Local Authority Inside information on the city of Leeds

Who Wh are you?

Peter Pete Baber, reviews editor forfor Ppractical Caravan.

Why Wh are you a local authority aut on Leeds?

II woworked in the city for the whole who of the noughties, and still travel back there at least once every two months. Or at least I did before lockdown.

What do you love about it?

I wasn’t at all surprised when Channel 4 decided to relocate to Leeds when it was looking for a new HQ. Unlike other northern cities, Leeds doesn’t spend the whole time trying to tell you how it’s the next best to London at this, that and the other. It just is what it is – although it does manage to have its own opera house, ballet company, and a football club that might finally be making it to the Premiership.

The city was also relatively lucky (if you can call it that) during WWII. There are relatively few obvious bombsites, meaning that much of its glorious Victorian architecture remains intact. And the city centre is quite small – you can easily walk across it in 10 minutes.

What’s your favourite place to visit in the area?

Even if you are not that keen on shopping, the Victoria Quarter will take your breath away, with its incredibly ornate interior. It recently opened an extension that looks as if Dubai has landed in the West Riding.

Kirkgate Market next door (Europe’s largest covered market) is always lively, as you would expect from the place that witnessed the birth of Marks & Spencer.

If you are tired of Mammon, drive out to the Thackray Museum of Medicine by St James’s Hospital (currently closed until October). Its exhaustive look at 19th- and early 20th-century medical breakthroughs, and vivid recreation of a Victorian slum street (where you are allocated a character, and only find out later whether they made it through) will leave you very glad you live in the 21st century (despite the pandemic).

There is another good reconstruction of a Victorian shopping street close to peaceful Kirkstall Abbey.

Which local campsite would you recommend, and why?

Although it is nearly in Harrogate, Rudding Holiday Park is well-kept, with loads of facilities. Emmerdale fans might like Esholt Caravan Park, located in the village where much of the soap is filmed.

What food and drink is the area known for? Beer, obviously. Although the Tetley Brewery has long since moved elsewhere, there is still a great selection of local beers to try at any of the city’s excellent pubs, in particular in The Calls.

Tell us somewhere great to eat!

Leeds is the best city in the north to site a restaurant – or so Raymond Blanc told me when he launched the latest Brasserie Blanc on the banks of the Aire.

I also like Sous le Nez en Ville, a basement bistro in Quebec Street. My kids like Little Tokyo, a sushi bar just behind Briggate, with its koi carp ponds.

You might know of The Man Behind the Curtain, the city’s latest Michelin-starred sensation in Vicar Lane. But for cheaper fare don’t miss Trinity Eats, the food hall in the Trinity Centre.

Where can you get spare kit?

Leeds Caravan Centre, at Scholes on the A64 York road.

Where can you find the cheapest petrol/diesel in the area?

Try Sainsbury’s, by the White Rose Centre on the A6110.

Where should you avoid in the area?

People would say don’t go to Holbeck, just south of the station. I wouldn’t recommend wandering there late at night. But at any other time, even here you can find amazing architecture, like Victorian mills built to look like Italian renaissance churches or Egyptian temples.

Share a secret highlight that only the locals would know…

Leeds, not Hollywood, is the birthplace of the motion picture. Louis Le Prince, a Frenchman who relocated to Leeds, can stake a claim to having made the first ever cine film when he captured his family wandering in Roundhay, and the traffic on Leeds Bridge, in 1888.