I am weather-bound in Whitby until Sunday, by the looks of things. The weather will improve tomorrow afternoon but the tides here mean I couldn't leave until dark, and I'm not prepared to run the risk of the lobster pot minefields at night.

Today I took the bus to Robin Hood's Bay, which was a spectacular little village. Quite like Portmeirion in the different levels, interconnecting lanes, etc. although architecturally quite different. Also Robin Hood's Bay is as it is because it grew like that, not because someone built it to a plan. It is now mostly second homes or rentals, with life-sized gnomes.

 The door knocker below is interesting, if you're into knockers. We saw many of these in the hill villages of Mallorca; the hand holds an orange.

Down on the beach, in the shelter of the cliffs, the sea looked positively inviting. It was rather different up on the headlands - which, by extension, is what it would be like out at sea. Happy I stayed put, but am beginning to go stir crazy.

Tomorrow I shall go to the Captain Cook museum. Janet and I saw the other end of the story, i.e. his demise, in a museum in Hawaii, so it will be interesting to see things through the eyes of the town from which he sailed.

I sat late this afternoon on the very bench occupied by Mina Murray (later Harker) when she saw, with horror, her friend Lucy Westenra being "converted" by Dracula in the moonlight at the top of the Abbey steps. I then went down the lane to the beach on which Dracula and his evil cargo were shipwrecked. And the moon is rising ......

P.S. thanks to Janet for pointing out the timing of these posts; I have hopefully managed to change it to reflect UK time, rather than Transylvanian.