“Every day lasts a year.” James Herriot (Alf Wight)

When I was growing up the TV show All Creatures Great and Small played a leading role in our family entertainment. We originally watched it on a huge wood encased black and white tv which weighed as much as a fridge and whose picture slowly retreated into infinity when you turned it off. Later on, when the TV sets showed colours, my grandfather introduced me to the books on which the tv show had been based. Written by ‘James Herriot’, the pen name of Alf Wight these books totally captured my imagination. My grandfather was a huge fan. He was not only the same generation as Alf Wight but he was also an Alfred although he went by Grandad Al rather than James Herriot.

For almost 50 years Alf Wight was a veterinary surgeon in Thirsk, a town north of York. Today his surgery is operated as a museum both to mid-20^th century veterinary practise, householding and to the books, TV shows and movies. We were going there.

We started with a delivered McDonalds breakfast. Not as exotic as the one in Thailand but it put us in good stead for the day to come. Then it was onto a train to Thirsk and then a long flat walk from Thirsk Station into the town. As we wandered along we spent most of the trip beside the race course which inevitably had it’s James Herriot Pavillion where the pints of Theakstons no doubt disappear on race days.

Once into the township we popped into first a Lidl then more successfully a Tesco in search of an emery board for mum. In Tesco there was more evidence of the strange English division between ‘lager’ and ‘beer’ where they each had a separate aisle .Road works complicated our passage but eventually we found ourselves walking down the road towards 23 Kirkgate.

We paid our entry fee and wandered though the recreated 1940’s rooms. Mum recognised much in the kitchen from her grandparent’s kitchens. We watched the show reel movie and avoided the “Children’s Active Learning Room” before exiting through the gift shop where mum loaded up on a few mementos.

We then crossed the street and popped into the Cross Keys for a pint. We were definitely out of place in this pub although not unwelcome. Greyhound races played on a large tv, a small elderly man stood at the bar and scowled at our odd intrusion over his pint of lager, young heavily tattooed thickly Yorkshire accented men boisterously discussed something at a table their conversations laced with expletives. Bar mum the entire pub was male. We drank our beer and moved on.

We wandered the town square where I avoided another couple of sports screen and bloke boozers before deciding on the Mowbray Arms. The pub still had some divided drinking spaces and we ordered a pint and a ½ of Landlord that was in perfectly fine condition. Not being up for the long walk back to the station I managed to disturb the bar maid’s lunch and asked her to order us a taxi.  She was super helpful and soon we were flying back towards the station.¹

Thirsk Station was now busy with the young forming up to go cause drunken sexy trouble in York for the evening. Mum was particularly taken with the young women in micro skirts without bras whose nipples were marking the cold north European air by standing to attention and whose mouths were marking it with the word “fuck”.   
We filed onto the train and ended up sat behind a group of women with Newcastle accents, rollers in their hair and fresh doses of Botox still settling their features into caricature. Middle aged men are not meant to understand the beauty processes of young women and I don’t.   

We rode the train to Leeds and wandered through the streets and pedestrianised shopping malls to Turks Head Yard, a narrow lane that houses Whitelocks. Whitelocks Luncheon House is a historic pub once championed by John Betjeman. It retains a striking interior. Unfortunately on this Saturday night it was absolutely rammed , we scrummed at the bar and managed to procure pints of Five Points Railway Porter and bags of crisps before retreating out into the yard to a table. Mum accidentally knocked a man’s pint over as she passed into her seat with her backpack and I was ready to offer a replacement when he responded “it’s ok, I wasn’t enjoying it anyway”

We were meant to be meeting Zak Avery and his partner Leeanne here but the cold outdoor seat wouldn’t do for mum so after our pint we wandered on to find the Angel. Being a Sam Smiths pub I correctly deduced it might be a bit more chill for mum. It took multiple wanders down back alleyways to finally find it but we were soon sat in the upstairs lounge with a pint of Old Brewery Bitter and a ½ of Sams Dry Stout. Zak and Leeanne tracked us down and soon we moved on to a craft beer bar where pints of a Kernel porter were consumed.

We finally moved on to a new Indian restaurant called Kerela Canteen where a meal of delicious Indian small plates were devoured and we were served by an Aussie waitress who revelled in hearing antipodean accents.

When travelling in Britain for the most part I avoid talking politics. My English family is a lot more right wing and conservative than we are. We don’t travel the length of the earth to argue. So, for the most part we just smile and nod. However, tonight’s company were fellow lefties although ones in support of the current (in my view terrible) UK Labour Govt. It is ironic that this was the mix that brought us closest to political argument on the trip. Still delicious spicy morsels and good hearts of the people round the table won the day in the end and a great night was had.   We took a late train back to York and a taxi to our guesthouse where much needed sleep awaited us.   

1. While writing this up I noticed that the Mowbray Arms has changed status on google to “permanently closed” although there seems some suggestion the pub is changing hands rather going altogether. One hopes a phoenix will rise. ↩︎