We had loved our visit to Flamborough on our Yorkshire Coast trip in April of this year, but Jeeves and Michelle did not meet-up with us until we had moved on to Scarborough. When he learned about our experiences at Flamborough, Jeeves expressed his desire to visit and tick off his bucket-list item of seeing puffins. So a return visit was planned at a time when there are more puffins to be seen, we had been told early June would be good.
We returned to for a second visit to Wold Farm site, which we also loved the first time. Well away from everything yet near to the coastal, cliff-top path and easy access to the RSPB reserve at Bempton Cliffs as well as the cliffs at Flamborough Head.
Jeeves’s craving to see puffins was met on the evening of our arrival when we walked to the south along the cliff-top path from the site. He was able to see them, but had not brought his camera, so tried to manage with his phone, with limited success.
We spent the following day, Friday, in the RSPB reserve which is north of the site, watching all the various seabirds nesting on the cliff-face. It never ceases to amaze me that they manage to raise their young under these circumstances. The limestone cliffs are full of ledges and fissures, providing niches for the different species to exploit.
On our way to the reserve, we met a young man, Barney Lee, who was walking around the coastal paths of mainland Britain, for charity. He started in 2019, walking around the southern part of England then all of Wales, but Covid had made him curtail his original plan when he had got as far as the west coast of southern Scotland, so when he resumed, he did a coast-to-coast, across England and returned south down the Northumberland coast. He was on the last leg of his journey and once back at Mablethorpe, would be back where he started. He had a companion on the day we met him, but he said that most had been completed alone. His website is: https://barneylee.co.uk/ which is interesting and informative. Check out his itinerary.
After spending a few hours in the reserve and enjoying a cup of coffee at the visitor centre, we returned to Fufu and Homer at Wold Farm for something to eat and drink, after which I had another wander to the south, this time alone, unsuccessfully trying to photograph some sand martins as they swooped to catch insects on the wing, at Thornwick Bay. I did manage to get some other images though:
On Saturday, we took the motorhomes to the car park at Flamborough North Landing, where all-day parking is just £1.80. This enabled us to walk further south as far as Flamborough Head and the lighthouse there to enjoy tea and cake at the cafe. Unsurprisingly, it was quite busy as it was a fine day.
The landscape here is stunning, with dramatic cliffs, pillars and caves. The stuff of boyhood adventure stories featuring smugglers and pirates.
There were some seals basking on the rocks while the tide is out, just south of the point. I always wonder why they keep their hind-flippers up off the ground and out of the water. Do they not like getting them wet?
Later that evening, having returned to the motorhomes, we were joined by Alison’s son Mark and his girlfriend Emma. It is Mark’s birthday this week and as they are having a week’s break in Pickering, they felt it was within driving distance to spend an evening with us. Alison had manged to make a birthday cake for him before leaving home, keeping it in the freezer compartment of the fridge until defrosting it and decorating it just prior to their arrival. Emma, who is vegan, had also made a vegan lemon-drizzle cake, so all in all the “piece-of-cake count” for the day was up to three. It is tough life is this motorhome malarkey.
"See-u-Later" 