Listen to the Christmas Carols, maybe Dick Turpin's ghost will join in! (York Castle Museum)

Member Name: lellagrace

Product:	York Castle Museum
Date:	27/11/06 (307 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great place to be this festive season

Disadvantages: Maybe you live a long way away from York!

YORK CASTLE MUSEUM

If you are fed up of all the modern day glitz and expense of 21st century Christmas, take a step back in time and visit York Castle Museum and see how the Victorians celebrated the festive season.

From early December the castle museum is hosting a series of evening carol concerts “Carols in Kirkgate”. The York Philharmonic male voice choir will join with the Kirkgate singers, dressed in Victorian costumes, to sing traditional Christmas music in the cobbled street which forms part of the museum.

I was going to wait until after the Carols in Kirkgate to write this review, but then decided that some of you might not know about this and if there is a chance you want to go, perhaps there may still be time for you to obtain tickets. As I live near York I visit the museum frequently, but if you have never been, then I am sure you will love it, even if you can’t make it to the carol concert.

Tickets have been on sale for a few weeks now but I managed to get a couple fairly recently, so you never know, there may be a few left or there may have been some cancellations and you might be lucky.

(See their website for more details www.yorkcastlemuseum.org.uk)

If you have never been to York then this is a wonderful walled city, with excellent rail and road links. It is a great place to do your Christmas shopping (Yes, I have actually started mine now!). But back to the museum –

The museum is not at all boring or stuffy and there is lots of interest everyone of all ages. I have been going there since I was a kid and still keep going back as it is so fascinating. The only difference nowadays is that the hansom cab and horse in the Victorian street seem much smaller than they did when I was little!

Open every day from 9.30 am until 5 pm, except Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day, the museum has good admission prices. Adults are 6.50, children 3.50 but there are also additional ticket combinations which allow discounts on these. There are also concessions. One thing I like about the ticket prices is that you can buy your ticket then use it as many times as you like throughout the following year for free! Now why don’t all museums do this I wonder?

There is a café, and in summer there is a picnic area. Disabled access is not good apart from the main areas, but I think they are working on improving this. Also no pushchairs are allowed into the museum, but again they are trying to help with this.

York Castle Museum is situated about a five minute walk from the main Coppergate shopping area, there are some good restaurants around here too (I particularly recommend 31 Castlegate, the food is excellent and the prices are very reasonable, the restaurant is only a few yards from the museum, near the Hilton Hotel).

Sorry, I digress again! Back to the museum, but there is so much to see in York I want you to have an enjoyable visit and look at the surroundings as well as the museum itself!

So you pay your entrance and you step inside this historic building, which used to be the county jail! You can see the cells where debtors and felons spent their time, you can see where the famous Highwayman, Dick Turpin, was incarcerated until he was hung in 1739. Incidentally, he is buried in St George’s churchyard, York if you have time to go there too.

The prison was built in 1709, to replace the castle prison which had existed on this site earlier. It became overcrowded (nothing new there then!) and in 1835 a new prison was built , but less than a hundred years later this was demolished and in 1938 the Castle Museum was opened on the site.

Not only do you see the seedier side of life as it was, you can also look at some social history of family life too. A Victorian parlour shows how people from that era lived, but there is also a range of household history from 1600 right up to 2002. This includes a 1950s living room, complete with many things that we probably remember our grandmother’s having in their houses! Oh dear, not a good idea, it made me feel old that I am now old enough to remember things that are museum pieces!!! But it is fascinating, really and you are sure to hear someone say “Oh I remember those!” or “My mother had one just like that!” as the visitors point at the ordinary household bits and pieces. (Makes me feel good, I am a bit of a hoarder and it makes me realise that if previous generations had not hoarded these ordinary things, there would be no museums like this, so I come away not feeling guilty about the boxes of junk in our loft!)

There is also a Military History section where there are displays of arms and armour, from medieval times to modern day. These show body protection for the today’s military forces and other related stuff. Personally, I found this all a bit uninteresting, but for those of you who like militaria then it is great.

You can learn about the siege of York, narrated from actual accounts by a Royalist soldier, from the English Civil War until the battle of Marston Moor in 1644.

There are various costumes on display, needlework, textiles, showing how these have changed through the years. It really is impossible to list everything on here, so do visit for yourself.

Now to my favourite parts of this museum - the streets, where you can wander round and feel as if you are really stepping back in time. Half Moon Court is an early 20th century Edwardian street. This was built in what used to be the old prison yard. There is a drapery store, an ironmongers, a butchers and lots more.

Then there is the Victorian Street – Kirkgate. Wander around here and you will find yourself in a schoolroom witnessing how children had to be seen and not heard, you can see the bank, a sweet shop (with luscious displays of old fashioned glass jars full of old time favourites), there is a toymakers and a pawnbrokers. Well worth a visit!

So if you just want a day out over the Christmas holidays, or maybe a weekend break, then do go to York and take a trip to the Castle Museum.

Or maybe you want your company to organise some “team building” or want to hire a special venue for a corporate event? The Museum can cater for all this, they can organise buffets for up to 700 guests or dinners for 80! So if your boss has been a bit of a Scrooge this Christmas, then butter him up at the Christmas party and suggest he books the Castle Museum for next year’s Christmas party!

Summary: York Castle Museum - something for everyone, all year round