Here is our latest Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots 6th April taken in and around the town this week.
Rowing on the river
The bandstand today
Lonely Crazy Golf
Misty at sea
Waiting to pounce at Easter
Royal Crescent daffodils
Captain Cooks new hat!
Whitby What’s On
Whitby Market Square
Whitby West Pier
Misty Piers
We hope that you have enjoyed our latest Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots 6th April.
Easter Weekend in Whitby is rather late this year, Good Friday is on the 18th of April which gives the weather a chance to warm up after the inclement weather we have been having this week, from the lovely sunshine to the dreaded Ha!
Happy Easter
There are some events happening on the Easter Weekend in Whitby which are worthy of note such as the Easter National Scooter Rally which will be predominately held at the Whitby Spa Pavilion complex and will see hundreds of scooters descend on the town, a real buzz for the scooter aficionados. The event is held over three days with two nights of music entertainment on the Saturday and Sunday evenings with live bands. There is a huge indoor parts fair and custom show held on Saturday daytime and on Sunday at midday there is Red Eds Sunday ride out to Heartbeat country departing from the Whalebones.
On Good Friday there is an Easter Fair held at the Whitby Town’s Turnbull Ground to help raise money for children with cancer. A very worth cause indeed. It commences at 10.00 am onwards with egg painting, crafts, cakes, tombola, a plant stall and face painting.
Slightly before Easter, on Thursday, 17th April there is Tinkerbell and the Pirate Fairy showing at the Whitby Spa Complex.
At the Town’s Market Square on both Saturday and Sunday from 9.00 am to 4.00 pm there is the Whitby Market.
Live music is at the Rifle Club on Easter Saturday with ‘The Pier and George Husband’, also live music is at The Resolution with ‘Unit 3 Playing Live’.
The Station Inn has live entertainment over the three nights of the Easter Weekend in Whitby, playing on Friday is Biz Benton, Saturday is The Sugarlicks and on the Sunday evening is the very popular local Carl Robinson.
The Easter weekend will also be the opening of the new Park and Ride System with many parking meters in situ ready and waiting for the grand unveiling. Hopefully the new car parking facilities will be ready in time!
Pannett Park Museum, Whitby is a wonderful place to while away a few hours. The museum itself was opened in 1931 annexing the art gallery the foundation stone of which was laid in 1927.
Pannett Park Museum, Whitby
Pannett Park Museum is run by the Whitby Literary and Philosophical Society which was founded in 1823 by a group of leading Whitby citizens. Over the years the Whitby Town Council is responsible for the upkeep of the building but the majority of the overseeing and running of the museum is left to volunteers.
There is so much to see when looking around the museum and Art Gallery. The Art Gallery has free admission and contains a wonderful collection of work by the Staithes Group of artists in the Staithes Room, the second gallery houses a collection by the Weatherill family who lived and worked in Whitby in the late 19th and early 20th century. Their work is a pictorial record of the development of the town, in the absence of photographs, the detail of the paintings allow us to see Whitby as it was in the days of sailing ships and the busy local fishing boats. The third gallery is home to exhibitions by various artists or local talent.
Pannett Park Museum, Whitby charges an admission fee but it is free for local residents, however, the quality of the exhibits is such that even though a fee may be charged, it is certainly excellent value. Exhibits include a Natural History section containing many fossilised creatures including the skeleton of a dinosaur, stuffed birds and animals, a collection of a insects and a beautiful array of Whitby Jet in the form of jewellery, chess sets, a replica carving of Whitby Abbey and carved bible covers.
An important part of the town’s history is that of the Whaling ships and there is an exhibition showcasing two whaling captains, William Scoresby (he who invented the Crows’s nest) and William Scoresby Jnr. Exhibits include whalebone carvings and teeth. Whitby’s other famous son, Captain James Cook, who was sent to observe the Transit of Venus and discovered Australia and New Zealand has a section devoted to his travels with a collection of memorabilia from his extensive travels.
Unusual exhibits to be found include a Hangman’s Locket (considered lucky to have a piece of the hangman’s rope especially if a card player!) and the Hand of Glory, a mummified severed hand, normally the right hand chopped from a felon on the gallows, it was used (so legend has it) to induce a coma in the residents of a home whilst a thief could steal at will.
The aforementioned are only a small part of the vast displays on view at the Pannett Park Museum, Whitby. It is well worth a visit for both historical information and curiosity.
Here is our latest Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots March 23rd taken around the town this week.
Lily pond at Pannett Park
The beach from the West Cliff
A host of golden daffodils
Pannett Museum and Art Gallery
The silver gardener in the park
Brightly painted beach huts
A different side of the Whalebone Arch
The last of the crocuses
We hope you have enjoyed our latest Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots March 23rd.
Here is our latest Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots March 16th.
The Inner Harbour flowerbed
The War Memorial still looking respected
A Survey Boat leaving the harbour
The sunny Swing Bridge area
Baxtergate
Last of the Summer Wine?
Spring Daffodils at last
Cherry Blossom too!
We hope that you have enjoyed the latest Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots March 16th. There is so much in this town to photograph.
Whitby Piers, those two iconic images of the entrance to Whitby as they reach out into the North Sea to welcome the visitors and fisherman to the safety of the harbour.
Whitby West and East Piers
Whitby’s Piers showing detached East extension
The piers have been in existence since the 1500s but initially were constructed of timber (oak). Over the next century, the timbers were partly replaced with stonework until in 1632 Sir Hugh Cholmeley, the Lord of the Manor, raised money for the total replacement in stone of both the West and the East Pier.
Both piers were rebuilt again in 1735, each measuring approximately 183m. In 1814 the West Pier was further extended to reach a length of 309m. In 1905, both the piers were again extended each to a lengh of 152m .
The lighthouse on the West Pier was built in 1831 and is a stone column tower reaching 83 feet with the lantern on top but in 1914 there was a replacement light erected on a wooden framework at the very end of the extension pier which is currently operational.
The lighthouse on the East Pier was built of stone in 1854 and is a 55 feet high tower column with the lantern on top. This too was replaced by a similar wooden framework light at the end of the extension pier which is is currently operational.
Sadly, over the years, there has been a steady deterioration of the stonework on the piers and the pier extensions, so much so that the East Pier extension is now inaccessible. It has been reported that there has been over £4 million awarded to Whitby by the Environment Agency to fund essential repairs to the structure of both piers to safeguard these vital sea defences. This, unfortunately, does not include the extension on the East Pier and most of the work which will be carried out at a later date will only strengthen the structures and not enhance it which is what the people of Whitby are concerned about. The Whitby Piers are an important part of the town, and as such, should be protected and preserved.
Whitby Railway Station has been in existence since the beginning of the railway system in the 1830s by the entrepreneur, George Hudson (1800 – 1871) known as ‘The Railway King’.
The Green Knight Steam train in Whitby Station
This week, a new project was announced to reopen the second platform at Whitby Station in a £2 million scheme of investment which will enable the number of trains from three to five per day running to and from Whitby by the NYMR. It is hoped to be completed by April 2014.
This year is the 41st Anniversary of the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, formed by a group of volunteers with the aim of keeping the rail links open, once threatened with closure by Beeching in the 1960s. Working with Network Rail, and with funding from the Government’s Coastal Communities Fund, it is hoped that the increased services to Whitby will bring extra passengers to provide an important boost to the local economy.
The station is owned by Network Rail and run by Northern Rail, and, together with the North Yorkshire Heritage Railway, will try to ensure that the works will be concluded with minimum disruption, indeed, Construction Marine Limited, the principle contractor for the scheme, have already commenced work as from this Monday.
This expansion will certainly help the number of travellers coming into Whitby from the students and schoolchildren to the hundreds of holidaymakers and day visitors to the town, via the NYMR line and the Esk Valley Line. The proposed new station to serve James Cook Hospital will be an additional stop on the Whitby Railway to Middlesbrough line enabling many of the local population, staff, patients and visitors, access to the hospital by rail. The new station is set to open in April and will offer fully lit waiting and seating area with passenger information and a public announcement system.
It is hoped that the improvements will help to generate around 70 local jobs which is very welcome for the towns employment statistics.
As well as the commuters to Whitby and the day trippers, the NYMR organises many events throughout the year including the Steam Galas, Sixties and Seventies Weekends, Railway in Wartime, Witches and Wizards Week, Classic vehicle Weekend and the ever popular Santa Specials. The Esk Valley Line offers visitors the popular Music and Ale trains every Friday throughout the summer with Santa Rides in December.
Whitby Railway is an important part of the structure of the town and the improvements will hopefully enforce the viability of this important link with the rest of the country.
Here is our latest Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots, 9th March.
Pleasure boats and fishing boats
The tranquil harbour
Sunny day at Robin Hood’s Bay
Gasworks on Church Street
The remains of Penny Hedge
Canoeists on the River Esk
Robin Hood’s Bay
We hope that you have enjoyed our Wonderful Whitby Weekly Snapshots taken this week in the town and surrounding areas.
Ship Building in Whitby has, until the last century, been one of the major sources of employment in the town.
Shipbuilding at Parkol Marine
Newly constructed fishing vessels at Parkol Marine
Alum mining near to Sandsend saw the Whitby Port develop to accommodate the transportation of coal from Durham needed to process the alum. The ship building trade began in earnest primarily for this coal trade, the Endeavour (formery the Earl of Pembroke) in which Captain Cook sailed was a ‘cat’ used for the transportation of coal. These flat bottomed boats were hugely successful and easily adapted for exploration in uncharted shallow waters and their ability to be ‘beached’ to permit loading and unloading without the need for a docking facilities. By the mid seventeen hundreds the town was the sixth largest port in England and had 11 shipyards along the River Esk.
Whaling, another prosperous industry for Whitby enabled further expansion of ship building and fishing vessels. The last wooden vessel to be built in Whitby was The Monkshaven, launched in 1871. In 1887 the first steel vessel was built in Whitby and from then onwards nearly all the shipping was made from steel.
Sadly over the years, shipbuilding at Whitby declined in so much as there is only one shipbuilding company left. The family run business situated on the west side of the river is called Parkol Marine, formed in 1988 this boatyard has two berths for new builds and a dry dock for repairs. In 2002, a 40% replica of the ‘Endeavour’ was built and launched. Over the years this company has produced many fine fishing vessels. It has been in the news recently as it has become a victim of its own success.
The weight of the new ships, according to the Scarborough Borough Council, has damaged the wharf and it is estimated that it will cost three million pounds to repair and protect the area. It is to be hoped that an agreement can be reached between the company and the council as it would be devastating for the town to lose this last connection with Shipbuilding in Whitby and the loss of thirty high skilled workers’ jobs in the town.
Spring in Whitby seems as though it has finally arrived to break the dullness and wetness of the last few months. It seemed as though the skies would never clear and the damp seemed to last forever.
Spring Primula in full bloom
Sunny Harbour View
Householders and business owners are feeling more inclined to decorate and rejuvenate their properties ready for the coming season. The flowerbeds on the roundabouts are now beginning to show their treasures as the flowers are coming into bloom. Not many of the daffodils are showing their heads but the crocuses are already showing their beautiful colours. Mayfield Road has its lovely lilac and white winding pathway on the grass kerbside. On the eastern side of the New bridge there is a star shaped bed of bright yellow crocuses, a real starburst!
Unfortunately the flower beds alongside the inner harbour are still awaiting to be planted, however, hopefully it won’t be too long!!
The beaches have been quite populated on a weekend with the donkeys making a regular appearance, ice-cream and coffee kiosks open and a general cheerful air. Spring in Whitby, bring it on!
