The Egton Bridge Gooseberry Show – on the first Tuesday in August each year – is the world’s most ancient: over two centuries old, having started in 1800. A splendid excuse to visit the North Yorkshire Moors village today on my folding bike, thanks to a £3 trip on the 840 Coastliner from York, Britain’s most scenic bus journey.
The bus took me as far as Goathland, five miles or so shy of Eskdale and Egton Bridge. As on previous trips here, I could enjoy Instagrammable sights of Heartbeat country.
These included vintage police cars from that TV series, flocks of sheep wandering the centre, a Harry Potter train station, and curious day-trippers wanting me to demonstrate my bike folding.
Beyond Goathland the back roads were quiet. Despite some steep gradients (this is the North York Moors, where 25% and 33% climbs are frequent) I got to Egton Bridge in good time for the 2pm opening to the public.
The event is held in Egton Manor, a fine place with gardens… and more vintage cars parked in the driveway.
I locked my bike up by the entrance, alongside a chap with a Spa Cycles Elan. He was a regular visitor to the show. You won’t believe the passion, he said with a smile.
The Show is held indoors, in some of the Manor’s various rooms perhaps familiar to anyone who’s been married there. On a day like today, with high winds in the wake of Storm Floris, being inside was very welcome. (Apparently the Manor has a wind meter out the back. If it records gusts over over 40mph, the venue’s insurance becomes invalid and the place has to evacuate.)
A long table showcases the entries, lined up on plates. Judging has already taken place by the time we’re allowed in, so we can see all the prize winners in the various categories.
Gooseberries come in many colours, four of which – red, white, yellow, green – are classed here. Over 200 types of berry have appeared at the Show over the years, which is about 199 more than I knew existed.
The rules for determining category winners are fiendishly complex, and require a long page or two on the helpful information boards to attempt to explain. But, in essence, it’s the biggest and best berries that win. Well, the biggest, anyway.
Graeme Watson of North Yorkshire is the Bradman of Berries. The Eddy Merckx of Egton Bridge. The GOAT of Gooseberries. The world champion, according to the Guinness Book of Records. He usually wins here. He won again this year, and his plum-sized No 1 fruit was literally put on a pedestal.
I had a quick chat to him, and he revealed that one technique for cultivating monster goosegogs is to avoid wind: he judiciously harvested his berries last Sunday, before Floris struck.
There’s more to the Show than marvelling at plates of berries. In the large reception room, a dozen or two large tables were packed with people enjoying snacks and drinks from the adjacent pop-up cafe and separate bar. Queues were long and demand high: most things soon ran out, as did the couple of stalls selling fresh gooseberries by the bag, and gooseberry preserves by the jar.
And there was music. The Eskuleles – yes, ‘Esk’ and ‘ukuleles’ – are a two dozen-strong band of locals and have been the Show’s resident entertainment for 13 years. They’re proud of their inclusivity (many members had never played an instrument before) and thanks to some judicious scoring (a good bass player, vibrant percussion, banjo solos, and plenty of ukes) produced a fun and engaging set.
Some of their 25 songs had a sort of link to the Show: Bring me sunshine, Gooseberry Pie Song, I’ve got a lovely bunch of gooseberries. Many were just there for the singalong though: Let’s Twist Again, Summer holiday, Sweet Caroline.
I talked to some of the cheery members of the band, including Chris. He told me that the aforementioned Mr Watson was a friend of the group, and had given them several gooseberry bushes. They started up their own trophy to add to the Show’s list, and Chris managed to win his own cup the other year. The Eskuleles raise money for the Great North Air Ambulance (a total of over £20k so far); let’s hope they weren’t called out today in this unseasonably stormy weather.
Even if you don’t want to cycle there, getting to the Show without a car is easy. The Manor is right opposite Egton train station, which can whisk you to Whitby or Middlesbrough along the superbly scenic Esk Valley line. Well, I say ‘whisk’. More like ‘swirl slowly with a fork’: services are leisurely, run only every three hours, and stop at all the charming villages along the way.
And why would you want to drive, anyway? Two minutes’ stroll from the Manor is the Horseshoe Hotel, a country pub with good food and proper cask ale. Oh no, we’ve missed out train! We’ll just have to wait another three hours here in the beer garden…
And don’t worry, they’re a friendly lot round here; you may be at a gooseberry show, but you won’t be playing gooseberry.
