June 8 - Around York

Today, I had 3 objectives, Laura had two:

-Laundry

-Visit York Minstwer

-Visit The National Railroad Museum (not on Laura's list)

We got to the laundromat and it was open.  Dropped off the laundry.  There's no need for  me to include pictures of dirty laundry in the blog, so that one is taken care of.

York is famous for a number of things, and one is the wall around the city.  It's very extensive, well built of stone and you can walk on sections of it.  Here's a shot of a short section - it's 15 feet down without a railing on the right side.

Enough about the wall; onto York Minster, the largest Medieval cathedral in Northern Europe.  The site was fist inhabited 2000 years ago; the present cathedral was begun 800 years ago. 

A couple of shots from the outside. The extra height attained by this structure was due to it having wooden framed roofs, which are much lighter than stone.  

Gargoyles near the entrance.

A view down the Nave from the West end.  That's the organ in the back of the photo, but there is still the Quire and the East End behind.

Two of the many huge stained glass windows. 

This is called the King's Screen, just under the organ.  The statues are of the 15 kings that ruled during the construction of the Norman and medieval cathedrals.

One of the many crypts - this one is for Walter de Gray; Archbishop 1215 - 1255.

Many of the crypts were simple black slabs on the floor - you would walk over them if you weren't careful. 






















I paid extra for the privilege of climbing the 275 steps of the central tower to the highest point in York.


A shot of the flying buttresses halfway up.




At the top I had a nice chat with the (volunteer?) staff member up there.  He comes up in the morning and chaperones each of the groups as they spend time up there.

Interesting facts:
-There are 20 masons working on replacing weathered stones at any given time.  The stone is a magnesium limestone, so it will weather.
-When they replace a stone, they make it to the original dimensions of that stone, instead of making it flush with the adjacent, weathered stones.  If they made the new one flush, then eventually the cathedral would shrink.

A view of the town.


















The west towers.  Look very carefully at the right side, just below the upper spires.  You may pick out  .....




this fellow.  Nesting Peregrine Falcons.
















A final view of some of the detail in the spires.


It would be easy to spend all day and take a zillion pictures, but I'll leave it there.  You'll just have to go and see it for yourself.

 After York Minster we had a coffee and snack and went back to the hotel so Laura could rest a bit.  This meant I could go out and get into trouble on my own.  My choice, of many choices, was to see the National Railway Museum.  A bit of a contrast to the morning's excursion.


This was Queen Victoria's saloon car that she used to travel in.





One of the many engines on display. (I forgot to take good netes about it)

 A replica of one of the very first steam engines.







I could go on & on, but I won't, partially because the battery in my camera died.  Suffice it to say that the place is huge, including an extensive display of the Flying Scotsman.  Also, there are lots of displays of more modern equipment, including one of the original Japanese Bullet Train Locomotives.

I'll leave it there for now.  I have lots of more photos, but space doesn't permit.  After the museum there was my adventure where I was trying to exchange my Northern Irish pounds (not generally accepted by retailers south of Scotland), but I won't regale you with it.

Time to prepare for tomorrow's 105 km to Gimby.  Not as much vertical (yay!).


Oh yes, our laundry arrives back a the hotel, nice & clean and it was all there.