The Flying Helminskis: One Night in (Old) York

When we lived in Indonesia we traveled quite a bit and we were very fortunate to visit exotic places like Bali, Malaysia, and Papua. Now that we're living in London, our travels have taken a bit of a different tack. Instead of going to exotic, remote locations, we're now visiting parts of the UK that are a bit off the typical tourist path. So it was in that vein that we took a quick 1 night trip up to York a few weeks ago. As we learned though, even in a quick 2 day trip there is a ton to see in York. So buckle up kids, this is a long one...

York is a quaint old city the Northern part of England, and much like the rest of the country, it's easily accessible via train from London. So, we got up bright and early on a Saturday morning, and hopped on the train heading north.

Gloria chose her finest Carmen Sandiego-esque outfit for the trip

The train had a built in Monopoly board, albeit with a British twist.

A quick 2 hours later we arrived in York. On our walk to our hotel, we saw this:

Apparently rowing is REALLY popular here

After a quick stop to admire the view over the river, it was on to our home for the weekend, Elliott's B&B.

Elliott's is an old Victorian gentlemen's residence that has been converted to a hotel, and it's lovely. If you're ever planning a visit to York, we highly recommend the place.

Now, on to the cool stuff in York! The city itself has just a wee bit of history. Per Wikipedia, it was founded by the Romans in '71. Not 1971, 1871, or even 1071. We're talking the year 71. As in 71 AD. Yeah, it's old. Much like many other places in Europe, York was conquered and ruled by various groups (most notably the Romans, the Vikings, and the English). As you can imagine, there's a ton of really cool historical artifacts and things to check out, which is exactly what we did. Onward!

The year was 71. The 9th Roman Legion arrived and conquered a local tribe known as the Brigantes, and proceeded to construct a wooden military fortress on the current site of the York Minster. This marked the founding of York (though it wouldn't be called that for quite some time). As you would imagine, not much remains from those early days, but there are a few artifacts. The most prominent being the city walls. Since the time of the Romans, York has had defensive walls surrounding it. Most of the walls from Roman times are now gone, but the medieval walls are largely still intact (fun fact: York has more miles of intact city walls than any other city in England). The most recognizable part of the Roman walls that still stands today is probably the Multangular Tower. It was part of a series of defensive towers built around 300 AD or so.

Not much else of the Roman wall remain, but there are a few ruins to be seen.

Roman ruins, and the traditional German automobiles found in ancient Rome.

We spent the better part of a day walking the full circumference of the medieval walls. It's an interesting mix of ancient structures, new buildings, and modern life.

Just imagine an archer firing arrows through this arrowslit. Crazy.

The view through the arrowslit.

These Daffodils grow all over along the walls

Walking the walls was actually a very cool experience. In some places, the original entrances and other artifacts still stand.

One of the old entrances to the wall. Note that bar here means gate. Really.

This is a toilet. People lived inside the building, and relieved themselves down a chute that emptied here. Look out below!

This is a good example of how the new and old intermix: a new office building right next to the walls.

One of the more interesting places along the walls is Walmgate Bar. Much like the other bars, it's an old gateway into the city. This one is quite well preserved though and has a couple interesting features. First, it is the only bar in York that still has its defensive barbican still standing. What is a barbican you ask? Check it out:

It's a narrow path that serves as the only way in. So enemies trying to get in would have to go through this chute, and there would be archers, people dumping hot oil from above, etc. Not fun.

Second, at the end of the barbican the 15th century doors are still intact. The crazy thing is the doors are wood. They survived for over 500 years! I thought my family did well to have our fence survive for 15 years. Sheesh.

That's my wife touching some 500 year old wood.

Thirdly, there is a house built into Walmgate bar. Seriously.

It is thought to have been built in the 1580s, and people still lived there all the way up until 1957. I can't really wrap my mind around the idea of living in a structure built in the 1500's.

The total walk around the walls was something like 2.6 miles and it was definitely a cool experience.

Some of the other interesting artifacts around York are the castle remains,

This is Clifford's Tower, which was once the fortified keep for the castle.

and the ruins of St. Mary's Abbey.

St. Mary's Abbey is kind of a funny/interesting story. It was destroyed in the 1540's after the Dissolution of the Monasteries (as directed by King Henry VIII). The story behind the dissolution is somewhat complex, but basically Pope Clement VII declined to annul Henry's marriage to Catherine of Aragon (Henry wanted a male heir and claimed that he and Catherine hadn't had a son because their marriage was "blighted in the eyes of God"). In response to this, Henry had himself declared Supreme Head of the Church of England (essentially ensuring he could have his way), and ultimately he closed St. Mary's and seized its assets (it was one of the wealthiest churches in England at the time). So, basically Henry VIII didn't get what he wanted, so he changed the rules and shut down/took the money from those who didn't go along with his demands. Apparently being a Monarch comes with some perks.

I'd be remiss if I didn't also mention York Minster.

It's a huge church that's visible from basically everywhere in York. It was built from 1230-1472 and is a very beautiful building. We didn't go inside though, as we've seen tons of beautiful churches now and we chose to focus elsewhere. Moving on!

I mentioned earlier that York was once conquered by the Vikings. Well, that happened in 867 when The Great Heathen Army of Danish Vikings captured York. They referred to the city as Jorvik, which is where we get the name York. So the Vikings conquering the area was a hugely important part of history. They ruled York until 954 when the last Viking king, Eric Bloodaxe, was expelled and the area was combined into the Anglo Saxon state. As I mentioned earlier, some of the Roman artifacts in York are huge walls and towering structures. The Viking remains are quite different. In fact, most were buried. In the late 1970's, well preserved remains of several timber buildings and many other artifacts such as pottery and metalwork were discovered during excavations in York. In all, over 40,000 artifacts were recovered. In response to the discovery, the excavated site was recreated, and in 1984 the Jorvik Viking Center was established. It houses many of the artifacts, and also includes a fun little ride inside. It's definitely geared towards children, but one thing really struck us. The ride itself includes smells, which is really a cool way to be immersed in the story. For example, on one section of the ride, you enter a recreation of a meat smoking/drying building. When the ride enters the building, it actually smells like smoking meat. It's hard to explain but it was really cool.

Ok I think that about does it for the history lesson!

There are two more things I want to cover here. The train museum and ghosts.

York is home to the National Railway Museum in the UK. We heard it was a must see, so we went to check it out. I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but it was really fun. They had all sorts of trains there, from very early models, to royal train cars, to modern high speed trains. It definitely took me back to being a kid and building model railroads.

Some of the royal train cars.

...and we'll never be roooyaaalllsss.....

A huge Chinese train. Crazy big.

Apparently the Mallard is one of the most famous trains in the UK. Now you know.

Quite Harry Potter-esque.

and there you go!

York is also home to a lot of ghosts (allegedly). It's generally known as one of the most haunted places in the UK, so naturally we went on a ghost tour. We had a great guide who came complete with snarky british attitude. He was actually great. A perfect mix of funny, snarky/witty, and knowledgeable about the ghost stores.

One of the more interesting stories was one about a plumber who, while working in a basement in one of the buildings in the city, heard what sounded like a horn and men marching. It got louder and louder, until it seemed to be right on top of him. Then, to his amazement, a legion of Roman soldiers marched through the wall and went out the other side of the basement. But, they didn't just march across the floor. For some reason the soldiers' legs seemed to extend below the floor level, so it appeared they were kind of walking on their knees. Later, the area was excavated and an ancient Roman road was found about 15 inches below the surface of the floor. Spoooooooky!!!!

In the end we had a blast in York and we highly recommend it for anyone visiting the UK. Definitely worth the trip. I'll leave you with a few more images from the trip.