Yorkshire Day 3 - Friday

Wensleydale today. One of our special places. We always look forward to revisiting some of the places made very interesting by the adventures about a country vet, by author IanWright (alias James Herriott), so off to explore today.  At the head of the dale lay our eventual destination - the Wensleydale creamery - source of a number of fine cheeses and the Wensleydale Pantry - excellent home cooking!!

While there was a little drizzle at times the drive was great with the countryside so very attractive. Typical rock walls all around and stone barns in almost every field. Lots of sheep to talk to also - they all have their own voices and huge eyelashes.

We chose a few roads that were new to us and thoroughly enjoyed being out in the Dales. Even on the higher country with no buildings or people in sight, it is a special place.

Villages dot the dales and each one has its own character. The local shops, such as Rustic Rabbit at Grassington (right), are always full of interest but in terms of architecture and content. Hawes itself has a real appeal for us being the location of the creamery and the Wensleydale Pantry.

Towards the end of the day we headed to Harlow Carr near Harrogate and location of our favorite Betty's. Unfortunately they were closing early and so we needed to head into the town itself if we were going to have dinner.

But it was not to be... in the carpark, and after a day of driving in very remote locations, the hire car lost all forward gears!! After reversing into a safe position - it lost its reverse one as well !!!!! To add interent to the situation, this was the only day we had left our mobile phone at the cottage. While Arthur made the car safe, I begged the Betty's staff for use of their phone and rang the emergency help line. Everyone was very understanding and we were assured that someone would rescue us within the next 2 hours - better than nothing.

As it turned out, help arrived in a little less than an hour. In the form of a fairly little and very friendly Yorkshireman. He managed to coax the car to be of some use ...and so with a large tow truck following to pick up any pieces, we made our way back slowly to the cottage and a warm fire. Then followed a series of interesting phone calls.
The first assistant had been a local guy called by the AA. But then there began a shuffle between the local guy, the AA and Hertz. Our car could not be driven, Hertz were all closed up until after Christmas except at Manchester Airport (2 hours away) and the AA did not want to help if there was no replacement vehicle. Eventually we located a replacement car at Manchester, the AA told us they would collect us and our car and take us there - "be picking you up in the next 15 minutes or so". This all began at around 5.30pm. By 11pm, and after several further promises of "be there in 15 minutes" we were still in our cottage and the Hertz place had closed.

See the Saturday Blog for the next exciting part of this saga.