We thought we would head to Leeds today for some more shopping options. Leeds is a much bigger town and mostly from the Victorian and Georgian eras. I was thinking the shopping would be fantastic.

We slept in a little bit but with the train station right next door we were in no hurry. we headed out with plenty of time to catch the 9:23 train to Leeds but the 9:43 train was cheaper so we bought those tickets. Little did we realize our train ride went from 20 minutes to an hour and a half for that $15. We decided to eat the first tickets bought new ones and boarder the 9:55 straight to Leeds. I didn’t even have time to finish yesterday’s post on the train it was so quick. The train station was lovely much nicer than here in York and London’s are just dark and dirty. So it looked like we were off to a good start.

The Victorian arcade shopping areas was within walking distance so we headed off. The area was very nice and the “arcades” were cool but the shopping was a disappointment. I expected so much better. It was all either way high end or just junk. Nothing really in between. We had seen such great jewelry in York I expected to be blown away with what we saw in Leeds. But that was a mistake. There were a lot of high end diamond places and other fancy new jewelry but very little vintage. We walked around a bit and tried all the areas. One of which was an old school food market with Victorian stalls. Think Pikes market in Seattle meets the Mercado area of downtown San Antonio and have a Victorian baby and you might get the vibe of this one. It just didn’t work.

Since shopping was a bust and the sun was out we headed out to the Kirkstall Abbey. They are some of the largest ruins in England. Of course Henry VIII ran off the monks and then stole the roof so there was no hope of it surviving. It does make for a pretty park today. We spent about an hour wandering around trying to get the perfect picture before getting an uber back to the train station.

In a moment of brilliance I realized we could just uber all the way back to York and save ourselves about $20 and a little bit of time. However the car was not as smooth as the train so I didn’t get to catch up on my writing.

We got back to York around 3:30 and headed off to wander around and shop a bit more. Val wanted to go back for a bracelet but we couldn’t find the store and we passed an antique store during the ghost tour and wanted to hit it but couldn’t find it either. Surprisingly they were one and the same and we found them at the same time. Val bought the bracelet and I got a new ring. I know you think I don’t need it but I do. So all is good. We shopped around a little more before going to have Italian at the old Assembly Room. They haven’t done much to the room since the 1860s so it was a fun place to have dinner. Definitely different than are dark twisty curvy pub from the night before.

We were done early so we stopped back at the church to take pictures of it in the setting sun. Much prettier than yesterday with the rain and clouds. Though it was pretty cold so we hurried back to the hotel for an early night. We have to get all repacked to meet up with tour tomorrow at a new hotel.