Day 7 – York Day 2 and Drive to Edinburgh
Church in York
Today is Sunday. The day started with us getting up and going to church at the 9:30 am meetings of the York Ward.
The church which was only 2 miles away from our hotel took us about 11 minutes to drive there as we had to weave in and out of the city to finally make it to church.
We stayed for Sacrament and Gospel doctrine. I felt as if we were in a movie listening to the young men bless the sacrament, their fine English accents made the words sound majestic. I am amazed at the conformity of the church. Same meetings anywhere in the world, with saints who have deep testimonies of the Gospel. The congregation there is about a 1/3 of ours at home. They sing about 10 times louder. And you had to fight to participate in class. It was great!
York Day 2
Sunday was considerably less crowded than Saturday in York. We decided to tour York Minster, one of the oldest Gothic churches in the world.
We decided to go up the main tower which is 297 steps high. Tours are held every half an hour because the stairway is too tight for more than one person to travel up or down.
If your not claustrophobic then you have to worry about vertigo, because you are up there, and there isn’t a lot of support. The view from the top of the church, however, is extremely impressive.
Of course I’m a little bit of both, but nothing ventured nothing gained. Just keep your head up and don’t stop until you get to the top, the view is worth it. And for those with vertigo like myself, the top is fenced in so you can’t fall. Whew.
Interior
Having seen two previous gothic cathedrals, St. George’s and Bath Abbey, I was able to quickly identify the stone growing into the ceiling theme. The Minster like Westminster Abbey and Bath Abbey has a Nave and choir seating.
As with the other churches, several local dignitaries are buried in there.
There is quite an extensive undercroft of the church with a museum of the old Roman City which lies under the streets of York. We quickly walked through this and the crypts.
Lunch, The Dungeon, & the Wall
After leaving the Minster, we wondered the shops and restaurants of York for a few hours. We ended up eating at the York Roast Company, eating a couple of turkey and stuffing sandwiches. The meat and stuffing was great, but the sandwich was a little dry.
Every street corner we turned we found another building built in the 1400s. All had a very Tudor look to them. We could have taken pictures of the entire city. We really loved York.
Tiff loved it because of the shoe stores. I have a feeling if we lived here I’d have to get a second job to pay for her shoe collection.
After walking the streets in the city, we ended up at the Dungeon of York. Which is a reenactment of some of the horrors committed there. The plague and the tortures there are imaginable. I can’t even contemplate what they were thinking.
Both Tiff and I played key rolls during the walking tour which takes you from room to room to tell you the stories of real life life and victims of terrible brutality.
I unfortunately was hacked up by the “Torturer” while Tiff was condemned in not one, but two different witch presentations. The second of which (he he) she was burned.
The presentation took a little over an hour and was really entertaining. The actors did a great job. They have these “Dungeons” throughout Europe. We passed three in our trip one in London, York, and Edinburgh. It was worth a one time visit.
On our way out of the city we stopped at the great wall which was built around York. They call these walls the “Roman Walls” although most of them, if not all of the remaining walls, were not built by the Romans. Not to take away from the impressiveness of the walls. The current walls were built between the 1200 and 1400s.
You can walk on most of them and see the defense positions created to protect the city. Tiff and I spent about 20 minutes walking on and checking out the walls.
Drive to Edinburgh
The drive from York to Edinburgh is a little over three hours in good traffic. We decided to drive up the coast so we stopped by Blyth and Tynemouth. The coastal view was really beautiful. It reminded me of something in Massachusetts, really pretty, but there is no way I would get in the cold water.
Once we got into Scotland the scenery turned to farm land. Farm after farm. It was stunning. I would highly recommend the drive. It took a little longer, but it was gorgeous.
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