York city has the best remaining city walls in England. They encircle a compact city centre with many historical buildings and attractive streets with shops and cafes. There are a number of gates, or as they are called here 'bars', in the walls. Wherever we walked we regularly came back to a section of wall or York Minster.  The minster is Northern Europe's largest mediaeval cathedral, and is certainly ornately decorated. Lovely too that it has some land around, as many cathedrals do not.



 
Clifford's Tower is another land mark. This is the only remaining section of York Castle, and has a sad history. 150 Jews were locked inside the tower by an angry crowd, and rather than be killed the Jews took their own lives.

From here we visited Fairfax House, a lovely Georgian house that has been restored after it had been left to decay. It has become the home for a bequest of a large collection of Georgian furniture, and so is beautifully decorated. Each of the major rooms have guides who seem very dedicated to the cause of explaining the history of the house and its contents.
 


There was also an interesting exhibition of paintings in the Castle Galleries - some done by Bob Dylan and also Ronnie Wood. Some very good ones here, and unexpected to see. 

There are a number of bridges over the River Ouse, and we crossed the river a few times. The Lendal Bridge is interesting as the old toll booths here are now utilised as cafes. Near here we picnicked in the Museum Gardens before visiting the museum. It couldn't really compare with Carlisle Museum, which was so good, so we moved on to the Art gallery. Sadly, it was closed for renovation.
 
Late afternoon we stopped at Betty's famous tea rooms. We have been here before and this time did not partake of tea but purchased a 'Fat Rascal' to take home. These rock cake-like delicacies are very good. It was getting towards dinner time, so, coming across another Jamie's Italian we decided we would have an early dinner. And good it was too. And then it was just the walk home to finish the day. Past crowds of people enjoying the sun by the river. 
 
The next day we went out of town to a garden near Malton. Scampston Walled Garden has a 4 acre walled garden divided into nine sections and also woods, a lake etc. The walled section has a number of sections with natural looking 'meadow' planting' which was very attractive.
Just as we reached the gardens we saw a sign for a 'Farmhouse bakery', and as it was 11am, it was coffee time, so that worked well. And what a find! The Farmhouse Bakery is not in a village but out on its own near the gardens. It has an amazing selection of baked goods, and when we spoke to the woman serving, it turns out she is a patissiere and makes everything in the shop! Sweet tarts, savoury pastries, cakes, bread, celebration cakes - she makes them all. And her story is amazing.
 

 
 
So we had a coffee, a lovely walk in the gardens, and then went on to Sutton Park, an 18th-century Georgian country house situated on the edge of the village of Sutton-on-the-Forest. The garden here was quite different to Scampston. It is a large garden with lots of lawn area amongst garden beds, trees and pools. We imagined it as a lovely place for children to play.

Back at our B&B in York we took a walk up the road to Lal Quila, an Indian restaurant where we had a fantastic dinner and an insight into a different style of Indian food. The Afghani chicken in particular was taste sensation. Loved it.

In this way our 4 days in York flew by, and now we were on the home run.