Leaving York at Walmgate Bar

I did not want to bid farewell to York with that grim post on the Rigg family monument, particularly as I found again my love for the city this summer. So here is something happier: Walmgate Bar.

When I was a student at the University of York the gatehouse over the roadway was home to a secondhand bookshop with sporadic opening hours. I did once manage to get in there and bought a David & Charles paperback called The Lost Roads of Wessex. I could not resist books with titles like that even then.

Today the gatehouse is home to a friendly coffee shop. When I climbed the stairs to look at the upper level, I found it full of young people bent studiously over laptops. I suspect they were from the University's Wentworth College, which is now a postgraduate college and has a building in Walmgate.

So, it's farewell to York. See you in Ripon.