Ey up! A weekend of Yorkshire motoring, visiting The Lady’s home county.

Welcome back to another helping of the The Lady’s Great British Tea Room Tour.

Nah then!  It has been a while since the last one.  In between dodgy dynamos and a hissy fit leaving us stranded at the side of road. My jottings of this excursion take me not only on an adventure in search of Cake, but a journey for The Lady going back home.  This time I had embarked on a rather ambitious journey from Somerset to Yorkshire for the Jowett Car Club’s Annual Rally, however while up in Yorkshire, a few followers of the blog recommended that I drop into visit the famous Betty’s Tea Room while I was there.

This will have been longest journey I have attempted in Lady, a 600-mile round trip, loaded up with cases, hats & tools.  As The Lady has always been a family car, accompanying me for the trip, is my mother. The event is a weekend of catching up with old friends once a year at this annual gathering of Jowetts and their owners. The excursion started with a two-day pootle of a little over 300 miles to Harrogate.  Along the most direct route off motorways along A & B roads.  Cruising at about a speed of 30 miles an hour.   Breaking up the run with a stop off at a B&B in Evesham.  Catching up with fellow Jowett owners in the area, who we followed up for the rest of the journey.  A trouble free run up, apart from a puncture less than 10 miles from the Hotel.  Sods law!  A quick change with the spare and back on the road again.

 

The Jowett National Rally is usually held on the May Bank Holiday.  The annual gathering’s events are broken up over the two days with a static display and a scenic run tour of the area.  Great to get in a few of those Yorkshire miles, a perfect opportunity to drop into Betty’s to sample some famous delights along the route.  There are in fact two Betty’s Tea Rooms in the Harrogate area, one in the city and the other is located at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Harlow Carr Gardens.

Betty’s tea room was an experience like no other, walking in through the gift & treat shop, the counter and shelves were full of beautifully boxed and bowed gifted tea’s and treats. Walking through to the tea room, joining the queue waiting to be seated by the maître d.  A bit like a posh restaurant only a rather elegant feeling tea room.  “Where would you like to be seated Sir, in the tea room or café?”  Well you know all know where we were heading…  It certainly has a high society feel to it, all the various waiters in their white pinafores carrying tea and cake to and from the kitchen on silver trays.  

 

Having a good peruse of the menu, a Yorkshire Cream Tea looked great to sample as well as a Strawberry Éclair. Placing an order with the smartly dressed waitress, we sat admiring its atmosphere, such a bustling place, I guess based on its popularity, lots of people sat enjoying tasty treats. A while later arriving by an immaculately dressed waitress a silver tea service accompanied by two well rounded scones on a three-tiered silver cake stand were presented on the table. The Yorkshire cream tea, two fruit scones, together with great dallops of cream & jam, served in silver pots.  The scones were pre-cut, well at least that kept the crumbs down to minimum.    

As you can tell from the photo, this tea room tour is making squeezing into awesome flat twinned machines quite the struggle.  But one of the great things about weekends like this is to look and admire at some of the other vehicles made by Jowett, all the rolling out from the same factory as The Lady a fascinating gathering of variants.  Even the chance to ride in others too. 

 

While in Yorkshire, I thought it would be a a good opportunity to drive back to the old factory site, which is now a Morrisons supermarket.  Though inside is a Frieze mural depicting a few Jowett’s commemorating the history of the site of one of Yorkshires past enterprises the Bradford made car.  Even on the outside, on the surrounding walls the outline of a Jowett Bradford van can be seen in the brick work.  This little adventure made a great addition to the weekend.   Rounding off the weekend, ready for departure the next day.   

 

The journey back was almost a complete success, less than 100 miles from home disaster had struck. The Lady’s get up and go seemed to have up and left, coming to halt near Kemble in the Cotswolds.  One of the things about motors like these is that most of time you can sort it out and they will get you home.  However sadly not this time after a rather chaotic response from a well-known breakdown company, which resulted in a lengthy stay at the side of road, eventually getting recovered home.  A few choice words were said at the side of road, but through the vale of disappointment came the reward of success not only fixing The Lady.  But with the help The Jowett Car Club providing the new parts to put her right, waking up a few of those 7 horses under the bonnet as well.

I know this blog hasn’t strictly been a Tea room jaunt, but still an epic adventure in an old motor in the scale of things.  A mile stone as it were along the tour, and a driving adventure none the less.    The furthest distance not only for the blog, but The Lady brought home a couple of accolades from the club weekend from my adventures in the blog and miles I have covered from it.

Here is to many more cups of tea, and more miles pootling on the open road.

Until next time on The Ladys Great British Tea Room Tour.