The Moors

My folks and I decided to try an easy hiking excursion this week with the kids. We took a train to Thirsk and stayed at The Golden Fleece in Thirsk. The train ride was only 20 minutes, which we felt would be no problem. One might think...what can happen in 20 minutes...well let me tell you. The train was packed, but we got a table and they were thirsty. We suggested they wait until we arrive as there was only 5-10 minutes to arrival. Oliver decided not to wait and opened the water bottle without adult knowledge and did not place the cap back on and it dumped out onto the table getting our backpack of clothes damp and leaving a nice puddle of water on the table. Harrison got a nice portion on his short and was not happy about it, but we were able to keep Oliver dry. Harrison wanted to take his pants off at the table right then and there, but I was able to reason with him and we waited until we got off the train. We just laughed and laughed. We decided to walk to the Hotel...it was ONLY 1.3 miles, which seemed easy enough to begin with. I carried Lily in a backpack child carrier and my folks each had a backpack FULL of snacks, diapers, a lightweight laptop, and clothes for the family. The kids boys were real troopers, but we decided that a taxi ride on the way back would be the way to go.


We ate dinner at The Three Tuns.

It is a chain restaurant in the area and the food was very good. We had to order, pay, and tell them our table number at the bar and then they delivered it to the table. The kids devoured their dinner and quite a bit of the adults. As we were waiting for our dinner Oliver got something wet on his shorts, so he took them off. He was sitting in a booth and we were downstairs, so it was sitting in a shirt and underwear. During dinner he said he was hot, but he was encouraged to keep his shirt on. Well the 3 adults must have been distracted by eating and making sure the other 2 kids had food, when we noticed Oliver sitting at the table completely NAKED! Yes friends NAKED! Gotta love how a 3 year old thinks. He had gotten something on his shorts and he was hot, so off came the clothes. Luckily no one saw and we quickly got him dressed. Yes even mommy saw the humor in this incident.

The next day we took a taxi into the Moors for a hike, which started at the Rievaulx Abbey. The hike was 2.5 miles and took about 1.5 hours.





We had to stay on a trail and Harrison thought we should be able to go wherever we wanted to, but we discussed we did not want to get lost.


The boys were quite excited. We saw lots of animals.


COWS and Lily carried on Moooing as we walked up to the cows and walked by them.


The boys wanted to roll down a hill, which was so cute. Oliver took quite a tumble, but he did pop right back up and was just fine. It did not even phase him.

We heard and saw fighter jets fly right over head, which were really really LOUD!

We climbed through gates...


The boys walked through the long wavy grassy fields of the Moors and had so much fun!



We ended at the Rievaulax Abbey to eat lunch and then the boys wanted to explore the Abbey and explore they did. It was beautiful!