About this guide
By Jon Cosson · Updated 6 October 2026
A dated record of the substantive changes made to this guide: new pages, reworked sections and corrections, including the ones I would rather not have had to make.
Entries cover changes worth a reader's attention. Wording, layout and typography adjustments are not recorded. Where a change was a correction, the correction is described rather than summarised away.
Bangers & Cash pages moved to our Thornton-le-Dale site, with permanent redirects from the old addresses.
Hole of Horcum walk rebuilt with the National Park's route figures, corrected parking tariff, a step-by-step route and licensed photographs.
Staithes, Hutton-le-Hole and Osmotherley rebuilt with parking, hours and transport; railway fares and timetable page; where Heartbeat was filmed.
New guides to Goathland and the heather season; the villages hub rebuilt with parking, toilets, transport and a base-village comparison.
Technical pass: eager hero images, AVIF and WebP for every photograph, author page, structured data cleanup, broken link and placeholders removed, stated check dates.
New page: Christmas in the North York Moors 2026, with an expiring events list. The earlier North York Moors at Christmas page now redirects to /christmas.
Walks: start car parks, postcodes, charges, toilets and buses added from National Park, council, Forestry England and National Trust pages.
Dalby Forest now has one clear section for each activity, Pickering separates its town overview from the detailed attractions guide, and Goathland adds its pubs, dog guidance and Mallyan Spout walk facts.
Two new pages give the remaining Mathewsons auction dates and the practical route to the Pickering saleroom, all four Bangers & Cash pages now share one set of Mathewsons facts and a guide menu, and the museum hours now show both figures Mathewsons publish.
All 13 walks now have neutral route notes, existing source attributions and practical facts, with a fuller walks guide and the Hole of Horcum distance aligned across the finders.
Both pages now list every matching pub from the pub database by area, with phone, postcode and directions, and the Cayley Arms at Allerston and the Fox & Rabbit at Lockton are corrected as not allowing dogs inside.
FAQ answers now point to the page that answers them, Malton joins the villages page, places named in the text link to their own guides, and what's on entries now expire on their own.
Each guide page now names its author and shows the date it was last checked, taken from the page's own stated check date where it has one and from its edit history otherwise.
The guide had grown two or three pages answering the same question, which split the material and helped nobody. Attractions and the top ten places are now part of things to do; where to drink is part of food and drink; the two dog pages have folded into the North York Moors with dogs; the weekend itinerary has folded into the itineraries guide; and classic car country and the Yorkshire road trips guide have folded into the classic car driving routes. Everything unique was carried across first, and all eight old addresses redirect permanently to the page that now answers them.
Whitby or Pickering, Helmsley or Pickering, and Cleveland Way or Coast to Coast. These are questions visitors ask constantly and which were previously answered only in forum threads, so each page gives a straight verdict and says who should do the opposite.
A press and citation page setting out how to name and cite the guide, what funds it, which is nothing, and which pages are worth linking to; and a links page collecting the official sites, data sources and local organisations the guide sends readers to. The links page exists because the guide repeatedly tells readers to check an official site before they travel and had not always given them the link.
New pages setting out who writes this guide, how places are checked, and the fact that it carries no advertising, no affiliate links and no paid placements. This changelog was added at the same time.
The Ebberston village guide existed and was in the sitemap, but had been left out of the site's own search index, so searching for Ebberston here returned nothing. It was the only village page missing.
A check that runs in CI on every push, and locally before each commit once the git hook is enabled, comparing every page on the site against the sitemap and the search index, so a new page cannot ship missing from either and a deleted page cannot leave a dead sitemap entry behind. It found the Ebberston omission above.
The dark skies map, the Whitby dog friendly map and the Plan My Day tool each showed only one item at a time and left the rest out of the page a search engine sees. All of the dark sky venues, all nine dog friendly spots including the seasonal beach ban notes, and the day builder's text are now in the page from the start.
Three accommodation pages named Sykes Cottages, Cottages.com and Booking.com as the places to check availability without linking to any of them. They are now plain links, with no referral code and no earnings to this site.
The Allerston village page described a cottage that does not exist, and the site search carried the same claim. Both were removed. This was a straightforward error and it should not have been published.
A section recommending a vintage petrol pump garage was removed from the classic car country page. This guide has no affiliation with the business and no arrangement of any kind, and a recommendation with nothing behind it does not belong here.
Two published pages had never been added to the site's own search index and could not be found from the search box. An entry for a post that was never published was removed at the same time.
If something here is wrong, or something has changed since I last looked, please get in touch. Corrections are the most useful thing this guide receives.
Quick, straight answers to the questions visitors ask most. Each one links through to the fuller guide.
Stargazing (it's an International Dark Sky Reserve), bracing coastal and moorland walks, cosy country pubs, and the North Yorkshire Moors Railway's festive steam services. The moors are atmospheric and empty in winter.
What's on →Ride the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, walk the heather moors and the Cleveland Way, explore Rievaulx and Whitby abbeys, see the Hole of Horcum and Sutton Bank, visit Goathland and Thornton-le-Dale, and spend a day on the coast at Whitby or Robin Hood's Bay.
Things to do →Ride the steam railway, visit museums (Beck Isle Museum in Pickering, the Ryedale Folk Museum at Hutton-le-Hole, Whitby's museums), explore abbey visitor centres, or browse the shops and tearooms of Helmsley and Whitby.
Pickering guide →Moor roads are scenic but narrow, with blind summits, cattle grids and sheep. Sometimes free-roaming through villages like Goathland, on unfenced roads, so drive slowly and use passing places. High routes such as Blakey Ridge can be bleak or closed in snow.
Driving routes →The national park is free to enter, and most walking, moorland and viewpoints cost nothing; you pay only for parking, attractions (abbeys, the railway, museums) and refreshments. Prices vary, so check official sites.
About the Yorkshire Moors →There are many campsites and caravan parks across the park, but wild camping is not a legal right in England and requires the landowner's permission, so use official sites.
Camping and caravanning →