Friday 15 July 2011

Now Marie – us blokes aren’t mind readers you know! We are a lot of things but not that particularly good when it comes to reading the minds of the opposite sex. Anyway the owls have all gone to bed.

Hot as this morning and we had decided walk the wall and visit the York Portrait Gallery. Gallery first and we wandered through the Museum park and passed the ruins of the old abbey. Out onto Low Petergate and around the corner to the Gallery. Wrong move really as was said to us by another older couple. The Gallery became full of a large group of teenagers from someplace in Europe as we didn’t recognise the language. They laughed and spoke loudly to their mates who sometimes were standing or sitting far away. They filled up all of the chairs and generally were not interested what was on the walls. We wandered into other rooms within the gallery and looked at what was on offer. We had head that there was a showing of Old masters but instead there were two different showings of a Yorkshire artist and a potter. The pottery was interesting and from 1920 to 1940s and by some particular potter. The artist had a fettish with nude bodies but also copied Titian and Van Dyke and painted a lot of friends but who had no exhibitions whilst he was alive. Not bad but not what we had hoped.

Out of the gallery and it was coffee time. Small coffee shop but during our coffee a chap who was a bus driver and who knew the owner debated loudly the pros and cons of retirement and the need for lots of people the need for super etc. It was becoming our morning for all this unneeded noise. We walked out of the coffee bar and straight across the road to the start of the wall. Up the first set of steps at Bootham Bar as the gate is called. The wall in York is now in three parts unlike the wall in Chester that we were able to walk the whole way round. The first part of the wall was quite high up but had a handrail along the city side to keep us on the right track. The upper stories of the wall, in this part, was added in the 14th century. The wall turns sharply along this stretch and the Minster is highly visable over the tops of surrounding houses. In parts the houses come right up to the wall and we could see down into backyards some of which had lovely vegetable gardens and one had a lovely water feature. Lots of people were walking in both directions. We came to the Richard III Museum which was in one of the wall towers. Smallest Museum I have seen and there was also a shop in there too. It was full with six people inside and the chap behind the counter couldn’t move much either. Along the wall was the Ice House an ancient domed building, a bit like an igloo, into which they put slabs of ice to keep food fresh. Sort of an ancient refrigerator. At Layerthorpe Postern we descended the wall and walked along the Foss River and then back up onto a much lower wall. Well it was low on our side, only about 2 metres to the grass and even lower in places. The next area where there was no wall didn’t need one as there was a large area of water from the Foss and Ouse Rivers.

We were not going to walk the third part of the wall as we both had sore feet and were in need of a beer! We turned towards Old York and came across Clifford’s Tower. For sheer drama of it’s setting in York there is nothing else to compare. The stone tower on top of a huge mound dates back to the 13th century when it was built by Henry III. The mound was put there by William the Conqueror and these were called “Mottes” as he built several. Clifford’s Tower was perhaps the scene of one of the most horrible events in York’s history. The Jews of York sought refuge there after being attacked by a mob. They were given the option – be baptised or killed, they took the third option of committing suicide en mass. At the time the tower was built of timber and was burned to the ground. It was then rebuilt in stone and offers one of the best views across York. It is a Heritage Building so out came our pass and we climbed the 46 steps to the base of the tower. Inside was quite cute – not huge but there are two circular staircases up to the ramparts. Up I went and when I got up there called to Jannie and said that she could do this!! So up she came – much to my surprise. She appeared and I held her hand – we walked around the perimeter and the views were wonderful, Jannies hand got sweatier and sweatier. Down below we headed to the Old City for lunch. Another beer and nice lunch – it was too hot to sit outside so we moved indoors to eat. Over lunch Jannie told me she didn’t look at the view up the top of the tower just followed me around the ramparts and couldn’t wait to get down.

After lunch we decided to go and look at the Minster.

We were also able to use our Heritage card for a discount at the Minster which was good. First impressions on walking inside were that it is absolutely enormous! It is made up of 3 sections. If you think of a cross with a short part across the middle, the middle bit was the early English bit. It was built in 1220-1260. The 2 long pieces that stretch from this early English Minster were built in 1280-1350 and 1361-1472. The Minster is extremely high – it made me giddy to look up at the ceiling. The ceilings were hugely elaborate and beautiful and one of the stain glass windows is the largest in the UK. It really is an impressive cathedral and we enjoyed our walk around immensely. After the main part we headed into the Chapter House. This is a bit like a cog of a wheel attached to the side of the cathedral by an angular walkway. The Chapter House is an octagonal room completed in 1290 and was designed for the Canons of York, the governing body of the cathedral to meet and discuss policy. There are 44 seats around the walls. The Chapter House has no central columns holding up the ceiling but has an ingeniously designed wooden vault suspended ceiling. There was a model of the c eiling in the room and it really was amazing. The ribs and wooden bosses are mostly original and date back to 1798. There was more to come as we descended to the Undercroft, Treasury and Crypts. There were grave fears that the central tower of the Minster was in danger of collapse so a programme of underpinning was started. Excavations were carried out which revealed the remains of the Roman Principia where Constantine may have been proclaimed Emperor in AD307. Also visible are the foundaqtions and masonry of the Norman cathedrals which were there before the Minster was built. It was very impressive underground and you could see the huge blocks of concrete that have been put there to secure the future of the cathedral. Kev was very impressed!

Very sore feet by now as the wall was several K’s long and we had b een on our feet for around 4 hours by now so we headed back towards our lodgings and bought an ice cream in the museum gardens on our way.

Girls – we saw lots of squirrels again today – they are such lovely little animals and jump around the trees very fleet footedly. They grab a berry and sit on their hind legs and hold it in their hands and nibble. There are also lots of geese on the river outside our room and they tend to make very loud squawking noises often early in the morning when we are trying to sleep. There is lots going on at the river with ducks, rowboats, river cruises and long boats.

We are off to Cambridge tomorrow – quite a long trip again so we might only start Mary once we get close to our target as she ran out of battery last time.