Plan a day in Thirsk · 35 places
Historic places near Thirsk
Two of the finest ruined abbeys in the country are within half an hour, and the town itself holds a 1940s vet's surgery, a Perpendicular church begun around 1430 and the birthplace of the man Lord's cricket ground is named after.
1World of James Herriot
4 min walk · Thirsk on foot
The house at 23 Kirkgate where Alf Wight lived and practised, kept as the Skeldale House of the books
Adults 10, children 5, under-3s free · allow about 1.5 hours
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2Thirsk Museum
3 min walk · Thirsk on foot
Free volunteer-run museum in the house where Thomas Lord, founder of Lord's Cricket Ground, was born in 1755
Free entry, donations invited · allow about 45 minutes
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3St Mary's Church, Thirsk
6 min walk · Thirsk on foot
The town's 15th-century Perpendicular Gothic parish church at the top of Kirkgate, free to walk into
Free entry, donations welcome · allow about 30 minutes
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Heritage illustration4Byland Abbey
20 min drive · Short drive
The free ruin of one of Britain's largest Cistercian abbeys, with the rose window that inspired York Minster
Free · allow about 45 minutes
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Rievaulx Abbey
40 min drive · Short drive
The most complete of England's abbey ruins, standing in a wooded valley where 600 Cistercian monks once lived
On the gate, adults pay 12.70 to 16.30 depending on the... · allow about 2 hours
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Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal
35 min drive · Short drive
The largest monastic ruins in Britain set in a Georgian water garden, a UNESCO World Heritage Site of 800 acres near Ripon
Free to National Trust members, English Heritage members... · allow about 5 hours
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Mount Grace Priory, House and Gardens
22 min drive · Short drive
The best-preserved Carthusian charterhouse in England, twenty minutes up the A19, with a reconstructed monk's cell, an Arts and Crafts house and a well-known family of stoats
Adults pay 10.79 to 13.85 depending on the day when... · allow about 1.8 hours
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Middleham Castle
50 min drive · Worth the day
The Neville stronghold in Wensleydale where Richard III spent much of his childhood, built around one of the largest Norman keeps in England
Adults pay 7.65 to 9.26 depending on the day when booked... · allow about 1.3 hours
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9Thirsk Castle Garth
5 min walk · Thirsk on foot
What is left of a Norman motte and bailey castle, five minutes from the square, on ground that has never once been built on
Free · allow about 20 minutes
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Aldborough Roman Site
20 min drive · Short drive
The remains of Isurium Brigantum, the Roman town of the Brigantes, with two mosaic floors, a museum of finds and a stretch of town wall in a Victorian garden; open on set days from April to October
English Heritage members go in free · allow about 1 hours
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Boroughbridge and the Devil's Arrows
20 min drive · Short drive
Three prehistoric stones on the western edge of Boroughbridge, the tallest standing stone row in Britain, free to see at any hour
Free · allow about 1.5 hours
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Newburgh Priory
20 min drive · Short drive
A private house grown out of a 1145 Augustinian priory, opened for a handful of days each spring, with a water garden, a lake and a Cromwell legend
There is a small admission charge on open days, but the... · allow about 1.8 hours
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Shandy Hall and Coxwold
20 min drive · Short drive
The parsonage where Laurence Sterne wrote Tristram Shandy, with a walled garden, a small museum and one of the prettiest villages in the county outside the door
Garden only 5, house and garden together 10 for 2026 · allow about 1.3 hours
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Helmsley
25 min drive · Short drive
A market town with a ruined castle above it, a five acre Georgian walled garden below, and a square of independent shops between the two
Helmsley Walled Garden day tickets 14, or 15.50 with gift... · allow about 4 hours
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Norton Conyers
25 min drive · Short drive
The Graham family's house near Ripon, a principal model for Thornfield Hall in Jane Eyre, with a mid-18th century walled garden and orangery
House and garden 18, paid on the day, since house tours... · allow about 2 hours
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Thornborough Henges
25 min drive · Short drive
Three giant circular earthworks in a line, built about 4,500 years ago and sometimes called the Stonehenge of the North, free to walk in daylight in sheep fields near West Tanfield
Free entry to all three henges, according to English... · allow about 1 hours
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Kiplin Hall and Gardens
30 min drive · Short drive
A Grade I Jacobean house built in the 1620s for George Calvert, the first Lord Baltimore, with walled and themed gardens, lakeside walks and woodland, open six days a week from February to late November
2026 day tickets: adult 13.00, concession or student... · allow about 2.8 hours
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Garden illustration18Nunnington Hall
30 min drive · Short drive
A 17th century manor on the River Rye with oak panelling, peacocks in the garden and a collection of miniature rooms that steals the show
Adults around 14.30, children aged 5 to 17 around 7.20,... · allow about 2.5 hours
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Wensleydale Railway
30 min drive · Short drive
A heritage branch line running west from Leeming Bar through Bedale and Finghall to Leyburn in season, and the home of THE POLAR EXPRESS Train Ride from mid-November to Christmas
THE POLAR EXPRESS Train Ride, 13 November to 23 December... · allow about 3 hours
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Jervaulx Abbey
32 min drive · Short drive
A privately owned Cistercian ruin left as a wild garden, with wild flowers growing out of the walls and almost no signage
An honesty box at the entrance rather than a ticket desk · allow about 1.5 hours
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Easby Abbey
35 min drive · Short drive
A free, unstaffed Premonstratensian ruin by the Swale, with a working parish church inside the precinct and rare medieval wall paintings
Free · allow about 1 hours
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Ripon
28 min drive · Worth the day
A small cathedral city half an hour down the A61, with an Anglo-Saxon crypt of 672 under the cathedral floor, a rebuilt Victorian workhouse museum and a market square that has been trading since the eleventh century
Cathedral entry is by donation, with 5 suggested, and a... · allow about 5 hours
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Ripon Museums
28 min drive · Worth the day
Three museums of crime, punishment and poverty a few minutes' walk apart in Ripon, led by a Victorian workhouse rebuilt and reopened in July 2026
Each museum has its own ticket, so one museum's ticket... · allow about 3.5 hours
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Castle Howard
35 min drive · Worth the day
The Vanbrugh and Hawksmoor house of Brideshead Revisited and Bridgerton, set in a thousand acres of parkland with temples, a mausoleum, a walled garden and a lake
House and Gardens was 27 for an adult and 13.50 for a... · allow about 5 hours
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Knaresborough
35 min drive · Worth the day
A market town on a cliff above the River Nidd, with a ruined castle, a courthouse museum and the classic view down onto its railway viaduct
The town, the castle grounds and the riverside are free... · allow about 5 hours
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Markenfield Hall
35 min drive · Worth the day
A moated medieval manor house south of Ripon, still a family home, seen only by booked 11am guided tour on selected weekday mornings from April to October
Every visit is a booked guided tour, sold through... · allow about 1.5 hours
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Beningbrough Hall, Gallery and Gardens
40 min drive · Worth the day
A Grade I listed Baroque hall of 1716 near York with a National Portrait Gallery partnership, eight acres of garden and an Andy Sturgeon Mediterranean garden
Adult 16, or 17.60 with Gift Aid; child aged 5 to 17 is 8... · allow about 4 hours
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Turkish Baths Harrogate
40 min drive · Worth the day
The only working Victorian Turkish baths in England built in Victoria's reign, still doing the job it was built for in 1897
A mixed session is 29 Monday to Thursday and 39 Friday to... · allow about 2.8 hours
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York by Train
40 min drive · Worth the day
A car-free day in one of the great historic cities of England, 16 to 23 minutes by train from Thirsk with everything walkable from the station
Rail fares from around 8 if you book in advance, more if... · allow about 8 hours
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Ryedale Folk Museum
45 min drive · Worth the day
An open-air museum of about twenty rescued and rebuilt moorland buildings on six acres in Hutton-le-Hole, open Saturday to Thursday until Sunday 29 November 2026
Adult 12, concession (65 and over, or a student with ID)... · allow about 2.5 hours
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Railway illustration31North Yorkshire Moors Railway
50 min drive · Worth the day
A 24-mile heritage line running steam and heritage diesel from Pickering through Newtondale to Levisham, Goathland and Grosmont, deep inside the North York Moors National Park
Day Rover adults 48.95 at the regular rate or 38.50 on... · allow about 6 hours
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Bolton Abbey
51 min drive · Worth the day
A working parish church inside a ruined priory, 62 stepping stones across the Wharfe, and one price for the whole car
The charge is per vehicle, not per person · allow about 5 hours
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Eden Camp Modern History Museum
55 min drive · Worth the day
A Second World War prisoner-of-war camp on the edge of Malton, built in 1942, whose huts now tell the story of 20th-century Britain at war, from the Blitz to the Bevin Boys
2026 prices · allow about 3.5 hours
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Yorkshire Air Museum
55 min drive · Worth the day
An independent aviation museum and the Allied Air Forces Memorial on the wartime RAF Elvington airfield south-east of York, with more than 45 aircraft across two hangars and several exhibition buildings, and a Halifax bomber at its centre
Cheaper online than at the gate · allow about 3.5 hours
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Ampleforth Abbey and Orchard
25 min drive · Short drive
A working Benedictine community above the valley, free to visit, with a 200 year old heritage orchard of 1,500 trees and its own cider mill
Free to visit the abbey church, the grounds, the orchard... · allow about 2.5 hours
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More ideas
Other ways to spend the day
The great abbey ruins near Thirsk
Six monastic ruins within an hour or so of the market square, and no two of them run the same way.
Walks from Thirsk market square
Flat riverside loops you can do in an hour, a lime avenue out to Sowerby, and the cliff-top paths above Sutton Bank when you want a view.
Things to do near Thirsk with children
Animals to feed, a vet's surgery children can play in, birds of prey flying twice a day, and enough open grass to let everyone off the lead.
What to do in Thirsk when it rains
Yorkshire being Yorkshire, this is the list people actually need.
Dog-friendly days out from Thirsk
Riverside walks, market-square mornings and a ride on the moors railway, where dogs travel for 3 pounds.
Every one of these starts or finishes well at Tea Time Cafe, 87 Market Place. Build a plan with walk times and print it for the day.