Our late afternoon flight to Manchester gifted us with a leisurely morning. We enjoyed a late breakfast of croissants and scrambled eggs in our oh-so-very-Parisienne courtyard. We didn’t need to go anywhere to feel we were completely immersed in Paris.

After breakfast, we reorganized our luggage in preparation for our flight to England. The goal was to get our largest suitcase below the 50-pound limit so we wouldn’t incur an extra charge. We also wanted to have our overnight bags ready for our two-day stay in Grassington in the Yorkshire Dales. We enjoyed a few restful moments outside in the street-side courtyard before packing everything in the cab and heading to Charles de Gaulle.

At baggage weigh-in, we found our bag was about 2 pounds overweight. Instead of paying an extra 75 Euros, we decided to re-allocate our stuff. The Air France staff directed us to a scale set up just for this purpose. We could put the bag right on the scale, open it, and take out stuff until it got below the limit. Voila!

De Gaulle airport was very organized and efficient, and the people were all very helpful, but it was somehow still exhausting. We ate some packaged sandwiches while waiting at the gate. A lovely woman across from us offered us a piece of homemade lemon cake. “I just can’t eat any more. You enjoy!” We did. People started lining up to board our flight before anything was happening. We weren’t sure why, but figured we should probably get in line, too. We waited and waited with nothing happening. Then finally they started boarding. We checked in with our boarding passes, then followed the line of people on the gangway. And waited and waited and waited some more. There had been no announcement of any delay. No one was saying anything. We all just stood there, baffled and frustrated. I was probably already in a grumpy mood, but this situation really pushed my buttons. Why weren’t they telling us anything? What was happening? Usual travel stuff, but I think I was at the end of my travel tether and really was not happy.

Finally we boarded, and blessedly it was a quick and easy flight to Manchester. We hopped on the shuttle to the Car Rental Village, which was about ten minutes from the airport, and picked up our Ford Focus hybrid. Much smaller than our Peugot SUV, we weren’t sure we could get all our luggage in, but by folding down the back seats, we managed.

We had decided that I would drive first in the U.K. I was nervous yet somehow excited to drive on the other side of the road. We set the GPS to our hotel in Grassington and were off. I told Santo to keep reminding me to get to the left, but I did pretty well with this. The roundabouts were a bit tricky (clockwise rather than counterclockwise) and it was not always clear when we were actually IN the roundabout so we could start counting the exits. The GPS instruction were always to “Enter the roundabout and take the Xth exit.” Amazingly, I only messed it up once.

Judging the width of the car and where I was in the lane was probably the hardest for me. Santo kept yelling, “You’re too close, you’re too close!” but I had cars coming at me on the right and figured it was better to graze up against some grasses and bushes rather than hit another car head-on.

Even expecting narrow roads, we had never imagined them this narrow—and with cars parked on the sides, it was quite dicey at times. I was also tired from the day of travel, and still recovering, so was counting down the minutes until we arrived.

I had set the GPS to the actual hotel, even though we knew we would have to park in the parking lot behind the Yorkshire Dales National Park Information Center. We hoped maybe we could just drop the bags off first. The Devonshire was right on the triangular cobbled square. This is the village that serves as Darrowby in “All Creatures Great and Small.” And The Devonshire is the pub, The Drovers Arms, in the series. There was nowhere to park, even for a moment, near the hotel or in the square, so we drove the quarter mile down the road to the car park. It had started to rain and it was so much cooler (Hallelujah). Luckily the rain had slowed down to a light drizzle by the time we left the car and walked to the hotel.

On the way, Santo stopped in a small market in the square to pick up a bottle of water for me (I needed to be constantly drinking water or my mouth turned to cotton). He asked the woman in the shop about where to eat, and she said The Devonshire, “but you better hurry, the kitchen closes at 9 pm.” It was 8:45 pm.

We entered the pub. It was like coming home to a cozy house on a dreary day. The dining room was on the left, the pub on the right, all in warm hues of brown, the old wood lit with the glow of lamplight. The clatter of dishes and friendly voices made it feel welcoming and comfortable.

We asked the bustling waitress where to check in for the hotel, and she said, “With the bartender.” OK, well that’s different, I thought. Santo asked if we were too late to have dinner. She hesitated at first, but we could tell she really wanted to accommodate us. “Yeah, sure, we’ll get it sorted,” she said. A few minutes later, we were at a table in the dining room with our luggage on the chairs next to us. No time to get to the room before dinner.

Santo ordered the “duo lamb” dish with lamb chops and a lamb shepherd’s pie. I had the pie of the day: steak and ale. The pie was the size of a large ramekin, crusted top, bottom, and all around with a beautifully browned, flaky crust. When I attacked it with my fork, the tender pieces of steak oozed out in a dark gravy. So delicious. Served with smashed peas: fresh green peas roughly mashed to the consistency of mashed potatoes.

After dinner, we double-checked with the waitress, “So we should see the bartender to check in?” He seemed awfully busy in the full and bustling pub. “Ach, I’ll take you up,” she answered and started grabbing our bags to carry them up for us. She double-checked the room number with the bartender, then led us up the stairs just behind a door at the back of the bar.

Upstairs, the hallway rambled left and right, up and down low steps. All of the rooms were named after characters in “All Creatures Great and Small”: Mrs. Hall, Helen Alderson, Siegried Farnon, the Herriot Suite, even Tricki Woo! Our room was the Skeldale Suite. It was a lovely large room overlooking the square. King bed, small sofa, desk, armoir, and a large bathroom two steps up from the room.

I wasted no time getting ready for bed and crawling in between he crisp white sheets. Santo sat at the desk for a while. For the first (and so far the last) time on our trip, I turned the television on. I found a show featuring female British comics and watched for a bit. Then I turned it off, preferring the stillness. Even with our window open to the square, the only sound we could hear was the low rumble of friendly voices from the pub below. It reminded me of lying in my bed as a child and hearing my parents in another room, their distant voices somehow comforting.