Kirby Ravensworth

The Shoulder of Mut­ton at Kirby Hill does a nice pint, has two coal fires, and a good menu.  Situ­ated on the edge of a small escarp­ment look­ing North over the Holme Val­ley, the vil­lage of Ravens­worth, and towards Tees­dale.  We were stay­ing in Kirby Hill, a small vil­lage, ham­let really, round a green off the through road. Snow made it all idyllic, once we man­aged to get to and from Rich­mond to get food sup­plies (thanks Stephen and Colin — saved our Christ­mas pota­toes).  Delight­ful walks across snow-covered fields to Ravens­worth (thanks for the tea and whis­key, Dorothy and Wil­liam) where there is a ruined castle in the middle of a marsh.  Going back up there was a lane too snowy for road traffic.  It would have been the most won­der­ful tobog­gan run. After a couple of days of slight melt­ing dur­ing the day and freez­ing at night it was more like a bobsled run — lethal, prob­ably.  Walks too along the edge of the moor, where the army, which usu­ally uses it as a fir­ing range, was hav­ing a Christ­mas truce.  Alto­gether  an excel­lent week in a flat con­ver­ted out of the Old Gram­mar School (1640 some­thing to 1957).

And we got there by train and 2 buses. Only down­side to this was the can­cel­la­tion of bus ser­vices on Xmas eve due to snow (see note above ref get­ting to and from Rich­mond) and Rich­mond Council’s refusal to provide any shel­ter for bus pas­sen­gers in the square where all the buses start from.