RUNNING A TOURIST SERVICE
Woman’s jogging tours around historic city
IT’S 7AM and Joni Southall is in her running gear at the west front of York Minster. “That’s the heart of Yorkshire window,” she says. “Locals say that if you kiss your partner on the steps under the window, then you will be together forever.”
She pauses a beat. “Some of my runners have done that. Perhaps I should check up on them in a few years.” Joni is a para-legal who runs marathons and likes history, interests that come together in See York Run York.
This venture does what it says on the, well, running shoes. Joni takes visitors for a short run around York lasting a little over an hour – or two if her clients match her for chattiness.
With the 40-year-old mother of two leading the way we jog to the Rose Window facing Minster Gates. Right on cue, the organ rumbles deep inside the Minster.
Joni points to the Roman column, once part of a great hall, which was rediscovered during the great dig of 1967-1972.
“Rumour has it that it’s been erected upside down,” says Joni. “But I don’t know if that’s true.”
Opposite is Philip Jackson’s statue of Constantine, commissioned in 1998 by York Civic Trust. In AD306 Constantine was hailed Emperor while he was in York, and he is known as the first Christian emperor.
“St Helen’s Square was named after his mother, Helena,” says Joni, as we set off. We stop to admire the restored and revealed Great East Window. Joni shows me the original wooden gateway into the Minster, next to the National Trust Shop, then we are off to Goodramgate Bar, one of four major fortified entrances to the city.
Joni points out the older stones that mark the original tower, which was begun in the 14th century. The top storey was added in 1484, during the reign of Richard III – and now houses a museum in his name.
At this point, Joni is frustrated by locked gates – “I’m so gutted,” she says, as that stretch of bar walls is her favourite. Instead we run along Lord Mayor’s Walk and Gillygate. At Bootham Bar, Joni says a door knocker was installed in 1501 when Scots had to seek permission from the Lord Mayor before entering the city – a tradition which persists today (only joking).
The stone statues on top of the bar were carved in 1894. “There’s a medieval mason, a mayor and a knight. The little chap at the end is the mason and he is holding a model of the bar.”
Next, we trot over the road to York Art Gallery by the statue of the artist William Etty – “He liked his nudes.”
Now we run down the passageway between the gallery and a remnant of the wall of St Mary’s Abbey. We run through the edible wood garden planted in 2015 and enter Museum Gardens. Joni pauses at the pebble map by Janette Ireland, which represents William Smith’s geological map of 1815.
Then we go past the Yorkshire Museum – “One of the first purpose-built museums opened in England” – and up the back path to the library.
From here, there is an inside view of the Multangular Tower.
“It was quite an innovation because the old Roman fortresses used to have the square corners, but because they were more exposed, people could hide round the corners – and it was done this way so there was no hiding place.”
Joni points to the ruins of St Leonard’s Hospital – which once covered this corner of York – and says: “You could only get treatment there if you confessed your sins.”
Crossing Lendal Bridge, we run down to the riverside and admire the view of the Guildhall across the River Ouse.
“This is where the Romans used to cross the river,” says Joni.
We turn around and run up the curving span of Queen Street and stand at the top of Micklegate, across from the Bar Covent. Joni went to school in York and heard rumours about the convent’s school having a hand in a glass cage.
This relic, which Joni hasn’t seen, is said to be the hand of Margaret Clitheroe who was married to a Shambles butcher and hid Catholic priests in her house.
“She met an untimely end because of that – and that was the only part of the body that could be conserved,” says Joni.
After that, we jog to Holy Trinity Church, said to be haunted by a mother, child and nurse. “Apparently if the light comes through the church window in a certain way, you can see the three ghosts embracing,” says Joni.
Crossing Ouse Bridge, we run up to Clifford’s Tower.
“It’s the third one,” says Joni. “They didn’t learn their lesson as the original one was wooden and it burned down. Then they built another and that burned down. They built this brick one with a wooden roof and the roof burned off, but we’ve got the remains. It was built by William the Conqueror.”
Opposite is the Castle Museum, which Joni visited on school trips and still counts as her favourite.
We run along Piccadilly, pausing at Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, then carry on to Pavement, where we dart down an alleyway, skirting a rough sleeper yet to greet the day, to look at a medieval building.
After that there is Whip-MaWhop-Ma-Gate and the cobbles of Shambles, street of butchers and home to a shrine to Margaret Clitheroe, who was crushed beneath a door weighted with heavy stones. Returning to the east end of the Minster, we enter Dean’s Gardens as the bells ring in eight o’clock.
“I’m extremely proud of the city and to be from here,” Joni says. “I love showing it off. But runners are known for watching their feet or watching the pavement, and I always say, ‘Look up in York. Above the shops is where all the history is’.”