The Beaches & Coasts of England: Scarborough
Once again a special occasion was fast on the approach and once again we had no idea what we wanted to do about it. Our last great excursion had been Llandudno, Wales and for reasons both known and unknown to myself I absolutely adored the coasts. The idea to travel to Scarborough was a mix of convenience and thriftiness: we were absolutely penny pinching it but still wanted a long weekend to celebrate a whole nother year without killing each other.
Had it not been for the weather I'm sure our weekend out and about would have been all in all quite good but as it does in England, November is not the kindest months with regards to the weather and having two back-to-back named storms slamming the island didn't make for an amazing weekend.
Our adventure begins on one of several trains. We began our excursion by bus to the train station and took our first train out to Worksop mid-morning. Incidentally it was fecking cold out and I swear I could feel the sharp stings of the wind in my knickers.
We arrived in Worksop without any issue and took refuge from the chill in this lovely little cafe. I had to give credit where credit was due, each of the stations besides Mansfield had either coffee stands or full-blown cafes whereas Mansfield has neither and it stinks.
At this particular little shop we had bacon cobs which, for the uninitiated, is literally a few slices of bacon on a seedless bun. We also treated ourselves to some Yorkshire tea and frankly I found it strong and with a funny after taste but maybe the hubby forgot how I took my tea. For the record it's 2x milk 2x sugar. <3
After Worksop we took the train over to Retford and then to York and then later took our final train to Scarborough. After the train rides it was good to just walk again. It was still brutally cold and windy but it wasn't yet raining and that was a huge plus. We walked for nearly half an hour, stopping to consult the map often. Finally we came across our haven for the coming days, Villa Marina B&B, and signed with relief. And exhaustion, as Villa Marina sits conveniently on a rather steep hill.
Across from the B&B was Peasholm Park, a rather unique park in that everything in the park was definitively Asian in persuasion. We had already had a rather long day of it so we decided to only take a small jaunt around part of the park. As it were it began to drizzle slightly as we walked around.
You'll need to excuse the poor quality of the first half of photos--for whatever bizarre reason the settings on my camera were messed up and caused the photos to be heavily distorted. You'll find after the black and white picture of the boats that the quality clears up noticeably.
Peasholm was largely quiet save for a few hooligans and elderly couples. The geese were geese-ing around and causing havoc and the seagulls sat solemnly on the light poles, clearly unhappy about the lack of food-carrying guests.
We did see one couple paddling around merrily on one of these dragon boats, however, mysteriously when we got to the entrance everything had already shut. This was still midday so who knows?
We ventured forth to the beach front and found several dozen people or so just walking the lengths of the beach, many with dogs in tow. Now, I'm all for dogs. I love dogs in general. But there's something about dogs at a beach that sends my anxiety through the roof. None were leashed save for one couple and all of them were haphazardly running amok without a single care for other beach patrons. I narrowly missed joyous faecal temples twice on that trek. And the barking. The incessant barking. I go to the beach to enjoy the sound of the ocean, not the incessant whining and cacophony of someone's fur monster.
Despite it clearly being the off season for tourism, many of these colourful little abodes along the beach front were still being inhabited. Most along the beach were bungalow-style whereas these had an additional storey above. While the colour combination is rather pretty, seeing rows upon rows of these rainbow hued cabins was actually a bit of an eyesore for me. C seemed to like them well enough, though, so we shot a couple and moved on. Hehehe anyone who knows me will find that last sentence hilarious.
The town looked very similar to most seaside towns really. Maybe it was the incredible weather or maybe because we had to walk ages to get anywhere but I wasn't overly fond of Scarborough.
I'm always a fan of statues. This one was pretty fun. On the bottom barrel on the small plaque it said "The Smugglers Apprentice (Lesson 1): If someone whispers, you whisper back. If someone shouts you run. But keep away from the well worn track for there waits a man with a gun."
It's no Llandudno, that's for sure. Again, the weather didn't help but whereas Llandudno has energy and life about it, Scarborough seemed very forlorn.
Pardon the speckles on the camera. It was full out raining by this time and keeping the lens dry was next to impossible.
Oh good gravy, let me tell you about this place. Firstly, we had gone there for our anniversary dinner.
It had decent reviews on Trip Advisor and strangely it was the only place in the area that appeared to serve lobster and crab. Well, despite arranging what I thought would be a window seat (see the ones upstairs?) and a nice seafood dinner, apparently their first and second floor dining was closed and only the main floor was open. So our "reserved" seat was crammed next to another couple in front of the window to the left there, but I couldn't see anything out from it due to the immense collection of stuff they had. Fine, hopefully the food would be good, right?
Unfortunately, being that I'm still getting used to a few things here I never thought to ask whether the crab and lobster were hot. So their menu offered cold scallops, mussels and crab whilst the only other crab-related item on the menu was a crab salad. Already I felt ready to cry/scream but I really hiked up my big girl pants and asked to please have a medium rare steak instead and C got his typical fish and chips.
The chips were good. But they were typical chip shop chips. Same type exactly. And the steak I was given was...well it was terrible. There was no seasoning whatsoever on the steak, it was chewy as all get out and frankly it was a sub par, substandard cut of meat. For nearly £16 for a steak and chips I want to be able to eat the steak, never mind it being tasty. So, we very politely said we'd rather leave, the floor manager amazingly comped everything, even the drinks, and we left.
I'll never understand C's amazing regard for the rules. I wanted to have a sit and those orange seats outside the Harbour Bar were about the only ones for a while that weren't in the rain. Well, because apparently being a chair renegade was out of the question, we ordered some ice creams and had a sit. I suppose adding that we both wanted ice creams may cheapen the effect this paragraph had, but I do still insist C is a rule abiding fanatic and I am so going to introduce him to the limit of his comfort zone one of these days.
I thought the colours of the fishing boats were nice and a strange contradiction to the otherwise bleary day.
And finally the camera's settings are back to normal. I've always been a huge fan of black and white photos. I find they provide much more atmosphere and depth than many colour photos.
Here it is! The greatest curiosity of them all! All these bloody crab and lobster traps and not a damned crustacean to account for them in the restaurants! How do you have a fishing port such as this with hundreds if not thousands of crab traps and NO restaurant that serves it?! Madness I tell you!
I want to tell you that The Doctor was in town that day, but sadly I reckon that is an actual Police Box. Maybe we should have telephoned and asked where in space and time he was!
I'm usually not a huge fan of chain restaurants but in a pinch they really can save the day. You at least know exactly what to expect from them. The lovely people at Ask Italian were no different. We'd not visited one before this trip but with our spectacular failure at the hands of Golden Grid we decided to walk a block further down the road and patronise these fine folks. It wasn't overly busy and we were seated at a lovely window (gasp!) seat immediately. You know, a window seat in which I could actually look out of. And see outside. It was amazing! The starter was lovely, the drinks very tasty and the lasagnes we both had weren't the best we'd ever had but were very close. All in all from being a crappy evening to a lovely evening I'd say Ask Italian had almost all to do with it. Well done you.
I don't know what this was or what purpose it served but I wanted it.
Dolphins! We saw loads of dolphins along Marina Drive. I'm fairly certain they were all bottlenose dolphins, however apparently a couple species of porpoise and whales also frequent the area also.
The remains of Scarborough castle. I didn't fancy walking all the way up there in the rain and wind but there it is, we got to see it. Blammo.
Part of Marina Drive in which you can see crazy kayakers paddling in the distance.
The day after the storm the skies were relatively calm and the surf wasn't nearly as treacherous.
I've always been rather fascinated with cemeteries. The English cemeteries especially pique my interest with how old some of them are. We didn't get much time to peruse this particular one, unfortunately.
The beautiful honey-coloured church beside the cemetery.
All in all Scarborough was an OK trip. Saw a few things I hadn't seen before. Picked stones and sea glass off the beach for my collection. Ate at a few nice places and stayed in a very well kept B&B across from the park. We may never return but I will say that it was a good over all experience and if given the opportunity and with a car, I may reconsider.