Goathland
OS grid reference:- NZ 831 012
Picturesque Goathland is situated amidst the stunning scenery of North York Moors National Park and lies to the north of the market town of Pickering.
The peaceful moorland village is set around wide grass areas of open common land where black faced sheep graze freely, due to a surving common right from the Duchy of Lancaster which extends back for hundreds of years. Goathland has a history extending back as far back as Viking times. In the early middle ages it was referred to as Godelandia. A charter at nearby Whitby Abbey records that in 1109 King Henry I granted land to Osmund the priest and brethren of the hermitage of Goathland, for the soul of his mother, the Empress Matilda, who had died in 1083.
The village was a spa centre in the nineteenth century. Goathland has many hotels and guest houses , the largest of which is the Mallyan Spout Hotel. Goathland was made famous as the setting of the fictional village of Aidensfield in the popular Heartbeat Yorkshire television series set in the 1960s. Many landmarks from the series are recognisable, including the stores, garage/funeral directors, the pub and the railway station.
The famous Goathland railway station is situated on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. The railway is run by a charitable trust which is mostly operated by volunteers. The railway carries more than 250,000 passengers a year and is the second-longest preserved line in Britain. It links Grosmont in the north with Pickering in the south, along the route of the Whitby. The Pickering line was built by George Stephenson in 1835 and upgraded in 1865. The railway station was used as the location for Hogsmeade railway station in the Harry Potter films, and the line filmed for Harry's journey.
The village church is dedicated to St Mary and is of late Victorian date. The building occupies the site of an earlier nineteenth century church. The stone altar slabstone with five small consecration crosses carved into the surface, dates to the twelfth century. There is also a royal coat of arms of King George III and an early seventeenth century wooden pulpit. Much of the woodwork inside the church was carved by Robert Thompson the famous Mouseman of Kilburn and bears his signature device of a mouse.
Wade's Causeway, also known as the 'Roman road', runs across nearby Wheeldale Moor. Long considered Roman in date, this is now less certain, it may date from early medieval times.
Nearby are several waterfalls, including Mallyan Spout, which is situated in a deep gorge, has a drop of arouund 60 feet, making it the highest waterfall in the North York Moors National Park. The water cascading from Mallyan Spout rises from springs in the moorland above Goathland until it flows into New Wath Scar. The waterfall can be reached by a footpath close to the Mallayan Spout Hotel.