This weekend we took our little ones to the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, to ride the Santa Express. After numerous hills and one wrong
turn (I was navigating - sadly), we finally descended into the pretty village
of Grosmont.
We had told our eldest that we were going to be doing
something that warranted a 6:30am wake up call, but we didn’t tell him what. As
we pulled into the car park it slowly dawned on him that we were going on a
train – which was met with a wide smile. We parked and C turned round to him
and said “We’re going to meet Santa!”.
Well…the next bit took us completely off guard, as our
eldest suddenly burst into tears.
“I don’t want to meet Santa!” he sobbed.
After a reminder that Father Christmas was going to give him
a present, he was right as rain again as we headed off to the platform.
The Santa Express chuffs away!
There was a little hanging around in the cold as the
assembled families waited for the ticket office, but it wasn’t too long before
we were onboard. As we were sat in Coach A, we were the very first to be
invited through to meet Santa (who I always thought was from the North Pole,
but appeared to have a Teesside accent). Despite his earlier tears, our eldest
was very good and couldn’t wait to tear open his present, which was a Dinosaur
excavation kit. Our youngest got a cuddly toy which our eldest almost
immediately wanted too!
Both the kids were having a whale of a time, watching the
pretty scenery go by and bouncing up and down on the very bouncy seats. We
reached Goathland (where “Heartbeat” is filmed) and then started making our way
back to Grosmont. Our eldest was happy with a Hot Chocolate, sweets and some
colouring in to keep him occupied.
All in all it had been a really nice little trip, which both
kids and parents alike enjoyed immensely. We’re looking forward to doing the
same journey again in the summer - this time without Santa!
