The dawn came up bright and sunny and there is just a trace of mist in the valley, but at least no frost (and that makes a change!)
We have picked a pretty good pitch which is already in sunshine at 8:45 AM and I am enjoying the view before getting ready to Drive to Sandsend along the coast.
We have enjoyed a little luxury this morning using the microwave to make porridge for breakfast, followed by toast in the electric pop up toaster.
(this van has all the comforts of home!
Last night I installed some LED lights for the times when we are on sites which lack electrical supply and they seem very effective. This is the view down onto Whitby Abbey as we descend the Hill From Low Moor
stopped on the roadside on the hill down from Whitby into Sandsend for a coffee and biscuits, sat out on one of the park benches for the first time this year.Here is a view looking towards Sandsend itself.
I find it hard to believe that the railway once ran through Sandsend (which had a little station) and along the face of the cliff you can see to the right.
Pat and I travelled on this train in what now seems to be a different lifetime!
I took a photo looking towards Whitby where already there were people on the beach walking the family pooch, and there were even a couple of characters having a paddle.
From here we continued along the coast road and turned off to Kettleness, where the one time railway station is now a rather large family home. Here is a view down into the bay, once there was a fishing village here, ( the twin to Runswick Bay on the opposite side of the bay,) but one winter night the whole village started to move, and the villagers crowded onto their fishing boats and watched in the moonlight as their homes slid down one by one into the sea.
Can you imagine how that must have felt?
The next shot is of Runswick Bay. This most beautiful village was rebuilt in the middle ages after it had suffered the same fate of collapsing into the sea.
We were a bit early for dinner so drove past Staithes and the Boulby Potash mine and over the top to the steep hill down into Skinningrove.
No tourist paradise this! rather down at heel as it used to house a sizeable inshore fishing fleet and also many of the miners who worked at the iron mine further up the valley that Skinningrove is built in.
Above the town there is the Corex steel works, and beyond the pier (used for shipping iron in its day) is one of the best unspoiled beaches on the east coast: three miles long it had strange domed cliff tops due to huge quantities of molten slag being tipped over the edge in the days of the iron works.
The stream that runs into the sea through the village still runs a bright orange with leakage from the iron mine. I will do a further blog on the place later as there is much history here
and a shot to give some idea of the scale of the cliffs to the south of the village.
, but today just a shot of the pier and one of the boat retrievel tractors will have to do,
and heres a view of this being done,
So eventually we got to Saltburn, here is the village centre, they have done well to get some early flowers on the roundabout, and today it was Farmers Market day at the rear of the Railway station.
Here is a view of the market and Church
Here is a view of the market and Church
I had intended to get some shots of the last remaining decorative pier on the East coast, and the cliff trams and general scene, but we couldn't get parked so that will have to be another day's visit and blog
Saltburn is an interesting place that has the last pier on the north east coast, though it is far shorter than it was originally, due to the damage caused by stormy seas, and even more by being run into by ships in distress!
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