my trip report, but I think I'm going to put it up here unfinished. We did have an amazing time and loved the NY Moors, the Dales, the Lakes and then we went on to Liverpool we were met with our friend and had another great time. Watch for my partial trip report!

Obviously the time of year is a big factor in most tourist towns. We were there in May and found it very easy to get around and no great crowds. We also spent time visiting the NY Moors, Robin Hood's Bay and Staithes so plenty to see and do.

Hi Jenny, we were there in June, wasn't overly crowded but just didn't do it for us. But that said the whole area is wonderful, easy to fill a week with plenty to do and see.

Right tuscan, I'll hold you to it and look out for your report. Did you get a chance to read mine and compare notes? I think we could quite happily have travelled together!

I also love Whitby and you have received lots of good suggestions above. The only one I'd add is to stop on one of your drives for a modest lunch (may be just sandwiches) at the Birch Hall Inn in Beck Hole, which may be a uniquely unspoilt pub - certainly I've never been anywayhere else quite like it, and I am a fan of unspoilt pubs. Good ales too.

Oh, and I can't see that anyone above has mentioned the Dracula connection - you may wish to read or reread the book before you go or while you are there. The church is worth a visit with or without an interest in Dracula.

Hi Caroline, we went out to Beck Hole to the pub after reading about it in the Whitby paper for lunch and it was closed so will try again next time. The other great place we stumbled across for lunch was the Wheatsheaf Inn Egton http://www.wheatsheafegton.com/ probably one of the nicest pub lunches we had in the UK. Looking forward to going back next visit

Staithes is just north of Whitby and is somewhere I have always wanted to visit. It looks fairly dramatic.

Beck Hole pub was a great stop for a drink on the Rail Trail walk, Grosmont to Goathland or vise a versa.

Yes it is humptynumpty. The day we went there they were filming a new mystery show there so you couldn't get around very well.

We were in Whitby in late May.

I specifically wanted to go there for the Dracula connections. I kind of loved Stoker's book when I was younger, and actually used to use it as a teaching tool in certain writing classes.

Alas, I was only spooked by dinner at The Magpie.

Staithes is great - used to have a terrific fish restaurant called The Endeavour which has now sadly closed. It's not really similar to Robin Hood's Bay except there's a very steep hill down and there are restrictions on driving in the old centre. Best visited out of season - we stayed there for a few days one winter and I can safely say it was 'bracing'.
I like Whitby but can see why people don't take to it. Children love to visit if they have read the excellent 'Whitby Witches' series of books.
Also The Plot by Madeleine Bunting (a memoir) is very good if visiting the NY Moors area.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Plot-Biograp....../1847080855

www.robinjarvis.com/whitbyhome.html
The main tourist hot spots in the area (Castle Howard, Fountains, Rievaulx etc) are well documented, but for anyone who wants a few of the less popular ones then can I suggest -
1) Wheeldale Roman Road - you'll be the only ones walking up there on it! Very atmospheric.
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/d...le-roman-road/
2) Byland Abbey
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/d.../byland-abbey/
3) Elvington Air Museum
www.yorkshireairmuseum.org
4) Eden Camp (ideal for a rainy day)
www.edencamp.co.uk
5) Scampston Walled Gardens
www.scampston.co.uk
6)Burton Agnes Hall
www.burtonagnes.com
7) Mount Grace Priory
www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-mountgracepriory

I have just got to this part of the British coast in my blog (I am blogging my way around the coast of Britain). It has some useful links and photos. Why don't you have a look: http://postcards-pfte.blogspot.com/