6/10 Gisborough Priory

It took me two trips to the small town of Gisborough to get these photos.  The first trip was on Monday, June 6, but it turned out that the priory was closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, so today, Friday, June 10th, I knew it would be open and it would not be too far out of my way when I left Danby and moved north into Scotland today.  

This ancient priory was founded by the family of Robert the Bruce, aka Braveheart, of the movie story.  Only problem is that the Mel Gibson movie was only "loosely" based on the real story of Robert de Brus and his family.  

Anyway, this town has two things going for it--some easy and free public parking lots and public toilets that are fairly clean right next to the parking lots, aka car parks.  There is also a Super Tesco nearby, which makes it easy to pick up groceries.  By my second trip, I was getting pretty good at getting here and parking. 

On my first trip here, all I could find was the church which I knew was next to the ruins of the priory.  (A priory, by the way, is where monks lived and prayed.)

The door to the ruins and pleasant garden was closed and locked tight!  Darn!!

Yea!  Today, not only was the gate open, but there were volunteers in the little booth passing out maps and selling some pamphlets.  It is one of hundreds of historical sites across England managed by English Heritage, which is a non-profit group that preserves and protects such places.  Here is their site that gives more information that I can on this site:  https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/gisborough-priory/history/

This is the original dovecote, where doves and their eggs were raised for food.

The priory was one of the most prominent in Europe until Henry VIII turned Great Britain into a protestant country, and the monks had to turn over the deed to the Crown.  

Now, when we see ruins, we often assume they are a result of war or weak construction techniques, or even natural events.  However, in this case, the family that leased the buildings and land in the 16th Century wanted to build a mansion nearby, so they had the buildings taken apart stone by stone so they could reuse them for their home!! 

They left the end of the priory standing as a landscape feature in their mansion gardens!  Sort of a glorified garden gnome!! 

Any way, a lot of volunteers keep this property up and have planted gardens and made this into not only a historical site, but a very pleasant park. 

Forgot to record my Fitbit data, but I did a lot of driving today, and only walked in the morning at the priory and then at North Berwick around the harbor, so I am guessing I walked a bit over 2 miles.