Gratitude Grace Growth: York

Oh, The grand old Duke of York,

He had ten thousand men;

He marched them up to the top of the hill,

And he marched them down again.

And when they were up, they were up,

And when they were down, they were down,

And when they were only half-way up,

They were neither up nor down.

Well we certainly have climbed to the top of Clifford Tower and back down again and walked the many streets of York today to the old town within the walled city.

St Michael Le Belfrey where Guy Fawkes was baptised.

Inside St Michael Le Belfrey

York Minster

York Minster is a cathedral in York and is one of the largest of its kind in Northern Europe. The minster is the seat of the Archbishop Of York, the second-highest office of the Church of England and is the cathedral for the Diocese of York.

One of the beautiful shopping streets of York.

The Treasurer's House.

Monk Bar

The city of York has, since Roman times, been defended by walls of one form or another. To this day, substantial portions of the walls remain, and York has more miles of intact wall than any other city in England. The Multangular Tower in the Museum Gardens is the most noticeable and intact structure remaining from the Roman walls. Although much of Bootham Bar was built in the 14th and 19th centuries, it also has some of the oldest surviving stonework, dating to the 11th century. It stands almost on the site of porta principalis dextra, the north western gate of Eboracum. Monk Bar - This four-story gatehouse is the tallest and most elaborate of the four, and was built in the early 14th century. It was intended as a self-contained fort, and each floor is capable of being defended separately. The current gatehouse was built to replace a 12th century gate known as Munecagate, which stood 100 yards (91 m) to the north-west, on the site of the Roman gate porta decumana - that location is indicated by a slight dip in the earth rampart. Today, Monk Bar houses the Richard III Museum and retains its portcullis in working order.

Monk Bar from atop the city wall.

Views of the City Walls.

Chapel of Margaret Litherow - The only common women cannonised in 1970 and made a Saint - Daughter of Thomas & Jane Middleton.

Outside the Chapel.

The famous Shambles.

The Shambles On the Corner of Fossgate & Saviourgate Streets under Kings on the Square. The Shambles won the award for Britain's Most Picturesque Street 2010. ‘The Shambles’ is sometimes used as a general term for the maze of twisting, narrow lanes which make York so charming. At its heart is the lane actually called the Shambles, arguably the best preserved medieval street in the world. It was mentioned in the Doomsday Book of William the Conqueror in 1086. Many of the buildings on the street today date back to the late fourteenth and fifteenth century (around 1350-1475). The Shambles was a street of butchers’ shops and houses, many complete with a slaughterhouse at the back of the premises, ensuring a ready supply of fresh meat. The meat was hung up outside the shops and laid out for sale on what are now the shop window-bottoms. It is still possible to see some of the original butcher’s meat-hooks attached to the shop fronts. Lacking modern-day sanitation facilities, there was a constant problem of how to dispose of the waste produced by the slaughter of animals in the city. The pavements are raised either side of the cobbled street to form a channel where the butchers would wash away their offal and blood twice a week. In some sections of the Shambles it is possible to touch both sides of the street with your arms outstretched. The architecture which now appears so quaint had a very practical purpose. The overhanging timber-framed fronts of the buildings are deliberately close-set so as to give shelter to the ‘wattle and daub’ walls below. This would also have protected the meat from any direct sunshine.

The Shambles.

I am always amazed at how off center these old building are.

This shop sold Cookies that were the size of pizzas for special occasions.

Here is one showing the inside of the cookie.

Just loved this Haunted House magic shop.

Mulberry Hall a fine china shop built in 1434.

Today the people of York were welcoming home the soldiers of the 2nd Regiment from Afghanistan.

Complete with marching band.

Dignitaries on the steps of Guildhall ready to accept the soldiers.

St Martin's Church courtyard was created in 1960 from the ruins of the bombed nave.

Gargoyle in very good condition.

St Martin's.

The major stain glass window inside.

Amazing detail in the sculptures on the cornices of the church.

An example of the short doorways that are so common in England and Europe.

Clifford's Tower.

Clifford’s Tower set on a tall mound in the heart of Old York, is an imposing tower and almost all that remains of York Castle, which was originally built by William the Conqueror. In its time, the tower has served as a prison and a royal mint, as well as the place where Henry VIII had the bodies of his enemies put on public display.

Guildhall York.

This is the way to sell soap with chandeliers.

Another view of York Minster.

Walking another section of the town wall.

The back of York Minster.

Museum Gardens had so many wonderful tulips.

This lovely squirrel was busy digging up something to eat.

More of Museum Gardens.

St Mary's ruin.

The ruins of St. Mary's Abbey stand in the gardens of the Yorkshire Museum in York. For 450 years, St. Mary's was the wealthiest and most powerful abbey in the North of England. The abbey was a Benedictine refoundation by King William II of England (1088) of a 1055 monastery dedicated to Saint Olave to the west of York Minster. St. Mary's was once the largest and richest Benedictine establishment in the north of England and the abbots were famously decadent. The abbey featured heavily in the early medieval ballads of Robin Hood, with the abbot usually as Robin Hood's nemesis. In 1132, a party of reform-minded monks left to establish the Cistercian monastery of Fountains Abbey. The abbey was destroyed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII around 1540. Today, the picturesque ruins of the abbey's north and west walls stand in the Museum Gardens and are often used as the setting for the York Mystery Plays. The plan of the rest of the monastic complex is laid out in the surrounding grass. Other remains of abbey buildings include the Pilgrims' Hospitium, the West Gate and the 14th-century timber-framed Abbot's House (now called the King's Manor).