Plan a day in Thirsk · 8 places
What to do in Thirsk when it rains
Yorkshire being Yorkshire, this is the list people actually need. Everything here works with the weather against you: under cover, warm, and mostly within a few minutes of the square.
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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3Ritz Cinema
5 min walk · Thirsk on foot
One of Britain's oldest continuously operating cinemas, run by around 100 volunteers, five minutes from the square
Tickets are sold online through the cinema's own website,... · allow about 2.5 hours
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4Rural Arts at The Courthouse
5 min walk · Thirsk on foot
North Yorkshire's cross-arts centre in the restored Grade II listed Old Courthouse, with a gallery, a shop of independent artists' work and a workshop programme
Free to enter the gallery and shop; workshops and... · allow about 45 minutes
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5The charity shop trail
1 min walk · Thirsk on foot
Eight charity shops within a minute or two of the square, good enough to be a destination in their own right
Free to browse; bargains from a pound or two · allow about 1 hours
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Mouseman Showroom and Viewing Gallery
15 min drive · Short drive
The Kilburn workshop where Robert Thompson's oak furniture is still made, with the carved mouse on every piece and craftsmen at work behind the gallery glass
Free to browse the showroom and the viewing gallery · allow about 45 minutes
Garden illustration7Nunnington 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 Creamery
70 min drive · Worth the day
The home of PGI-protected Yorkshire Wensleydale at Hawes, with a cheese-making demonstration, a tasting room and a viewing gallery over the vats
The Cheese Experience is 5.95 for an adult, 3.50 for a... · allow about 2 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.
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..
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.