隐秘乡村第三季 P3 - Hidden Villages_S03E03_North Yorkshire.UMMU.NET

Cream teas, bunting, the local shop, quaint church spires, and games on the green. I suppose people have an idea of what the perfect village should be, but real villages are far more fascinating. I've lived in a village for 38 years now, and I know there's more to village life than the picture postcard suggests. Oh, it's lovely having Vikings to help me. So I'm off for another summer, exploring our smallest communities. I bet you wish you were here with me. I'll travel by bike. Wow. Oh, I see. Yes, there it is. To unknown places that have made a big impact. Fine figure of a man, isn't he? My inspiration is the Batsford Guides, whose words and pictures from the 1930s offer a window to the past. But I'm discovering what it means to be a village today, and it's incredible how rich and varied our country is. The more I see, the more curious I get. Why do we love this quintessentially British institution? It's lovely, isn't it? From the Cornish Peninsula to the Lakeland Fells, my village travels have taken me to some of England's most celebrated areas. But, as headlines go, it's difficult to eat God's Own Country, a name that's forever associated with Yorkshire. Those of us with long memories and quite a few years remember when Yorkshire was divided into ridings. It always sounded so romantic to me. But in this journey, I'm getting to what remains, I presume, as a brand new home. There's Yorkshire pudding, which, of course, one had as a child, not knowing that Yorkshire was a county. I just thought it was a name for pudding. Then there's Parkin, Yorkshire tea, and, of course, you think of flat caps and whippets. This is rather interesting. My Batsford Guide is not called The Guide to Yorkshire. It's called The Spirit of Yorkshire. That's something I must be on the lookout for. One passage reads, on the one hand, the county has the reputation of being the most hospitable and generous in the kingdom. On the other, a sponging toadies, ready to accept any favour and to give nothing in return. Well, Yorkshire, I come with an open mind, and I've chosen to begin my journey in the Yorkshire Dales National Park. I'm driving north over the flanks of the Pennines to reach a remote valley, or dale, I should say, that many visitors fail to get to. Oh, here I am at the top looking down. This must be Swaledale. With ancient fields, distinctive stone barns, and limestone villages, Swaledale was a place my guidebook chose to illustrate. Yorkshire still rules in villages like thwit, agriculture, and tourism, that is. Because 100 residents are now joined by thousands of walkers. Hello, I'm Penelope Keefe. Nice to see you. Hello, hello. Nice to meet you. How far have you come to walk the dales? We live in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. A long way. Yes, a long way. Had you been here before? In 2008, we walked the coast-to-coast path. It was lovely. In Kellogg, the Pennine Way and the coast-to-coast intersect, and I said, where's the Pennine Way? We say Pennine. Pennine. I'm sorry. Accents and pronunciations matter a great deal around here because if anything has helped carry the spirit of Yorkshire over the years, it's the local dialect. Right, Yorkshire cream tea, jolly nice. Beautiful. Right, good. Yes. Eric Scaife is part of the Yorkshire Dialect Society, which stretches right back to 1897, making it the oldest such society in the world. If you think our words are spelt, and you emphasise every letter, in many cases you will be talking in a Yorkshire dialect. Where's an O and an R in water that you people in the south put in? Water. There isn't an O and an R in water. It's water. Of course it is. So why put an O and an R in it? It's the true English language. Travelling here, coming over that pass, it's terribly, terribly isolated. Even in the 21st century. Yes. The dialect in this area is probably the best preserved of any English dialect. You know, it's small pockets of farming communities. That's why the dialect has been preserved in these areas more. It hasn't been watered down. No. By the different industries and towns. It's still the true, the true Viking dialect. So, if you want to hear how English might have sounded centuries ago, Swaledale is the place to be. There are just a few dozen folk left who offer a true window to the past. Hello. Are you Sigele or how? I don't know what that means. Please tell me. Are you well? Yeah, I'm fine. Thank you. That was... John Waggett's family have been farming in this dale since the early 1600s. What's gale? Gale, it means are you well or happy and that like. Oh, I am. Yeah, yes. Very, very. Yeah, when you met everybody, it was always that like. It was, was it? John speaks what's affectionately called swaddle. What brought this down, do you know? Yes, a tractor, but it was getting badly... Driven by you. But it was getting badly chastened. What does that mean? Bent and twisted. Oh, I see. Now, a lot of words in our language, in the English language, we have for weather. What is a day like today called? Well, there was a fellow up dale and they would have said it was a parrot and dry rook. And what would that have meant? Well, there's a dampness in there, but it's not rain in life. Any special words for sheep? I know you call them tups, whereas we would call a male sheep a ram. Yeah. What, any other ones? We would call them yow, as you say, a swaddle yow. Which is what I would say you. Yeah, yeah. Right, yow. A swaddle yow. And what about the lambs? Anything for the lambs? I don't know what twinters is. Well, twinter is another word for two in the two year old, you say. A twinter. Raymond Calvert of Hoggarth's farm, where the sheep have been shown since the very first Swaledale shows. One of the exhibitors of that day showing the sheep was from Hoggarth's area. Oh, really? Very far. So an ancestor of yours? You know, as a bit of proof, there's one of the cards from the very first show. Ribbon as well. The ribbon as well. It's just wonderful. An aged tup. How old is an aged tup? It can be anything from around about three years above. And a tup lamb. How old is she? Just a shearing. That means she's... One year old. One. She's fine. And why did you pick her to go to the show? Picked her particularly because of the distinctive black and white she has. I mean, it looks as though it's makeup, doesn't it? It really does. I promise you it isn't. But those beautiful eyes. Raymond, if I was a judge, which I'm not, because I just think she's beautiful. I think you're doing pretty well. I'm quite impressed by the way you're feeling the hair. And it does rather feel almost bristly and hard. I was going to say, it's like a Brillo pad. And that really denotes what we would say that's a good sort. She's had the best wash of her life. Shampoo and set. She has. We've also added a little bit of colour to its face. And maybe I might just put a little bit more colour on the back end there. What, sort of just like a brown dye? The idea is it's just to rather look that sort of weathered look. Gorgeous, beautiful girl. Just do with you judging tomorrow. Well, I'm happy to report that the day of things went rather well. Competition amongst four children won the race. Downstream to the village of Mucha, a bustling metropolis in Swaledale towns. It grew thanks to an old lead mining industry in the surrounding hills. It now boasts a pub, a parish church and even an art gallery. Come in search of Mucha's most celebrated organisation. Now, I've just seen a gentleman going up those stairs with a brass instrument. Actually, it was a silver instrument. And there we are, the sound of music in Yorkshire. Mucha Silver Band have been bringing music to the Dales since 1897. Their first public appearance was for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. Brass bands were common amongst the lead mining communities of Swaledale. And even from their early days, Mucha invested in more expensive silver instruments. For 50 years, the all-male band were the centrepiece of village events. But of course, all the best village events take place outdoors. All the members of the band have said that they will play in their uniforms in the rain for me. I feel very privileged. The male band members are now joined by a host of women and children. And I'm sure this won't be the first time any of them have played in the rain. Stand close to each other. Of course, the thing is, I'm like a stringed instrument. This is all right if it gets wet. And do you have to polish it? Try and get me wife to do it. You see, the thing about... It's wonderful when you hear them out. The hillsides of Swaledale provide gentle sound with the band reverberating around the old stone buildings of Newport. Next, I meet a Dales lady who bared all for her community. You're July. Yes, I always say I'm the hottest nun. And I head to the moors or in hardy folk keeping Viking traditions. Things I do for television. I'm on the search for what my guidebook called the spirit of Yorkshire. And I'm getting to know just a few of North Yorkshire's 800 villagers. I'm staying in the Yorkshire Dales to unearth a village story that I imagine you'll remember. With WI ladies and a rather memorable calendar. But for me, this story began 20 years ago in pretty Wolfdale village of Grassington. It's lovely, isn't it? A bit busy. Here while staying in our cottage on the Lancashire moors. Roddy, my husband and I, were driving through Grassington and I spotted a small art gallery with a lovely picture of a Swaledale sheep. In the window and I thought, I've got to have that. Look at the painting. I ended up meeting the artist and his wife who invited me to their studio in the neighbouring village of Craco. So two decades on, I'm meeting Terry and Linda Logan once more to learn how they helped bring the world's attention to the Dales. Linda, Terry, look what I've brought. Oh, I remember painting that. Isn't it wonderful? I saw it in your gallery and fell in love with it. And that's been hanging in your house? Yes, I see it every day. Now perhaps Linda looks a little familiar to you. Since I last met her, her face, in fact most of her body, has been seen across the globe. Linda was a calendar girl. She and the ladies at the local WI were set on the road to Starland thanks to a chance suggestion by Linda's friend, Tricia. When they were asking for photographs for the WI calendar of bridges and churches, she said, we should do our own calendar, but we'll be in the nude doing crafts at WI. And I said, oh, don't be so silly. You know, forget it. The unusual idea was firmly parked until Linda's friend and neighbour, John Baker, was diagnosed with cancer in February 1998. He didn't live long after that. And to keep Angela, his wife, busy through the winter, I said to Trish, let's do that calendar. Give her something to think about. And so she put it to a few ladies. But what did people think? I mean, did they think, oh, hell, we'll have to go on a diet? That's what I knew. No, they didn't. Because we didn't think we were going to be famous. We thought it was just for the village to make a few hundred pounds. And maybe that would have been the case, but for the excellent work of their photographer. I said, what about Terry? Oh, they all knew he was an artist. Right. I said, I think he's got all the equipment. I'm sure he could take nice photographs of us. I did some rough sketches beforehand, to show people exactly what we were going to do. Yeah. This sort of thing. That's lovely. Yeah. That's lovely. Angela playing the piano. And of course, I love the fact that he's got Jerusalem up there. Were there any ladies who were more nervous than others? A couple were nervous. Yes. But we're doing all the things that one does in WI. Except that we had no clothes on. We had a string of pearls on. Oh, well, you must. Yeah. You were WI members, for heaven's sakes. Can I see some of the photographs? Yes, this is... You see, you are an artist. Now, Linda, this is you. You're July. Yes, I always say I'm the hottest nun. Quite right. The consensus is that just like their jams, the ladies from the WI are very well preserved. And from that day on, it hasn't stopped really. It's extraordinary. Absolutely amazing. Calendar Girl's story has become a successful film, a stage play, and recently, a musical. We didn't do it because we thought we were beautiful women. Oh, but you are. We did it to hopefully, well, keep Angela going, you know, and to make some money for a charity dear to our hearts. And they've certainly done that. Between them, Terry and the Calendar Girls have raised nearly £4 million for leukaemia and lymphoma research. Bravo to them all. It's time for me to leave the Dales, lovely though they are, and head east to another national park, the North York Moors. That is mighty big. A landscape. You can see for miles. It looks wild, doesn't it? Rising to nearly 1,500 feet in horses, this is the largest expanse of moorland in England and might just be its ultimate village. Here's a sign for Goathland. Yep, Goathland. When I first saw it, I thought it was Goatland. Surrounded by the heavy high grounds, this is a true moorland community. This was the backdrop for Heartbeat, the TV police drama set in 1960s Yorkshire. There's still the odd clue. I've come in search of nostalgia on an altogether different level. The traditional dance of the plough starts in the little village of Goathland. All the youths are descendants of the men who did the dance over a thousand years ago. Merry England at her merriest. Goathland isn't at its merriest today, I'm afraid, but moorlanders don't let a spot of rain dampen that Yorkshire spirit. There's a group of musicians in rather pretty clothes playing in the bus shelter. This is the hardy band of the Goathland Ploughsports. Oh, there's other people walking down the road in the same sort of clothes. And they're carrying a plough. Scenes like these have been witnessed around the moors but Goathland is one of the villages keeping the tradition alive. The tradition of the longsword dance. It's believed this scene stretches right back to the Vikings. It's terribly complicated. This was how the Vikings encouraged their gods to bring rich harvests to the village. In recent centuries, pagan gods are less of a concern. Here's a host of us all from Goathland, are we? We've come a-travelling the country far to see. Roles like the fool played in Goathland for over 25 years by Keith Thompson. They always had a fool that went around ordinarily collecting money. So how often do you get together? We probably go dancing eight, nine, ten times a year. Because we're isolated, that's why the tradition stayed in Goathland. What do you do on a winter's night? You either stay in or you go outside. Oh, you're playing swords. Oh, you go and play sword dancing. And that's it. Yeah. Well, I guess after this long, the plough stops must know what they're doing. I feel as though my head's been cut off. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you. And in the rain, the things I do for television. Wonderful. Discover Yorkshire's most prolific inventor. He invented a theatre safety curtain, which we've all seen. Indeed, many of them. And I explore a coastal village that was meant to be so much more. Look at that sandy shore. Yes. Total light. We're crossing North Yorkshire, and I've arrived in the heart of the Moors. Quite the most expensive English landscape, I think I've ever come across. And if there's one way to understand a place like this, it's from the air. Are you ready for this? Yes, indeed, I am. Retired pilot Paul Glidner has agreed to take me for a spin on his 1935 Ornette Morphy. This is for tall passengers. Do the sheep mind? No, no, they get totally used to it. They're much more interested in their lunch, really. We are airborne. This really is a most British of scenes. Around 70% of the world's heather moorland is found right here in the UK. It's said a sheep can walk for 25 miles here without ever leaving the heather. Sheep can come quite a ways without seeing any habitation at all. No, no, and the population is minimal, which is the way we like it, quite frankly. It's a very pleasant place to live. Two-thirds of the national park isn't Moors at all. Eat into the plant and life, and they're home to dozens of small communities. That's a brilliant guess. That's right, and very typical of the villages here. All on the south side of the moor, so they're sheltered from the north, which is obviously a good thing here in the winter. It's fascinating to see how life and this landscape combine. Well, that worked quite nicely. We saw a few villages. I hope they were the sort that... Oh, yes. Oh, absolutely. I have to admit, there was an ulterior motive behind that. I'm heading now to Broughton-by-Sawhorn, a delightful village on the southern edge of the Moors, one with a remarkable story. Birthplace of aviation. What an extraordinary claim. I thought that happened in America. The right Broughton-by-Sawhorn begs to differ. There's a chicken crossing the road. Do you think the birthplace of aviation is another village joke? But no, it really isn't. Because on the edge of the village is Brompton Hall, once the home of Sir George Cayley, 6th Baronet, owner of a cool 9,000 acres round here. But when he wasn't busy with life as a titled landowner, he was an insatiable inventor. Leading me to the bottom of Sir George's garden is Vivian Bearstone, his great-great-great-great-grandson-in-law. This is the shed which every man should have. As the 19th century dawned, this is where you would find Sir George, tinkering with ideas and pushing engineering to new limits. Come into Sir George's workshop. This is where Sir George carried out most of his experiments. You are at the centre of all his inventing. No electric light. No heating. Nowhere to make a cup of tea. If he needed a cup of tea, I'd no doubt he could get one from... Probably shouted for the servants. Probably shouted. These replica displays give a hint of Sir George's work for his achievements. In 1808, the theatre hall at Covent Garden burnt down as a result of naked flame in there. Yes. And what he did was to invent the theatre safety curtain, which we've all seen. Indeed, many of them. He invented an artificial hand that was the first practical working artificial hand. And it so impressed Prince Albert because he could pick up sixpences with it. He invented the world's first self-righting lifeboat. The bicycle wheel that we all know with spokes in it. Automatic braking on trains. Really? There's something you and I use every day. Which is what? The seatbelt. He invented the seatbelt. Gosh, what an amazing man. And he had such a fertile brain but he had the time to be able to do it in that workshop. In his shed. But the signpost when I drive into the village says the birthplace of aviation. Indeed, it does. Because he invented the world's first successfully flown heavier-than-air aircraft and it flew in this very village. Since his days as a schoolboy, Cayley had been obsessed by the idea of flight. Birds and their wings. For well over 50 years, developed theories of aerodynamic lift and stability. It led him to the creation of a glider, or as he called it, his governable parachute. Welcome to Brompton Dale. By 1853, he was ready to test his invention in front of a handful of his staff and the local sheep. He even risked putting his coachman in it. He was a plucky lad and it flew from over there to, we don't know, to somewhere over here. To about here. So, two or three hundred yards? Yes, yes, yes. I think we would. And the coachman got up and walked? The coachman got out and walked. He was a bit shaken up, by all accounts. But he said the immortal words, Please, Sir George, I wish to give notice. I was hired to drive and not to fly. Good man. But his coachman aside, George Cayley's tireless work and brilliant mind were to the benefit of all of us. He only wanted to do things for mankind and it is believed he never patented anything and therefore made no money from his inventions whatsoever. He was a magnificent man with his flying machine and that took place here. Fascinating to come somewhere and find out a man who really should be celebrated by the world, who is only known in this small corner, plus a few people who know about aviation. Maybe we should celebrate our heroes more in this country. You see, the sheep agree with me. Welcome to the strange world of Ravenscar. I've been to quite a few villages now in my time, but I've never been anywhere quite like this. You see, my sat-nav tells me this is the centre, the village green, but there's only one house here and this is the railway station, but there's no railway. I'm going to have to find out more about this place. 120 years ago, there were a few scattered houses here, a tiny community known as Peak, but a London property developer bought the land and decided a catchier name was required. The railway had arrived a few years earlier, so why shouldn't Ravenscar become the new Scarborough? They had big plans. I'm visiting Val Russell, who's lived here for 35 years, to find out what did, or rather what didn't happen. I'm Penny. Lovely to meet you, Penny. Would you like to come in? I'd love to, thanks very much. There's an old original sail catalogue. Which came with a map. It's quite old. Oh, it is very old, isn't it? And we have to be... Oh, look, but... What a plan! Yeah? It was going to be a town, wasn't it? I was at the railway station. Now, that is there, isn't that? Station Square, yeah. So this should have all been lots and lots of houses. There's only one on this side, isn't there? We're here. That's you? Yeah. So all these were going to be built? They were. So this was 1905? Yeah. And this was given to us by a Monica Nelson from York. I think it was her aunt. Yes. Bought a plot, and there is the actual... Deed of sale. The deed of sale. Bit expensive. Well, £18. Well, then I suppose it was. I suppose it was. But they only had to pay a deposit, a small deposit. Of £1.16. £1.16. Isn't that extraordinary? And was this one ever built on? Virtually nothing was built as a result of these sales. This is a picture of a railway poster making it look absolutely wonderful. Yes, of course. And you can get to the sea easily. And look at that sandy shore. Yes. Total life. It's shore as opposed to beach. It's lots and lots of rocks. And, of course, it's just an easy little trip down, isn't it, according to this? So whilst large numbers rushed to reserve a plot of land for £1.16, fewer than 50 houses were ever actually built. This is Marine Esplanade. Sounds rather grand, doesn't it? And here, you can see this is where the kerbstones of the rather glamorous road would be. And, of course, a drain cover, which you don't normally see in country villages. Certainly not as big as that. Here I am, 1905, come to view my plot of land, which is by the sea. So I walk along here, this wonderfully manicured path, but... I haven't brought my rope with me, so I can't abseil down. For the small matter of 600 feet, three or four thousand people might now be living here. Instead, Ravenscar remains a village of a couple of hundred. Do you remember any salesman who was selling plants and greens here just over a century ago? Probably went to Spain and lived on the Costa Brava on the proceeds. Next, I discover the boyhood home of a fine figure of a man, isn't he? No shirt, North Yorkshire. And there's the fishing village that swapped fishing nets for artists' easels. Do you paint here often, as they say? And I've reached the north. Greater Scotland marks the end of the moorland plateau, as over a village is here. Villages like that, where the spirit of Yorkshire, proclaimed by my Batsford guide, is alive and cycling. The bunting is out, not for me, but for the Tour de Yorkshire. I believe they're going to leave it up quite a long time, because it makes the village look such fun. But here in Grade 18, pride of place in village affections belongs to one local son, a true Yorkshire hero, Tim James Cook. His parents were farm workers and lived over the field, so every day he would have walked along here. No cars, of course, just horses. I shouldn't think even a road, and come here to go to school. It's probably there he learnt about the outside world. And that might have inspired him to go exploring. The great explorer was 41 by the time he reached Australia. But here in Grade 18, he's remembered in slightly more lonely circumstances. This is Cook as a young man. Well, boy, really. Fine figure of a man, isn't he? Looking longingly towards the sea. Evidently quite a hardy chap. No shirt. North Yorkshire. I've arranged to meet Mark Falun, Run's area home farmer. Mark. Hello. How are you? It's the same farm Cook's parents worked on almost 300 years ago. But whilst the farm is still going strong, I won't be seeing the Cook family cottage, which was sold to Australia in 1933. Here at Grade 8, the workmen are dismantling Captain Cook's cottage, stern by stern. Each stern of the cottages it is removed is marked according to a plan. It is to be re-erected in Melbourne, Australia, and there preserved as a lasting memorial to him. We have a little secret here that not many people know about. There was an old chap in the village, a butcher. He was that disgusted. One night, he went out and pinched a stone. How wonderful. And he didn't tell anybody, but he's hidden the stone in this wall somewhere. So in Australia, they've got a house, one brick short of a full house. And we've got one of their stones. But we don't know which one it is. And don't tell the Australians, but Cook may never have lived in a cottage anyway. Local wisdom says it was little more than his parents' retirement home. And the villagers here have a new theory about where they're born. I love styles like that. Well worn, isn't it? I prefer a kissing gait. A photo from the 1930s recently came to light, showing a clump of trees overlooking Mark's farm. On the back of the photo was a note suggesting that this may be the site of Cook's house. That was enough to spur the villagers into action earlier this year. And with the help of archaeologist Kevin Gale, their efforts have been rewarded. What we're in the process of doing now is taking off the grass. Yes. And exposing the stonework beneath. Right. It's fantastic to find it. We've got the outline walls and we've got various things inside. And can you date the stone? We're trying our best. We've got a number of artefacts from the excavation. And those artefacts are all pointing to the right time period for sort of an 18th century building. And we know by the mid-19th century, by the time that the maps were being made of this area, there was no building here at all. It was gone completely. And all these people helping you, are you all archaeologists? Are you all archaeologists? No. This is a genuine village initiative. There's a real desire to get to the bottom of a local myth. We've got the perimeter walls and the best find to date is this in the corner. Yeah. We've got the remains of a fire. Must have been terribly cold in winter, mustn't it up here? I'm just a soft southerner. These aren't all archaeologists. These are people who live in the village and come up here in weather like this to find out more about their famous son. Remarkable. I'm finishing my visit to North Yorkshire with a return to the global favourite. I love the singing you listen to that. The village of Statham's is one of those important homes close to the settlements that Britain does so well. Houses cling desperately to cliffs, whilst still being remembered in their many bright colours. Oh, that's so pretty. Stathes is a delightful confusion of cottages and cottages, but it's been formed by landscape, economy and history working together to produce something quite special. And for least, my old friend Captain Pope better have you too. The young James Cook received his first taste of the sea and ships in this harbour village where he worked as an assistant to William Sanderson, merchant. Cook moved from Great Aiton to Stathes aged 16 and worked as a greengrocer. The shop was lost to a storm around 200 years ago and it's believed some of the stone was salvaged to build yet another Captain Cook. He must have been attracted to the sea from here because he'd have seen it every single day while he was polishing the apples and thought, I must go down to the sea in ships. And indeed he did and went further than most men. He went to the other end of the world from Yorkshire. From Cook's time, Stathes grew for a century becoming the most important fishing station on the Yorkshire coast by the mid... It's an enormous harbour for such a small village. But then you have to have protection from that wicked, wicked North Sea. The harbour here would have been filled with the classic Stathes fishing boat, the Cobble, with its sleek Viking longship lines. Today, Sean Baxter balances fishing with running tourist excursions and can tell me about the gritty life of the 1800s. It was extremely tough. It was more than tough. Because it was so isolated, when there was a death, when the breadwinner was killed at sea, the family starved, the family starved. And it's hard to describe how grim. We have this little tiny beautiful painted area and we see this in its light, but it was incredibly grim. Change came to Stathes at the very end of the 1800s, but it wasn't down to a Victorian development or even the lure of Captain Cook. It was down to a group of painters inspired by impressionists like Monet and Renoir, artists being here in search of a gritty Yorkshire spirit in a quite wonderful setting. If you're sitting in the pub on a night time and you're watching the light over here, the pink light, the lighting here is absolutely fantastic. They came up and made this little colony and stayed with the fishermen and stayed in the little attics and the little garrets. So they would have paid them money? Oh, gosh, yes. For lodging? Yes, yes, absolutely. And food? And food and lodgings and these people would have looked after them. It would have been part of their summer season to have the artists there. Some of the paintings are incredibly dramatic of the beaches, boats washing up on the beach. And they saw this quaintness, but with this harshness as well. And the thing is, I'm here all through the year when the winter's freezing cold and the northeast wind cuts you like a knife and we see it in all weathers. Do you paint here often, as they say? I mean, I live near Oxford, but there's courses here, you know. I see. Been on three courses and then a couple of holidays. I do see it coming back. And who can blame you? From surprising coastal communities to life surrounded by the moors and the beautiful dales with their preserved dialect, village life in England's largest county is as diverse as the surroundings. And as for the spongy toadies I was warned about, well, I've not found one. My guidebook told me I should go in search of the spirit of Yorkshire. And it's great to see that it's alive and well in this 21st century. Long may it continue, as long as this wonderful landscape. Next time, I'm across the Welsh border exploring a storybook setting of coastline and castles. Pembrokeshire. I've never thought of castles as cosy, but this feels cosy, doesn't it? From a rich land of plenty to villages caught in the war. There seemed to be plenty of liquor to go around. That wasn't rationed. No, that wasn't rationed. I'll discover how this peninsula likes to do things its own way. I had not an idea what you were singing about. Lovely.