Our next stop was York, and what an amazing city it is. I’m not a big city person (see my thoughts on London here) but I absolutely loved it. The city centre is compact with history everywhere you look and world class attractions like Jorvik, York Minster and the City Walls.

On our first evening in York once we’d settled into our Airbnb we had a wander through the city. You can feel the history all around you in central York. Down this street is a 16th century pub. Turn that corner and you see where Guy Fawkes was born. Down this alley is the remains of a Norman house.

The Shambles is the most spectacular part of central York, comprising of a few streets with an unbelievably historic atmosphere. With very little difficulty you can picture how life looked here in medieval times, and how little it has changed. You can completely understand why the Shambles was used as the inspiration for Harry Potter’s Diagon Alley (and this isn’t the only place that’s been used in Harry Potter. Read more here).

The narrow cobbled streets of the Shambles house centuries-old buildings leaning into the streets. Full of quaint and unique shops selling everything from chocolate and ale to books and ghosts. Yes ghosts! I’ll tell you more about that shortly. We absolutely loved walking through here. During the day it is busy, so be sure to come in the evening as we did, when it’s even more atmospheric. The shops will be closed, most of the people will be gone and you will have the streets to yourself.

The Shambles actually has a grisly history. It’s very name is the Old English word for slaughterhouse. The hooks on the front of the shops were originally used for hanging meat, and the overhanging buildings were built to protect the wattle and daub walls and stop the sunshine hitting the meat and turning it rancid. Lovely!

On our first full day in the city we started with Jorvik. Jorvik was the old Norse name for York and during the time of the Vikings it was a very important city of trade. In the 1970s they found a street in York with the remains of a massive Viking settlement which helped them greatly understand how Vikings lived. The Jorvik centre is a museum containing fascinating glimpses of Viking life such as cookware, jewellery, coins, combs and much more. As well as the museum Jorvik has a ride that goes through a recreated village built on the site of the original settlement. This interactive element, complete with the sounds and smells of Viking life, was great fun for the kids.

My favourite tidbit I learned was that Viking children had a particular toy they would play with which was a piece of bone on a string that made a buzzing sound when you spun it. During the dig they found 40 of these little toys inside a Viking toilet. They think the parents must have got so fed up with the noisy toys that they threw them in the toilet. I think we can all relate!

After the morning spent in Jorvik and another amble through the Shambles where it was hard not to get distracted by all the little shops and ancient buildings, we stopped for lunch in Bettys. Betty’s is a very famous tea room and we couldn’t resist the afternoon tea – when can I ever! There was a queue to get a table in Bettys and we did have to wait quite a while, but we ticked it off the list at least.

Post-lunch we had another top attraction in mind and that was the York Minster. This is a massive Norman cathedral, one of two of the most important seats of Christianity in the Church of England, and possibly the finest Gothic-style church in the UK. It is spectacular from the outside, a really beautiful building. Inside is also very impressive – the stained glass windows and the Chapter House in particular. You can also climb to the top of one of the towers for a nice view over the city from up high. Bear in mind that it’s 275 steps and they are narrow and winding, much like climbing castle towers.

While Rich and Rose climbed this tower, Theo and I stayed in the main cathedral. Now you might think that a 4 year old would find a dusty old cathedral boring, but you’d be wrong. At York Minster they are well set up for kids. The kids can borrow backpacks which have binoculars, magnifying glasses, torches, a compass and a notepad inside. You return the backpacks at the end ready for the next child to have a turn. Theo spent a very happy hour wearing his backpack, shining his torch into the cracks and crevices in the stone looking for spiders and dragon footprints through his magnifying glass. We had enormous fun doing this. This is a really inspired idea from York Minster which I’d never seen before. I was seriously impressed!

Just outside the York Minster I stumbled upon a little bookshop selling second-hand books where I picked up a beautiful hardback copy of Wuthering Heights. I had been very inspired by our trip to the moors the day before. Unfortunately this little book didn’t do so well on the journey home, falling victim to one of Rich’s ales. But it still sits proudly on my bookshelf next to my Book of Scones.

We came back to York Minster before dinner to catch Evensong. While we only managed ten minutes of this (it was always going to be hard for a 4 year old to be quiet and still during a church service), what we heard was beautiful. Listening to the haunting sound of the choral voices and the organ right in the middle of a 13th century cathedral was memorable indeed.

Dinner that night was the York Roast Co. If you like Yorkshire puddings and roast dinners this is the place for you. The roast dinner is served inside a Yorkshire pudding wrap. I opted for roast turkey with cranberry sauce and all the trimmings. Yum! We had really enjoyed some good Yorkshire puddings this trip.

After dinner we had another walk through the Shambles – honestly I just couldn’t stop looking at it – and had a climb up Clifford’s Tower which is the only-surviving part of York Castle, once a formidable medieval fortress. This Norman keep is a iconic landmark of the city. As we had English Heritage membership we were able to go inside for free. We climbed the tower stairs to the top for views over the city.

We finished our busy day back at the Airbnb and enjoyed the chocolate we had bought earlier from the York Chocolate story. Their flavours are very interesting – I can vouch for the orange and rhubarb and the oat milk chocolate.

On our final day in York we started with a long walk across the city to the National Railway Museum. This museum has quite the collection of trains including the famous Mallard, the fastest steam train ever recorded with an unbeaten high speed of 126mph in 1938. As well as steam trains there were also a few modern trains such as a Eurostar and a Japanese Shinkansen which you could go inside. I thought the steam trains were fascinating and I loved learning more about them, but the kids were getting bored after the first few – apart from the Shinkansen there were no other trains you could go inside. I think the museum would have benefited from a few more interactive exhibits.

After the museum we walked back to the city through the York Museum gardens which were teeming with squirrels, much to the kids’ delight. This was a nice city park with some open spaces, pretty gardens and the aforementioned squirrels. Oh and the ruins of the 13th century St Mary’s Abbey. How can you not be delighted by this history all around you! There was also a group of students with some owls which you could hold. Obviously this provided the kids with no end of entertainment.

From the park it was a quick hop to Bootham Bar, one of the entrances to the York City Walls. You can walk all the way round these elevated 13th century city walls and we walked as far as Monk Bar.

After the walls we headed to the York Ghost Merchants. This an actual shop selling ghosts. There are two of these ghost shops in York, one of which is in the Shambles, and we had seen the queue outside yesterday. The York ghost shop has become something of a viral sensation and the queues to get inside can be 3 hours long at peak times. The Shambles shop was closed today, but luckily for us there was a second ghost shop at the Dispensary just outside of the city centre and this had a much shorter queue. We only waited around 30 minutes and there was a park for the kids to run around while they waited.

Once you get inside the ghost shop you can choose from a huge range of little ghosts to take home. These are hand-crafted onsite and come in a range of colours and patterns. They are charming little ornaments and once you have selected your York ghost he has his photo taken and gets put in a little box with a window so you can safely take him home. It’s all very twee and the kids loved it, but the selection is massive and pretty hard to choose. The shop is tiny and only lets 4 people in at a time, hence the long queues.

Ghosts in hand we walked back through the city which was buzzing with people and live music. Amazing to see it so full of life on a Wednesday afternoon. In general York was full of people our entire stay. It’s great to see a thriving city centre like this as so many of them have suffered post-Covid.

York is a fantastic city to visit, and one of my favourite stops on this trip!

Coming up…nostalgia in Warwickshire.

Previously…read about the North York Moors here.