A lyrical and haunting landscape

The Yorkshire Wolds inspired David Hockney – and have plenty to offer beyond the artist’s canvas, says Stephen McClarence

As we drive eastwards, we pass places called Drain Lane and Sand Hole. Wetwang and Fangfoss aren’t too far away. Then, most intriguingly, there’s a road sign to Land of Nod. We turn right pretty sharpish to investigate. My my wife and I are in East Yorkshire, ultimately heading for Spurn Point, one of the strangest, most haunting outposts of England. It redefines remoteness; from time to time it becomes an island.

East Yorkshire – or, if you prefer, the East Riding – is a place of vast horizons that sometimes feels more Dutch than English. It’s easily overlooked. Even the beautiful Yorkshire Wolds, the area’s biggest concession to altitude, don’t get much of a look-in thanks to the higher-profile Yorkshire Dales and North York Moors.

The Wolds don’t offer rugged drama; they offer lyrical landscapes of the sort celebrated by David Hockney, whose current exhibition at Tate Britain is one of the most popular in the gallery’s history. As an added incentive to visit here, Hull, East Yorkshire’s only city, is making waves as 2017 UK City of Culture.

We’ll be sampling Hockneyland and Beverley, arguably Yorkshire’s – arguably the North’s – smartest market town, over a busy weekend. There are, we discover, some rich pickings for City of Culture vultures wanting to explore the wider area.

But first, in search of Land of Nod, we drive down a straight, dead-flat track. The occasional tractor trundles across the fields on either side; heavy clouds press down in a pearly sky; starlings form chorus lines along telegraph wires. We pass the turn-off to Rascal Moor and, two miles on, reach a gate that’s literally the end of the road. Beyond, there’s only a canal and further flatness.

So this is Land of Nod: two brickbuilt farmhouses with outbuildings.

Farmer Mark Laverack is talking to two builders. “In summer, people stand next to the road sign to be photographed with their heads resting on it, as though they’re asleep,” he says. Pause. “It’s lovely down here. So quiet.” He’s right. Land of Nod is a hint of the wound-down, no-rush-we’vegot-all-day pace of life visible here.

We carry on along the main road and reach Beverley, a handsome part-Georgian town with streets called Old Waste, Toll Gavel and North Bar Within. Its most celebrated building is the Minster, one of Europe’s finest Gothic churches. It stood in for Westminster Abbey in the recent ITV series Victoria.

For all its soaring grace, it’s the Minster’s detail that registers – such as the Percy Tomb, a festival of intricately carved medieval masonry, blooming into flowers and leaves. They look so organic that, if we come back in 10 years’ time, more flowers may have bloomed. A row of carved medieval minstrels lines one of the aisles. They strum, blow, bang and pluck their instruments, like a band hired by Chaucer’s Canterbury pilgrims.

Any other small town would have been satisfied with one great church. But Beverley also has St Mary’s, as big as many an abbey, with a pure blue nave ceiling studded with golden stars. The chancel ceiling has 40 panels, originally medieval, depicting Kings of England, real and legendary. They include Egbert, Canute, Athelstan and, unexpectedly, George VI.

Across the road, the White Horse is probably the best known of the town’s Clockwise from top left: ‘Woldgate Woods’ by David Hockney; the Yorkshire Wolds; the rugged coastline where the Shipping Forecast is essential; and Thixendale village pubs (Beverley’s new Historic Pub Guide weaves a potentially tipsy trail around 30 of them). Dating from before the 17th century, and not looking greatly changed inside, the White Horse – known locally as Nellie’s after a previous landlady – is a warren of densely dark rooms, stone flags, creaking staircases, gas lighting and blazing coal fires. “We get groups in from the United States, Australia, all over Europe,” says licensee Ian Wardle. “They can’t believe it.” He surveys the lunchtime regulars busily getting on with the glass in hand. “We’ve one or two here who helped build the place,” he says (ironically).

We stroll through the market square to the Eastgate Bookshop, where owner Barry Roper brings the Far East to East Yorkshire. He leads the way up steep stairs to a book-stacked room. Essentials

Stay at Tickton Grange (01964 543666; telegraph.co.uk/ tt-ticktongrange), a Georgian country hotel near Beverley.

Eat at the King’s Head (01482 868103; kingsheadpub beverley.com), a popular pub with rooms in the market square.

Spurn Safaris: 01904 659570; ywt.org.uk.

For more information, see visithulland eastyorkshire. com.

For details of City of Culture events this year see hull2017. co.uk.

The David Hockney exhibition at Tate Britain runs until May 29 (tate.org.uk).

The Home Life of Borneo Head-Hunters and Among Primitive Peoples in Borneo.

“This belonged to the first Rajah of Borneo,” says Roper, picking up one at random. “And this was the author’s copy. He gave it to his manservant and I bought it from him.”

Next day we veer off our eastwards-ever-eastwards trajectory to explore the Yorkshire Wolds. Dozens of pheasants scurry in front of us as we weave down high-hedged lanes. Hockney has described the Wolds as “hidden, small, full of valleys… a lovely bit of England, not spoilt”. They have a quiet, understated charm that his landscapes exactly capture – rather oddly, as the pictures are as vibrantly colourful as the brightest Matisse.

Hockney has defined the area for outsiders. What once seemed just copses of trees are now Hockney copses – nowhere more so than at Warter, location of one of the most celebrated canvases. We edge through a hedge and “into” the picture. The silence is broken only by crows and distant pheasant-shooters.

Finally, back eastwards. We drive through Thorngumbald, past Swine and Roos to Spurn, a three-mile-long needle of land, curving out into the Humber estuary.

It sticks out not so much like a sore thumb as a slightly arthritic finger, scratching an itch on the Lincolnshire coast on the far side. In places it’s only 50ft wide, and a tidal surge three years ago breached the road down it. The Shipping Forecast is essential listening out here. Visitors can reach the far end, with its lighthouse and lifeboat station, only after an arduous and potentially dangerous walk. So at low tide, its owners, the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, are running Spurn Safaris, lasting three hours or so, on board a converted Unimog truck. On a sunny day Spurn can be idyllic, with a great arching sky, silver-shimmering water on either side, and the splash and slush of the tide. Its windswept wildness and the promise of unexpected migrating birds lures naturalists from all over Britain.

“We’ve recently had a megatwitch,” says Andrew Mason, the YWT’s heritage officer, as a dozen of us clamber into the Unimog. “There was a Siberian accentor!” Hundreds of enthusiasts turned out last October to see this small bird from the Urals – a first sighting on mainland Britain. We trundle along the road and then across the sand where the road used to be.

“Spurn is all about change,” says Mason. We tour wartime remains and see roe deer and climb the 144 steps to the top of the black-andwhite-striped lighthouse. The whole of Spurn stretches behind us, itching to scratch.

Dusk comes down. We drive home. And as we pass Nod, we nod.