Ways To Go!

The Cleveland Way runs from Helmsley to Filey down the East Coast. It ends on the cliff top on the landward side of the Brigg.
These photos are taken from The Wolds Way which also ends at the cliff top on to the landward side of the Brigg at Filey and runs south down the coast before crossing the Yorkshire Wolds to its starting point at Hessle by the Humber Estuary.

The second photo is taken from the clifftop above Hunmanby Gap looking south towards Flamborough Head.

The third photo is from the same spot looking north towards Filey Brigg.

The fourth photo is further along the clifftop heading towards Filey.

Photos one, five and six are of the Lifeboat House, Coble Landing and Filey Lifeboat #12-13 ( which is our local boat) respectively.

Photo seven is from the town centre of Filey looking towards the sea down Cargate Hill (or 'Cardiac Hill' given its steep ascent from sea level. Particularly when you're carrying stones that you've knicked from the beach to build a rockery for the garden).

Puffed Out!

Between North Landing and Flamborough Head.
May 15th 2018.

Following on from my recent success yesterday of paying to enter the RSPB reserve at Bempton and then spotting the only Puffin on the whole East Coast, I spotted another one from the cliff path, a little further south today.

For free!!

Actually there were, apparently, a few of them.
So I want my fiver from yesterday back.
They drew a bit of a crowd and much fun was had watching those who had spotted one trying to describe where they were to those who hadn't.

"You see that black and white bird, to the left of that other black and white bird? Well just above that is another black and white bird and the black and white bird to the right of that one is the puffin. But it has its head down so it looks like the rest... "
"..... er, which cliff is it on again?"

Anyways, seeing as how I seem to be a pro puffin spotter, I've highlighted it in a circle on the photo.
The Yorkshire Belle (out of Bridlington) sailed past on a puffin spotting trip, but I don't think that they saw ours.
Unlucky.

Following all the Auk related excitement, we continued our leisurely stroll to see Flamborough Light and the Fog Station on the Headland.

Long Distance Roundabout

This is the turntable which is just outside the throat of Scarborough Railway Station. Once you've cleared the platforms and rounded the left hand curve, heading towards York, the track to the turntable can be seen, veering to the right.
It is this facility which enables Scarborough to be a fairly regular recipient of the summertime steam hauled charter trains and rail tours.
Being a terminus station, a fair amount of jiggery (and quite a bit of pokery) goes into extracting the locomotive from the front of the train, reversing it down the track to this turntable, spinning it around, reversing it back and attaching it to the other end the right way around.
The guys doing it seem to be having fun, though!
A few weeks ago, ex LNER A3 Pacific 4472 (aka 60103) "Flying Scotsman" had a turn on this very table before spending the night at Scarborough Platform 1.

INTERESTING FACT
To the left of the locomotive, running along the retaining wall, you can see the longest railway station bench in the world.

Getting The Bird.

After the visit to Bempton Bird Sanctuary last year, it was good to find a few more of our feathered friends in residence this time.
Hundreds of Gannets, Guillemots, Razorbills, Kittiwakes, and Fulmars.
Only one Puffin though.

Pleased to Meet Ewe Two

Dotterel Roundabout, Speeton.
May 14th 2018.
Outside The Dotterel Pub.
Sheep (fibre glass).

Pleased to Meet Ewe

Chatburn, Clitheroe, Lancashire.
May 13th 2018.
On the way down to the River Ribble.
Sheep (real ones).

Fishermens Christmas Tree

Made from fishing nets and lobster pots.
Cobble Landing, Filey.

RAF Bempton. Wars & Witchcraft.

The clifftops at Bempton contain a large RSPB sanctuary.
They are home to the largest community of seabirds in Europe, with something like 500,000 birds of varying types nesting, squawking and flying about the cliffs at any one time and at all hours from March to October.

We went in November and saw 3 pigeons, a couple of Herring Gulls and a crow.

Fenced off from the sanctuary, but visible from it, are the remains of RAF Bempton which was part of the Chain Home Low radar system which was used during World War Two to detect incoming flying things of a different nature.

Once we'd shot down all the Huns, however, it was then used during the Cold War to keep our eye on what the Trotskies were up to.
During this time it housed an improved, high speed centrimetric radar system ('winkle') which could detect smaller objects at greater distances. The remains of this system can be seen with the posts lined up in a 'V' formation towards the front (seaward) part of the site.

RAF Bempton was decommissioned in the 1970's and, it is claimed, became inhabited by an occult sex group who added strange graffiti to the walls and partook in even stranger goings on within the many underground chambers of the operations centre.

They were eventually and forcibly evicted by The Military Police and the site was cordoned off from the public. It is now harder to access, being entirely situated on private farmland.

This didn't stop the inquisitive, though, and the occult reputation continues after a lad from Hull disappeared visiting the site in 2010.
Supposedly, he visited the site to look at the graffiti in the bunker. His car and possessions were found nearby but there has been no sign of him since, despite extensive searching of the premises and surrounding land/cliffs/sea.

There are reports of other missing persons in the area and nearby Flamborough village has a local reputation for witchcraft and the occult which survives to this day.

Stoned

Whitby Abbey from over the wall of the neighbouring Youth Hostel garden.
The Abbey is closed during the week now we are into November, so this is probably the best peep at it anyone is going to get until next year.

The dividing stone wall appears to contain some interestingly shaped stones. These have probably been 'borrowed' from the Abbey at some point in the past following its dissolution and fall into ruin.

It was common practice to recycle materials from an Abbey, especially if you were a landowner who was in the favour of King Henry VIII.

Sir Hugh Cholmley of Whitby obviously was as he also built a large house to go with his wall, which he rather modestly called 'Cholmley House'.

There is also a nice dragon sculpture in the garden too, which is a representation of the original carving on one of the wooden beams inside the house.

They Call a Spade a Spade in Scarborough.

Beach cleaning and maintenance equipment for Scarborough South Bay.