When bored...

Make a rainbow out of stamps

Re-arranging my books

Books by blueness

A rainbow

Black books by height

One afternoon, when bored, I decided to re-arrange some of my books, here are the results

A leaning tower of books (they fell over first time)

18/5/12 Georgina’s Café, Petergate: Lunchtime

Note: We were sat in the window of this cafe, which made me feel a bit like a cake on display, only less edible

Six individuals each dressed all in black just passed by like a parade of rubbish ninjas.

Slightly “aggressive” leaflet hand-outer just shoved a leaflet in the faces of some people who were clearly trying to avoid him. He just looks a bit lost now, must be gutted because the place next door is handing out free food. Leaflet man doesn’t look like he suits this restaurant, like he’s nicked all their leaflets and now he’s handing them out to try and get rid of the evidence. Hopeless thief though; who would give away the stuff they’ve nicked right outside the place they’ve nicked them from, it’s like selling TVs off the back of a lorry in front of a Currys. Based on this I assume he’s a bonafide distributor of the restaurant’s leaflets.

Mini rush on outside, but poor Mr. leaflet is largely rejected. Creative Italian cuisine? Does it draw pictures while you eat? Singing spaghetti? Guy just completely blanked Mr. L.

Quite enjoying watching people looking at the menus, they approach like they’re not just what they’re looking at; Don’t get too close! They might think we’re interested. Police man with a proper policeman hat on, but it makes his head look really small.

A bloke just waved at me, brilliant. I can half see a guy in the 1^st story window across the road, seems to working intently but I can’t tell what on. He seems to have a napkin tucked under his chin.

16/5/12 Driving Home about half 3

Note: This post isn't in brilliant prose because I was writing in the car, and getting a coherent sentence on paper while being shaken about is rather difficult and I am too lazy to edit it.

The road from the car park is unpleasantly bumpy. Mum’s decided to drive through town, risky, car in front is half in the bike lane, probably a douche, he turned left. A mixture of suited gents and casually dressed men around. Two ambulances just hurtled past. The view under Bootham bar is nice; it makes a brilliant aperture. Lendal bridge is busy with pedestrians as usual. The station: an excellent place to sit around at rush hour and watch the chaos stemming from the poor road layout and high level of traffic. Sat behind bus at the traffic lights, says “push to open” on the back, sounds like an instruction, I’m compelled to do it but that would involve leaving the car. Man put his hand up as we passed, didn’t realise another bus was following us. Guy sat smoking in a hilux is dwarfed by his vehicle. Race day today (guy with sign advertising cycling being pull along by his bike), lots of cars on Knavesmire, now the trees are in the way. Landrover went past with what looked like a death ray attached to the roof. Car with personalised registration plates, always assume they are egotistical and aware of their superior registration status. Big thing with orange lights ahead, always intriguing – can I work out what it is for? It’s a crane. 

16/5/12 Tesco’s Café: lunchtime

Just eaten a filling bit of Shepherd’s pie in the café and am now sitting back to observe. Mum is arguing with her phone; parent + smartphone, who thought that was a good idea?

Unsurprisingly the café is about a fifth full of people eating lunch. The only ones I can see from here are an older couple, but they’re just leaving. However, in their place there are now two teenage girls, who approached the table cautiously… A police officer with a clipboard has just walked down the store with a bloke in a suit, which could be potentially interesting, but they’ve passed out of my line of sight so I shall never know. Anyway, the teenagers, I assume they’re college students, don’t seem very lively or cheery. One’s on her phone and picking at fruit salad, a lunch break to remember.

Just spotted a guy downstairs who spent ages looking closely at the plants while I was eating; I thought he might be something of an amateur horticulturalist, but why would he buy plants at the supermarket if he was? He didn’t even pick any up, he left with 4 cans, some bagels and a few other boring things precariously held in his arms. I guess he didn’t intend to buy that much.

There’s a guy just walked in with sunglasses on, didn’t think the light were that bright; he’s most likely come from outside and forgotten. The girl picking at the fruit has a rather false face, I think it’s the eyebrows, they’re too bold. A woman downstairs has a baby carrier, complete with baby, in her trolley. If I did that I’d stick it on the conveyor at the checkout then complain when they wouldn’t let me buy it.

An employee just walked past with a Bluetooth device in his ear, presumably for vital messages: “we’re running out of cornflakes, prepare for carnage!”

Watching Mum: 15/16-5-12

So people watching begins… I have procured a note book and found a subject to watch. Granted that subject is my mother, who, in the 22years we have been acquainted I have come to know pretty well, so I am cheating a bit, but once an idea strikes me I can’t help but act on it. I sincerely hope I never have a sudden desire to go diving, because acting quickly on that one would result in me being found lying in my bathtub with a serious head injury. Anyway I digress. At present my mother is ironing; nothing unusual or spectacular about that, she does this regularly, and has even admitted enjoying it.

Right now she is pressing my grandparent’s towels and telling me a story about dad’s burgers and the washing (it was getting wet, but dad’s burgers were perfectly melted, the horror!). My grandparents’ washing has a distinct smell about it; I assume it’s something to do with the fabric conditioner.

She has now moved on, from ironing, she hasn’t died and transcended to the spirit world. She has gone to make herself a cream scone, inspired by me. So I shall stalk her to the kitchen. The scone is jammed, and she’s now wrestling the cream on top, something she managed better than I did. On her return from the fridge she actually remembered to turn off the light in the back room, I’m amazed, and we’re off to the front room. She’s drawn the curtains and knocked over a pile of books in her quest to close the chink in the curtains; heaven forbid anyone should manage to see through and observe us at ease!

She’s gotten out her laptop which is notoriously slow and while she understands it well enough to use it, the gaps in the knowledge are enough to provide amusement, and frustration. While said laptop is being slow she has complained that her glasses are dirty and told the laptop to hurry up and show a video of a woman running herself over with her own car. Her previous behaviour leads me to believe she will be doing her tesco order and falling asleep in her chair, but I may be wrong. I am, possibly she’s undecided. She slouches with her laptop on her lap (how appropriate) but juts her head forward; this, and her habit of falling asleep in the chair, contributes to the neck pain she almost always complains about just before bed.

She’s running away, well walking away to clean her glasses. She finished her cup of whatever bizarre tea she’s drinking this evening, nettle and something else green perhaps? Or it may be just hot water, which rates only slightly above fizzy water on the disgusting beverage scale. Now she has returned she’s telling me the tale of my grandparents’ chattering while she continues to wait for her laptop to load. She is now despairing because the laptop has locked up, which also happens regularly. And now it has died completely, so she’s restarting it. Then she spontaneously asked about syncopation, inspired by some story Grandma told her earlier. I thought she was about to retell a story from earlier, but she went along a different line; she was discussing musicality with a neighbour and thinks she’s too old to pick up an instrument; in the sense of learn, she’s clearly not so old and frail that picking up a flute would cause her to collapse.

It is rather unfortunate that I have been struck with this creativity in the middle of the night. If it had been day time I might have been able to comment on the many colourful characters who inhabit this village; like the couple who go for a walk every morning, the depressed looking woman with a pram (I assume there’s a child in it, if not that may explain her constantly negative facial expression), the woman with a double decker pram (not as cool as it sounds), the man over the road mowing his lawn to death, or the guy with the dog that’s built like a fluffy tank. Such thrills!

People-watching does not come naturally to me. I find people quite boring to observe, they just do ordinary people stuff, which I do, and it’s dull enough doing it, let alone watching it being done. Animal-watching is infinitely more interesting. I don’t do animal stuff, if I did I might have fewer friends and spend more time in institutions, unless I pretended I was doing performance art, which, because it is deep and meaningful, is not mad. 

Watching Stuff: An introduction

I've decided to start "watching stuff". It's a bit like people watching, but not just people, because they are a bit boring.

Sheriff Hutton Castle; found it at last

I've driven through Sheriff Hutton a fair few times and always spot the castle on my way through, but have never seen anything indicating how I get to it, so today on my way back from Yorkshire Lavender in no particular hurry I decided to have a scout around. There are no signs until you are pretty much in front of it and even then they're not obvious, I'm half convinced that if you asked a village resident how to get to the castle they'd deny that they even had one.

Some ruins

 Turns out you need to follow the sign for 'Parish Church' (on the right coming from York) then there are couple of spaces outside the shop where you can park for 20mins (that's all you'll need, unless you're a slow walker). From there you walk further down the lane until you seen a green "public footpath" sign on the right, follow this.

Ruins from a different angle with more trees in the way

You'll walk up a drive way until you find signs for a circular walk around the perimeter of the castle. There's another sign saying that 'bona fide visitors' are welcome provided they call first. Given the circular nature of this walk it doesn't matter which way you go round.

Another view of the ruins

If seeing the crumbling remains of what was probably a great castle from several different angles through varying amounts of folliage then this walk is right up your street. Also if you're trying to kill time before going home after a day out north of York and sitting in a layby for 15mins doesn't appeal, this would also suit you. Or, if you've only ever seen this when driving through the village and you've always wanted to get a slightly closer look then it'll satisfy you too.


The Sheriff Hutton website has a little bit of history about the castle if you're interested: http://www.sheriffhutton.co.uk/history.htm

Yorkshire Lavender

Seeing as how today was lovely and rainy, we decided we should go and spend the day outside like sensible people do. The plan was to go and explore Kirkham Priory, but alas, when we got there we discovered that it was only open Thursday to Sunday (this being Wednesday). Undetered we decided that we would cross back over the A64 and go to Yorkshire Lavender at Terrington. It hailed on our way there, glad I took layers with me.

View from the top

In spite of the slightly unpleasant weather the view from Yorkshire Lavender was still pretty good: you could see Sheriff Hutton castle and two of the three power stations that are visible on a good day. It was about 1pm at this point, so we decided to go for some food in their tea room. The sweets menu is rather lavender influenced, but what would you expect from somewhere called 'Yorkshire lavender'. We went savoury; I had a slice of quiche with an enormous amount of salad, including colslaw and pieces of fruit, no scrimping here. The coffee was pretty decent as well. The ladies on the table next to us had slices of sponge cake with blueberry and lavender jam filling, and each slice was about the size of my face!

Part of the site, cafe and shop on right, scultpure people play cricket on the far hill

It's free to wander around the garden (big thumbs up in my opinion) and they keep adding bits to it; since I last came a pond has appeared, there are a few more people scultpures playing cricket up on the hill, and they seem to be working on a tiered garden. There are plenty of plants available to buy so if anything takes your fancy on the way round you can probably find it to put in your own garden. There's a combination of beds planted with various lavenders to create nice patterns when they're flowering, bit hard to tell at the moment. Then there are features you can interact with, like the lavender maze (no cheating please!), and a game of snakes and ladders on the side of the hill. There's also some deer down at the bottom of the hill, which seems a bit random for a lavender garden, but they're quite cute so I'm not complaining.

Oh deer

 So if you want to kill an hour or so in a delightfully scented garden, with a lovely view down towards York, then this is the place to do it. There's plenty of open space and its quite hilly, so you can wear children out for a quiet drive home. Then before you leave you can buy a multitude of lavender related goodies on your way out, and if its a warm day pick up a tub of lavender ice cream (surprisingly good) to cool off.

Me on a random bridge in their signature colour

Link to their website: http://www.yorkshirelavender.com/home

Malham Cove - North Yorkshire

On the 19th Feb I headed up into the Dales with the Mother and my sister. The sun was out and it wasn't too chilly so we went up to Malham Cove, which I've been wanting to see for ages but just haven't gotten round to it. It's about an hour and a half drive from York with the roads getting noticeably narrower the closer you get to Malham.

Malham Cove - close up

 We parked in Malham village at the Dales Visitor Centre (it was packed!) and from there we walked in the direction of the Cove until we came to the footpath that leads to it. The Footpath follows the river Aire and I imagine in summer it would be very tempting to go paddling. The river seems to come directly out of the base of the cove, it looks rather odd.

Malham Cove 

After you've walked right to the base of the Cove and gotten dizzy from looking up at it you can back track a little and turn right and up some steps (about 400 of them) up to the limestone pavement. The view across the dales as you climb is pretty nice, which was handy because we kept stopping for letting people pass and because it's rather tiring.

Limestone Pavement above the Cove

The limestone pavement itself is rather fun, though perhaps not so much for those who are unsteady on their feet (my mother for example). The majority of the rocks are nice and stable and it's easy to stroll across them, but there was an occasional wobbly one, just to keep you on your toes. We didn't dare to venture near the edge, falling to my death wasn't all that appealing surprisingly. The cracks between and in the top of the rocks are rather interesting, almost artistic. I amused myself trying to spot shapes in them. From here you can carry on walking up to Malham tarn, but given the time of day we didn't think we had time to get there and back before darkness fell.

A 'crack' in the Limestone Pavement

The walk back was as pleasant as the walk there, perhaps even a little more as the wind had dropped. We called at a small cafe on our way back to the car for a caffeine boost and a bit of cake before the drive back. There are a fair few places to eat in Malham but I imagine it's hard to find a table in the height of summer so packed lunch is recommended.

Excellent sky

The area has its own website: http://www.malhamdale.com/ which seems to have plenty of information on it for planning your own visit. Also, if you fancy trying a good walk around the area taking in a few more sights around the cove then the Walking Englishman has details of a three hour walk around the area which looks rather good: http://www.walkingenglishman.com/dales17.htm

Lovely Clouds this evening

They really were lovely...

Short Review - Coffee Culture, York

I 'discovered' this coffee shop, located on Goodramgate, sometime in Summer 2010 after it was recommended by a friend. It was love at first sight. Downstairs there are a few stools and a small bar against the wall, but the room is dominated by the counter, coffee machines and food preparation areas. So you head off up a steep narrow staircase to find yourself somewhere to sit. (Important note at this stage: delightful though this place is it's not suitable for pushchairs, disabled people, or those with an irrational fear of steep, narrow staircases).

So, you've made it up the stairs and you find yourself facing a wall that's covered in posters advertising all sorts of stuff in going on in York, from music gigs, to yoga sessions. Look to your right and you'll find 4 tables set out along a narrow room. The first two are standard table and chairs, but the other two are high tables with a chair on one side and the coveted window seat on the other. This is my favourite place to sit for a coffee in York; you can prop yourself up on cushion and spy on the people in the street below (might need your coat if it's chilly mind, I'm pretty sure its single glazing).

If there are no seats on this floor you can head up another set of steep narrow stairs to the next floor. This is a snug little room with a nice squigy sofa, 1 table and chair set up, and 1 corner seat. If there's still no room in here, and if it's open, there is another room up an even more steep and narrow staircase. You find yourself in the loft with a choice of two tables and a view down the alley behind the building towards the Bedern area, or if you lie on the floor you can look through the front window at the street (it's rather low down).

I love the coffee they serve here, not too strong, but not really mild either, and they make a very nice cappuccino (unlike some places where it comes out more like a latte that someone's spat on). The food is good, not an enormous range, but enough to satisfy most tastes. I enjoyed a bacon and brie panini on my last visit while mum had the soup. There's also a fairly large range of non-coffee drinks, and they stock Teapigs tea, which my mum, who likes all sorts of odd tea, is a big fan of. I've even bought a single teabag from this shop to take home for her to try once. They only take cash, but according to their menu there's a cash machine just down the street, yey.


So conclusion: Best coffee shop in York; great coffee, tasty food, friendly staff, bags of character.


Where to find it: 41 Goodramgate, York YO1 7LS

Looks like they're on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/41Goodramgate?sk=wall

Holy Trinity Church, Goodramgate

This redundant church is hidden away in the heart of the city of York. I have walked past the gate to this place for years and never gotten round to going to look at it. It is surprisingly large inside, with pews all over the place and a rather uneven floor. When I went around Christmas the church was lit by candles, which was very atmospheric. The church was built mainly in the 14th and 15th centuries and is now maintained by the Churches Conservation Trust.

It can be reached either from Goodramgate, or by going down Hornpot lane a 'snickleway' off Low Petergate.

Ledsham - Fairburn Walk

Ledsham Church

Today the Mother and I braved the cold and did the circular walk from the village of Ledsham to Fairburn Ings and back again. Both villages are close to the A1(M) and about 40mins drive from York city centre. Of the two Ledsham is definitely more picturesque with its lovely old limestone houses and 8th century church and a pub called 'Chequers' which has a convenient car park. Fairburn is home to the RSPB reserve Fairburn Ings, which comprises of several lakes formed by mining activity in the area over the past 150 years. The RSPB centre also has a car park which is ideal for this walk but parking costs £2 unless you are an RSPB member. Anyway, on with walk...

View back towards Ledsham

 We started the walk in Ledsham, leaving the road on Holyrood Lane and following the public footpath signs. There is a 'trail' of 18 geocaches on this circular footpath and we were using the directions for them to guide us, but if that's not your cup of tea the route is well signposted and it's also marked on OS Explorer map no. 289. Along this path you walk across a combination of open fields and woodlands, and although it's not the most picturesque place it has that sense of calm one associates with past times when the pace of life was slower. There are a few different routes of this part of the walk but they're not too far apart and they all seem to lead to Fairburn. This section of the walk is called the 'Hills and Hollers' and you can see why when you walk it. A piece of local trivia I learnt after completing the walk is that before Fairburn had a church the dead of that village were brought to Ledsham for burial. The coffin was carried along the hills and hollers route by hand, rather an ordeal I would imagine given the gradient at times. (Bit more info about 'Corpse route': http://fairburnvillage.co.uk/newpages/corpswalk.html)

Fairburn Ings

 Once you reach Fairburn village you join the road on Caudle Hill and turn left and walk straight until you reach Cut Road on the right hand side. Following this road leads you down to the Ings and you turn right just before the river Aire and up hill then follow the path between the Ings and the river. Along this path there are several hides and benches so it's a good place to stop for a break or a spot of lunch on a nice day. There wasn't much visible bird life this afternoon, but there were people planting willows from a boat on the lake, so that might have disturbed them I suppose. 

Footpath Above the Ings

 After you leave these woods you walk across one of the slag heaps left from the mining days and from these you head down towards the RSPB visitor centre. At the bottom of the slag heap hill there isan excellent place to spot kingfishers, according the the RSPB. You can't miss it, there's wooden screens with holes cut in it to spy through. After this you turn left and go through a kissing gate and take the first right to get to the visitor centre. The Ings is worth a day out itself, there's plenty to do and (big surprise) loads of birds to see that you wouldn't spot in your back garden. While we were sat drinking a coffee we spotted Great Tits, Blue Tits, Willow/Marsh Tits (can't tell the difference), Long Tailed Tits, Robins, and a couple of Pheasants. The RSPB website has plenty of information on the Ings, see here: http://www.rspb.org.uk/reserves/guide/f/fairburnings/  (very amused that it looks like Fair Burnings)

Ings again

 So, from the visitor centre you walk through the car park and cross the road, through the little field and across the other road. From here you just follow the footpath through the woods until you reach Ledsham again. We were coming down here a little later than planned so we got to see this lovely 'pre-sunset'.

Sun going down over the fields

 When I did this walk in September no special footwear was needed, but doing it again in February was a different matter. At some points it was more like traversing a bog than a footpath, but it added to the fun (more so because the Mother's walking poles kept getting stuck). Given the number of stiles along the way, and the condition of the footpath I wouldn't recommend it for pushchairs or anyone who isn't sure on their feet. Walking at a moderate pace, and if you don't stop too long at the visitor centre, it takes about 3hrs to do the full circuit. It took us about 3 and a half hours because we were stopped to look for geocaches and we got waylaid by a talkative RSPB volunteer at the visitor centre.

The AA have this handy-dandy guide to the route, which is a lot clearer than mine (but the pictures aren't as pretty :p): http://www.theaa.com/walks/fairburn-ings-and-ledsham-421268

When bored...

Build a den out of your books

University of York - Nice place for a walk

On Sunday afternoon the Mother and I headed up to Heslington to do a spot of geocaching* on the University of York campus while it was a little quieter than usual (or so we hoped). While a university might seem a rather unlikely place to go walking York uni campus is really nice for a stroll. Whenever I've been during the week there have always been loads of people around, not surprising as there are around 13000 students at the university, so if you're after a nice peaceful walk I'd suggest a Saturday. Sunday was surprisingly busy with lots of students dragging suitcases around after a weekend away from campus.

 The vast majority of the buildings on campus are far from picturesque, mostly 1960s concrete monstrosities, however there are a few which redeem it. Heslington Hall, for example, is a beautiful red brick building which, according to the University's website, is a modified  Elizabethan country house, rebuilt in the 20th century. Behind this building is a lovely garden (a hidden gem if you like) called 'The Quiet Place', describe as an area set aside for stillness and quiet. With its large hedges cut into unusual formations it put me in the mind of Alice in Wonderland. It was a shame to see discarded crisp packets and beer cans (and some even more undesirable items) tangled in the bowels of the bushes. Still, a rather mysterious, almost magical place nonetheless.

Hedges in 'The Quiet Place'

Another prominent feature is the lake which is home to several species of wildfowl (beware of droppings on the pavement) and there are boards to help you identify them. There's even a 'Duck of the Day' blog run by the university (http://www.duckoftheday.co.uk/). I found these Barnacle geese particularly charming; they look particularly dainty next to the more common Greylag and Canada geese.

Barnacle Geese at York Uni

Parking at the university is a bit of an issue. If you're lucky you can snag a place on the street near the bus stop by Derwent college where you can park for up to 2hrs Mon - Sat. There is a large pay and display car park at Campus North (around £1 an hour, if memory serves) but during the week it is rather busy. Parking in Heslington is pretty much a no go, but if you drive to the end of the main street and turn right at the mini roundabout there's a small car park for the sports field which seems to be free (I've not been in trouble for parking there to date anyway).

Final note: If you fancy geocaching there are 7 caches on campus and a further 3 in Heslington.

*Geocaching is a global treasure hunt where you use a GPS device to lead you to hidden caches (there are 325 within a 10mile radius of York) where you sign a log and can sometimes swap small items. Official website: www.geocaching.com

York Cemetery (not as morbid as it sounds)

I've been meaning to visit York Cemetery for a while now and today I finally got round to it. The cemetery website site states: 'York Cemetery: A fun place to spend an afternoon, a beautiful place to spend eternity', which I found a rather amusing summary but on reflection fairly accurate I suppose. This was another place that surprised me with its size and you would probably need an hour or so to walk all its paths (if you can work out which you've already been along).

A landscaped part

Unsurprisingly there are rows and rows of graves and the paths lead you up and down these. There's a combination of grassed and wooded areas, and some parts are really overgrown and the gravestones are hidden under tangles of brambles and behind tall grasses, then occasionally among the plant chaos you come across a small clearing where a more recent grave is situated. These overgrown areas don't actually detract from the appearance of the cemetery, well not in my opinion, they actually give it a rather 'Secret Garden' air. In fact the whole place has a rather secluded feel to it, though that could be because it was a rather damp Winter day and no one else was around.

An overgrown section

 Considering it is a 'Garden of Death' there's a lot of life in the cemetery. As well as varied plant life, both the wild, overgrown sections and the nicely landscaped sections, there are lots of birds to be seen flitting between the cemetery's many trees. We spotted some Chaffinches, Bullfinches, Magpies, Blue Tits and Blackbirds although if you look carefully there are probably many more species to be seen. We also spotted a black cat lurking around the gravestones, seemed rather fitting. There were plenty of spring flowers popping up as well, most notably the snowdrops.

Winter Snowdrops

 So despite it's rather depressing nature York Cemetery is a nice place for a quiet walk round. It's not too far from the city centre (probably about 15mins walk) and there's parking close by at Kent Street car park (about £1.20 per hour) near the Barbican Centre.

Official Website: http://www.yorkcemetery.org.uk/index.php

A double church surprise

This is one of York's little hidden gems; off the tourist trail and probably off the locals' trails as well. Located on Lawrence Street (opposite Walmgate Bar, outside the walls) there are two churches in the same yard. The elder of the two was built in the 12th century but was largely demolished in 1881, all except the tower which is maintained by the Churches Conservation Trust. The new church is Victorian and I'm amazed I've never noticed it before because it's so big! The churchyard is fairly unremarkable with the gravestones propped up against its wall, and there's a 'Garden of Remembrance' marked out with wooden posts and covered in a variety of wreaths. There are some spring flowers popping up around the place, most notably a row of yellow crocuses on the path up to the new church door.

St Lawrence Church (old)

St Lawrence Church (new)

Precentor's Court, York

Precentor's Court is one of York's lesser known and less frequented streets, but it offers one of the best view of the Minster that you can get from street level. You can reach it either from the Minster end or by a small passageway called 'Hole in the Wall' which is situated next to a pub by the same name on High Petergate (near Bootham Bar). This is also one of the first points on Mark W. Jones 'A walk around the Snickleways of York', which offers an alternative perspective on York presented in a charming handwritten style; great for tourists and locals alike.

The book is available on Amazon: http://tinyurl.com/6tv9ar4

Short Review - Spring Espresso, York

I spotted Spring Espresso on Fossgate the other day while visiting a shop across the street and decided to give it a try as soon as I could. Today was the day; a wet, cloudy and generally dreary day. It's a pretty small establishment; a single room with about 5 tables, an assortment of stools and sofas, and bar style seating by the window. You order at the counter at the back of the room where there are blackboards listing food and drinks available, and cakes etc. are on display on the counter. They offer a range of paninis, cold sandwiches, bagels with four different spreads, and a soup option. The cakes included sponge cakes, cheesecakes and a range of biscuits. Unfortunately there was no gluten free cake available for my coeliac mother, but apparently they do have gluten free options available sometimes, though not today. She settled for some Hendersons relish Yorkshire crisps (very nice actually) while I had an extra large portion of roast vegetable and ham soup (there wasn't enough left in the pot for two servings, hence the extra). The soup was lovely, a slight hint of spice and packed full of veg. The coffees were lovely as well (we ordered a cappuccino and a latte), and from what I have gleaned from their laminated newsletter and their twitter page (link below) these people really care about the quality of their coffee.

I got the impression that this is a small coffee shop with loyal customers, based on the number of people who came in and seemed familiar with the barista in the short time we were in there, and given her friendly attitude and the quality of the coffee it's not hard to see why you would want to return. They sell takeaway coffee as well so its easy to pop in on your way to work or if you're just on a quick dash around the city centre. The furniture (tables in particular) is very nice and homely and although things are packed in rather tightly you don't feel too much like a sardine. Even though it was quite quiet inside (I wouldn't pick it as a place to discuss something very private), my mum and I didn't feel like our conversation was disturbing the ambience. In addition to food stuffs, they also sell a small range of tea and coffee 'accessories', e.g. reusable takeaway cups, coffee pots etc. As for reading material, the 'I' newspaper was available and there was a small stack of magazines on one of the tables, as well as a few laminated copies of their newsletter around with short, interesting pieces on the world of coffee.

In conclusion this is a place I'd recommend if you like your coffee and you want a break from shopping away from the hubbub of York's main shopping streets in the quiet and comfortable atmosphere of a small coffee shop.

There's not a great deal on their website but here's the address: http://www.springespresso.co.uk/index.htm

Their twitter account however seems to be updated pretty regularly, every few days at least: https://twitter.com/#!/SpringEspresso

Free tea? Don't mind if I do

While wandering back to the car park from a quick walk around by York Minster my Mum and I were stopped by a lady with a clipboard and talked into doing a tea taste test at York's Central Methodist Church as part of some market research. We sat down at a table with a researcher and got two samples of black tea (with milk and sugar on hand if you wanted it) and asked to say whether we liked them or not, and whether we thought they were the same, similar or different. They were both fairly nice and similar in taste. After answering her questions I was free to go and asked if I could take one of the cups of tea with me (I'd only drunk a small sip, seemed a shame to waste it). The lady seemed a bit bemused but said that would be fine she supposed. Mum also got given two washing powder samples to try (I saw her being given two small packets of white powder, suspicious). Apparently these market research people are there fairly often so if you fancy trying some free stuff then look out for people with clipboards near Whip-Ma-Whop-Ma Gate in York.

The Queen's coming to York

Even I am quite excited at the prospect of Her Majesty coming to York in April. I might even be tempted to join the crowds in hopes of catching a glimpse of her. She's coming up to distribute the Royal Maundy from the Minster. So, if I have my facts right, she'll be giving 85 pensioners, chosen because of their Christian contribution to both church and community, specially minted Maundy silver coins to the value of 85pence in a white leather purse, and a second, red leather purse containing ordinary coinage.

Link to The Press article about the visit:  http://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/9477340.Queen_to_visit_York/?ref=mr

When bored...

make a crime scene mock up with a dead ladybird you found on your desk

Yey! Books!

Something to aspire towards

This might give me some ideas for some future storage solution for my own growing 'library'

http://bookshelfporn.com/

Pretty frozen things

 Frosty Morning Afternoon

On Saturday 14th Jan I went for a walk in the cow field to have a look at the frozen flood water. Here are some photos I took; some I'm just quite proud of them, and others show the ice intriguingly hanging on halfway up plants. I don't really know how the ice formed so far above the water (unless the flood level dropped dramatically overnight) but I'll endeavour to find out.

'Suspended' ice by the stream

'Suspended' ice

I just think these 3 are pretty

Nessie in North Yorkshire

Nessie Sign

Spotted this on a footpath sign at Sutton Bank and it reminded me of the Loch Ness Monster