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The main A170 road enters the National Park from Thirsk as it climbs
five hundred feet in half a mile to Sutton Bank (960ft), a phenomenal
viewpoint whose panorama extends across the Vale of York to the Pennines
on the far horizon. At the top of the climb stands a North York Moors
National Park Visitor Centre (Easter-Oct daily 10am-5pm; Nov, Dec &
March daily 11am-4pm; Jan & Feb Sat & Sun 11am-4pm; tel 01845/597426, ),
where you can pick up details about local walks - such as the marked
White Horse Nature Trail (2-3 miles; 1hr 30min) which skirts the crags
of Roulston Scar en route to the Kilburn White Horse , northern
England's only turf-cut figure, at 314 feet long and 228 feet high.
A diversion off the A170 takes you into COXWOLD , as attractive a little
village as they come. The majority of its many visitors come to pay
homage to the novelist Laurence Sterne , who is buried by the south wall
(close to the porch) in the churchyard of St Michael's , where he was
vicar from 1760 until his death in 1768. Shandy Hall , 150 yards further
up the road past the church (May-Sept Wed 2-4pm, Sun 2.30-4.30pm;
gardens May-Sept Mon-Fri & Sun 1-4.30pm; £3.50; gardens only £2.50), was
Sterne's home, now a museum crammed with literary memorabilia. It was
here that he wrote A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy and
the wonderfully eccentric The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy,
Gentleman . Sterne talked of "A delicious Walk of Romance" from Coxwold
to twelfth-century Byland Abbey (Easter-Sept daily 10am-6pm; Oct daily
10am-5pm; Nov-Easter Wed-Sun 10am-1pm & 2-4pm; £1.70; EH), a mile and a
half northeast of the village. His description captures the appeal of
the ruins, which though larger in ground area than the Cistercian houses
at Fountains and Rievaulx, are far less well preserved. Buses run to
Coxwold from Thirsk on Mondays, Fridays and Saturdays (and on to
Helmsley), and the Moorsbus runs here from Helmsley in summer. The
Fauconburg Arms (tel 01347/868214; £60-70), a superb old pub on Main
Street, has a cosy bar serving good food and a more formal restaurant. |
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