North Yorkshire - The Market Town of Thirsk

We arrived in York at about 1:30 PM on 13th August. We located the car hire service and picked up our car - a bright red Toyota Yaris. This time I drove. It took about 40 minutes to drive to the Gallery B&B in the market town of Thirsk. We found it with little difficulty. We've been using Google Maps on our iPhones for turn-by-turn directions and so far the maps have been pretty darned good. The cheap USB cigarette lighter adapters I picked up before the trip have been great to keep our phones charged while using the battery-intensive Maps and GPS features.


One of the first shops we saw on entering the town was a little sandwich shop. But, as it shares a name with one of my nephews, I thought I'd take a picture of it. 
Thirsk is in the heart of North Yorkshire, and is the local town for the surrounding farms and hamlets. The marketplace in the town center is charming and contains eateries, small shops, 3 small supermarkets and about a dozen pubs. Apparently Thirsk has some, err, Thirst.


Thirsk's largest attraction, however, aside from its quaint charm, is the James Herriot Museum.

The Herriot Museum chronicles the life of Vetrinarian James Wight (Herriot was a pen name). The first half of the museum explores the "real James Herriot" and the second part follows his rise to fame through his books ("All Creatures Great and Small" was the breakout hit in the U.S.), the BBC television series that was more popular in the U.S. (the Downton Abbey of its day in the 70s) and the TV movies. The last bit of the museum records the history of veterinary practice.

 
ABOVE, Left: beloved character Mrs. Pumphrey and her dog, Tricky-woo wait to be seen by Dr. Herriot. Poor Tricky-woo has been stricken with flop-bott again. Right: My Dad, also suffering from flop-bott, sits down in one of the TV series sets, attempting to learn his lines. 
The museum was very well done, whether you are a particular fan of Herriot or not. There is also a 20 minute video, hosted by Christopher Timothy (who starred as Herriot in the TV series), which is well worth seeing and which is the transition point from the "real" Herriot to the famous one. There is even an interactive section of the museum, allowing kids of all ages the chance to dig in, elbows deep.



An udderly brilliant experience!We strolled around the Thirsk marketplace, checked out the historic church not far from the center, and took the opportunity to do some washing-up.

 

Next we'll head further into the Yorkshire countryside and explore the ruins of Helmsley Castle and Rievaulx Abbey!

---

Interesting VacaKen Sidebar, Entry Four:
My favorite travel accessory?  My bottle-opener.  There really aren’t twist-off tops for bottled beer in Europe, and bottles are better than cans.  You can also buy soft drinks in glass bottles with caps – although plastic bottles with twist-offs are taking over.
My second favorite travel accessory?  My toenail clippers.  Although useful to trim your nails, I’ve used them more frequently to open stubborn packages, trim wayward threads and clip open zip ties I’ve used to secure my luggage in the hotel from casual snooping by chambermaids.