Blakey Ridge to Grosmont

The most important thing to mention today is that the girls convincingly won triv last night!  (Steve W was an honourary girl!).  The decider is tonight.

Day 13 (not unlucky for anyone) broke with mist shrouding the hills, but no rain.  We left at our usual time of 8 ish and got to the start point at about 8.30.  Carol and I started out on the walk across the moors with everyone and after about an hour and 2.7 miles we turned back to collect the bus.  It was windy on top and quite cold - but no rain!!  We saw quite a few grouse about, they make a funny sound like a laughing duck!  Carol and I also saw a skylark quite close. 

The walkers carried on in a downwards direction for a change to Glaisdale and then onto Grosmont.  The steam train goes through Grosmont from Pickering to Whitby.  Once they had walked down to and through Grosmont, they needed to walk up out of the village.  This was by no means an easy task as it was a 1 in 3 road and went on for quite a distance; but they must be fitter as no-one needed to stop half way up for a breather.  Unfortunately the leader group took the wrong road when it forked and got to the top only to realise they had taken the wrong road, so had to come back down half way to go back up the other road! Once at the top it was an easy walk to the main road and the mini bus.  13 miles walked; just 13 to go to the end.

Once back to the mini bus, Carol and I headed down towards Pickering and passed through a pretty village called Rosedale Abbey, and (oh dear) they had a tea room displaying some rather gorgeous cakes and scones.  It had to be done, so we went inside and ordered coffee with a toasted cheese and
mustard scone; it was scrummy.  I forgot to mention the other day in Reeth that we also had a scone with coffee - this time it was a cranberry scone with wensleydale cheese;  we are becoming quite expert at finding different scones!  Interestingly where the walkers walk about 13 miles across the moors, it takes the bus a lot more miles to get to the destination as the roads only seem to go north to south not West to East.
We gradually made our way then to Goathland where they filmed Heartbeat and the station was used in the first Harry Potter film.

 

 

After a quick look round here, we headed to the main road and a layby to meet the walkers.  Then back to the house for tea and biscuits etc. etc.