Panic on the Streets of London

ST LUKE'S: It's almost as if summer has disappeared. Where we were baking outside in the sunshine three weeks ago, now we huddle inside to avoid the rain. Running home from work is less a struggle to dodge tourists and keep hydrated than it is too keep warm. But regardless of the weather fellow joggers never, ever smile. Some things never change.

We were lucky on the weekend though. By all accounts London was drenched but we (me, Kate, Jaq, Libby Trew and Elerig) headed north for the bank holiday. After dodging most of the traffic we spent our first evening in a stunning converted hunting lodge in the Yorkshire Dales. Unfortunately we only really had time to enjoy the breakfast provided and then take in the dry walled fields of the dales for about fifteen minutes before we had to leave for Whitby.

Whitby is the town where Captain Cook spent his apprenticeship but we didn't have time to visit the museum. Instead we dined on greasy fish and chips (I don't think I'll ever like the English version of gourmet cuisine) and visited Whitby Abbey. An atmospheric collection of ruins on a windswept cliff, it is notable for having helped inspire Bram Stoker to write Dracula. Unfortunately we were forced to share the English Heritage sight with looniest collection of medieval revivalists you've ever seen. They'd lugged their medieval beds, to sit at hand made tables and eat gruel out of handmade bowls. Of course they had to drive to the abbey but then thats by the by.