Signs of the times

IT is to be a column of signs, if not necessarily of wonders, but first to Middlesbrough railway station. Once there was a milk train to Whitby, now the first one out's just after 7am and the second at 10.38, late enough to deliver meals on wheels as it ambles agreeably down the Esk Valley.

We leave it at Castleton Moor and head for the hills. Somewhere up there, back of beyond and then some, there's a cricket match to watch at 6.30.

Castleton's a pleasant village, with rather a lot of houses for sale - one's described as a penthouse, and there can't be many of those on the North Yorkshire moors - and a post office with, inexplicably, a window display on the delights of Italy.

Immediately above the village, heading south towards Hutton-le-Hole, a sign warns that 150 sheep were killed on the road last year and asks drivers for a bit more consideration and a bit less speed.

For the first couple of miles, however, there seem hardly to be any sheep at all. Either there were only 150 in the first place, or the rest have been learning the Highway Code the hard way.

The views are spectacular, or would be if they could properly be witnessed. It's a scene seeking sunshine, but the sun frets, decides otherwise and hurries, unseen, towards the west - like those unfortunate sheep, almost, an occident waiting to happen.

If the road towards Rosedale is mildly precipitous, its tributaries are one-in-three and it's as if the fret's following their ascent. Car headlights are on after four miles, mist rolling in from the C1384.

Once or twice in a ditch there's a sad and stinking reminder that the death toll continues, mutton dressed up as lamentable.

Ralph's Cross - an elderly, if not ancient, obelisk - stands at Rosedale Head, near which the Lyke Wake Walk crosses the moor like an appendix scar. Not far beyond is the celebrated Lion Inn at Blakey, 1,325ft above the sea and reputedly a hostelry since the 16th century.

At the foot of the cross, in a waterproof bag beneath a stone, lies a copy of the Complete Prophecies of Nostradamus - signs as in portents. The old lad may have seen it coming, but it's a hell of a surprise to me.

A printed note inside the cover advises that it is a free book, that it hasn't been lost or forgotten, and urges that it should be read and then "released".

It's a scheme set up by www.bookcrossing.com - and the website explains that its members love books sufficiently to let them go.

"Our goal, simply, is to make the whole world a library. Sharing your used books has never been more exciting, or more serendipitous."

Each donor has an identification number. Nostradamus's is Monteith-the-lost. It's tempting to take it down the pub, but there's a Whitby Gazette in me backpack and it's more likely to provide a local angle.

The Lion has several nicely furnished rooms, all well filled even on a Wednesday lunchtime and plenty of signs there, too. Mind your head, mind the step, watch out on the slippery floor.

Once it was regularly cut off by snow; on a June day on a windy ridge, it just seems cold enough for it.

Some customers are walkers, others may merely suppose Blakey to have been a character from On the Buses. An elderly lady can't understand how they do the coast-to-coast walk in a day and is unconvinced by her poor husband's ever more irritated arguments that they don't. She has St Bee's in her bonnet.

There are six or so hand pumps, dominated by the Theakston's range. A pint of well-kept Pedigree is £2.60; like those one-in-threes, it seems a bit steep.

The bar meal menu is extensive, unremarkable and, probably, mostly frozen. From six or seven vegetarian options - leek and mushroom crumble, nut roast - I order for £8.50 the vegetarian kiev, said to come with a silky (oh, come on) cheese, herb and garlic sauce. It arrives within minutes with peas, chips and a bit of salad.

If that is unexceptional, the bread and butter pudding is decidedly sub-standard. It's bland, boring, in need perhaps of jam on it. The estimable Whitby Gazette hasn't much to say for itself this time, either, though they've formed a Whitby branch of the East Fife supporters' club, for which the drink is blamed.

Just beyond the pub, wholly improbably, is the site of Rosedale Junction, where the railway following the contours up from Battersby served a booming mid-nineteenth century iron mining industry - "the Yorkshire Klondyke", one of the information boards calls it.

Between 1856 and 1871, Rosedale's population rose from 558 to 2,839 - more, it's said, than Middlesbrough's. Trains carried the ore back to Teesside, and to County Durham.

The trackbed remains, a lovely walk down to Rosedale Abbey but still too fretful to afford much of a view. After two or three miles it's time to turn back, cross Blakey Ridge and drop down into Farndale. There's still a cricket match and tea.

MIDDLESBROUGH railway station has been much improved of late, sufficient for those "Passionate People" placards to offer a welcome and to bang on about innovative animation hotshops and things. Whatever one of those is, it's in Hartlepool.

A lady, innocent abroad, asks if I'm Graham. She really does want to know, not euphemistically looking for business or even for an innovative animation hotshop. Times really are a-changing.

What the station still lacks is a buffet. It's been closed for years, still to let, ever more forlorn.

Instead, en route to the moors, we take breakfast at Campbell's - opposite the bus station and a clothes shop called Box Femme, which is a clever play on words but may not universally be translated.

Campbell's is both civilised and very welcoming, the sort of place - a bit like the old independent bus companies - where staff and customers seem to know one another by their first names.

A carefully cooked all-day breakfast - there was a 15-mile walk ahead - is £4.95, including excellent fried bread and pretty decent everything else. Only the toast is tasteless, and pappy. Toast almost always is.

Coffee, disappointingly, is an extra £1.30. They mustn't have coffee with breakfast in the Boro.

DESCRIBED as being "tucked away in a beautiful corner of the Land of the Prince Bishops" - at least it doesn't nestle - the Manor House Hotel in West Auckland has had a £500,000 refurbishment. "To the Manor re-born", as the invitation to an open day on June 24 suggests. There's a new cocktail lounge and stables bar, a chance not just to meet the "resident" town crier but Henry VIII and his wives as well. The manor is said to have been one of Henry's hunting lodges: the old lad certainly got around.

FROM Martin Snape in Durham, the answer to a puzzle and another one. Writing last week about the Rose and Crown at Bainbridge, in Wensleydale, we noted that at 9pm every night between Holyrood Day and Shrove Tuesday the old horn is traditionally sounded on Bainbridge village green and wondered when Holyrood Day might be. It's September 14 - "seems appropriate," says Martin. OK then, why?

...and finally, the bairns wondered if we knew what sort of crisps are named after an Arab ruler. Sultan vinegar, of course.