The Weekend Away: Things to Do in York for a Day and a Night by Ben Cooper
Featured Hotel in York
Grange Hotel
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As you get off the train from a big city like London and stroll around the old centre of York, an odd sensation hits you. Something has shifted. The buildings for one are decidedly quainter, inward-leaning and crooked-beamed; in shops and bars, strangers actually talk to one another (yes – strangers!); the streets are less hectic, and shopping hours don’t go on until the middle of the night.
Try as it might to be trendy and modern, York will still always have a slightly doyley-ish charm to it: of teashops, antiques, fudge shops and old pubs advertising "Most Haunted filmed here" outside... It’s a town that’s filled to the gunnels with guilty pleasures. And it’s absolutely no worse for it. To put it another way, York is the perfect weekend retreat for the stressed out big city dweller.
Where to Stay in York
The Grange Hotel is one of the classiest and most understated luxury hotels in York. A grand regency townhouse of just 30-odd rooms, a couple of excellent restaurants and impeccable service, it’s a comfortable and intimate place to bed down for the weekend. With rooms starting at around the £80-a-night mark, it’s extremely good value, too.
What to See in York
First port of call? The Minster, obviously. A vast Gothic affair adorned in all the usual twiddly finery, from the outside it's one of the finest cathedrals in Britain. But it’s inside that it gets really special, with some of the most impressive medieval stained-glass to be seen anywhere in Europe.
To the South of the Minster, the Old Town rambles away in a tight network of crooked houses and narrow streets. And where there are crooked houses and narrow streets there are always going to be tourists... In York, though, it never really reaches scrum proportions. Except in one place: the Shambles.
Twee as a Miss Marple omnibus it may be, but the Shambles is also a genuinely interesting little thoroughfare. After all, how many streets do you get to stroll down that were featured in the Domesday Book? Something to keep an eye out for? The wide windowsills in front of the shops were used for displaying meat in the days when it was still lined with butchers’ shops.
The Shambles was also the home of the martyr Margaret Clitherow, the 'Pearl of York', who in 1583 was crushed to death (by an 800-pound weight) for refusing to recant her Catholicism. It's far from an isolated incident – York's history is littered with gory events (a fact that keeps the city’s thriving ghost tour industry alive).
Starting from the top, Britain’s most famous 'disembowelee', Guy Fawkes, was born in 1570 on High Petergate and baptised opposite in St. Michael le Belfrey. Slightly ominously for him, in the same year that he converted to Catholicism Margaret Clitherow met her grisly end... Some 150 years later, the infamous highwayman Dick Turpin was hanged out on the Strays (for, by his standards, the relatively prosaic crime of horse theft).
Alleyways were made to poke your head down, and the streets around the Shambles and the adjoining Snickelways are riddled with courtyards and passageways, some little more than a narrow slit running between the old houses. Duck down a few and you invariably find something of interest – be it a 12th-century house or an inviting old pub.
Away from the Shambles and the Snickelways, the next stops on the itinerary are pretty hard to miss. A stroll along the city walls (at 2.5km one of the UK's most extensive stretches) is a must; while a keep has loomed above the city from the top of its grassy motte of Clifford’s Tower since the time of William the Conqueror, the current incarnation dates back to the 13th century.
As you'd expect with so many gory historical details knocking about, York doesn’t lack for things to keep the kids busy either. The York Dungeons offer all the usual sort of groaning exhibit shtick, so the youngsters are guaranteed to love it. Only slightly less boringly, the Jorvik Viking Centre boasts a Viking cesspit smell simulator!
Where to Shop in York
York’s not really known as a global mecca of high fashion. That said, there are still a few stylish international brands like Paul Smith and Mulberry to be rummaged through. Quirky boutiques are much better represented: Vintage (surprise, surprise – a vintage clothes shop) and Elizabeth Wells (lingerie) have plenty to keep the ladies happy, while Sarah Coggles, Mannix and Van Mildert all do a nice line in sharp menswear.
Where York really excels, though, is in its antique shops. The Red House Antique Centre (just opposite the Minster on Duncombe Place) is a good place to start, as it offers hours of happy browsing through everything from jewellery and artworks to assorted police truncheons, horse brasses and pipe fragments...
Where to Eat in York
For a town of its size, the York restaurant scene is surprisingly vibrant. Local residents may grumble that The Blue Bicycle (34 Fossgate) “isn’t quite what it used to be”, but it still serves top-class food in attractive surroundings. Nineteen and Cafe No 8 are a couple of other standout dining choices, while sushi/noodle joint Tokyo Joe’s a great choice for a quick refuelling stop.
Where to Drink in York
York specialises in two tipples: tea and ale. And it’s with the first in mind that throngs of visitors (and locals) make their way to Betty’s, the grand old dame of tea shops, for afternoon tea. If the queue stretches all the way outside, Little Betty’s (nearby on Stonegate) makes for a worthy alternative.
On the ale front, The Golden Slipper is a typically Olde Worlde York pub – tiny, low-ceilinged and with a nice snug for whiling away a wintry shower. Slightly less scenically and a little off the beaten track to the west of the Old Town, The Minster Inn is a top find for fans of real ale.
It’s not all tea shops and Olde Worlde pubs, though. During the day, Xing (on the Shambles) is a very cool little smoothie bar – the place to head for a variety of health-packed pick-me-ups served by a couple of passionate and seriously friendly owners.
As the evening lengthens, 1331 (a bar with bites tucked away down Grape Lane) makes for an excellent place for a slow start to the evening; moving on, The Biltmore is an excellent cocktail bar set dramatically in an old church. For something a little livelier (and later), across the river, The Maltings is a fantastic little pub which often puts good gigs on. Wildly hedonistic it ain’t, but then that’s hardly why you’d come to York, is it?
(Photo credit – The Shambles York, By Unnatural Blonde on Flickr)