Harrogate Audio Tour: Taking the Waters

Name: Harrogate Audio Tour: Taking the Waters
Brand: AudaTours
Price: 4.99 USD
Availability: InStock

Audiogids11 stops

Harrogate's mineral springs made it the most fashionable resort in England. But every glass of sulphur water dispensed, every hot room maintained at the right temperature, every bath chair pushed up Montpellier Hill was the daily labour of working people whose names are rarely on the plaques. This tour follows the dipper elected Queen of the Wells, the Swiss pastry cook who arrived at King's Cross not knowing which city he was headed to, the engineer who became the town's greatest benefactor, the first park superintendent who shaped the valley for the public gaze, and the banjo player who recognised a famous novelist sitting quietly under a borrowed name. From the first spring discovered in the late sixteenth century to the great hydrotherapy palace opened at the end of the nineteenth, this is the story of the workforce that sold health to Victorian Britain.

Tourvoorbeeld

map

Over deze tour

schedule
Duur 30–50 minsGa op je eigen tempo
straighten
2.9 km wandelrouteVolg het geleide pad
location_on
LocatieHarrogate, Verenigd Koninkrijk
wifi_off
Werkt offlineEén keer downloaden, overal gebruiken
all_inclusive
Levenslange toegangOp elk moment opnieuw afspelen, voor altijd
location_on
Start bij Tewit Well, The Stray, Harrogate

Stops op deze tour

location_on

lock

Tewit WellThe first of Harrogate's eighty-eight mineral springs to be identified and promoted. William Slingsby, a Yorkshire gentry traveller, recognised in 1571 that the chalybeate water here tasted like the famous spa waters of the Low Countries. His nephew Sir William Slingsby later promoted it; Edmund Deane published Spadacrene Anglica in 1626 to advertise its properties. The domed octagonal pavilion now covering the well dates from 1807, designed by Thomas Chippendale (not the furniture-maker; he died in 1779). The Stray itself — two hundred acres of common land — was formally protected by the Award of the Commissioners for the Enclosures of the Forest of Knaresborough in August 1778.

location_on

lock

Bettys Café Tea RoomsThe site of the original Bettys Café Tea Room, opened on 17 July 1919 at 9 Cambridge Crescent by Frederick Belmont, a Swiss confectioner. The Parliament Street branch around the corner opened in 1976 following the 1962 merger with Taylors of Harrogate; this Cambridge Crescent address is where Belmont's enterprise began. He arrived in England in 1907 at King's Cross railway station, not knowing which city he was supposed to be heading to; he boarded a train to Bradford by luck. After working as a baker at Bonnet & Sons in Bradford, he opened the first Bettys on 17 July 1919. Takings on the first day were just £30. The name 'Bettys' has three possible origins: Betty Rose, grand-daughter of the company chairman; Betty Lupton, the spa's Queen of the Wells; or a 1914 musical called Betty. The company itself says the origin is unknown.

location_on

lock

Royal HallBuilt in 1903 as the Kursaal (the German for 'Cure Hall') for the Corporation of Harrogate, designed by Robert Beale with the direct involvement of Frank Matcham, one of the most prolific theatre architects of his era. The funding came principally from Samson Fox (1838–1903), a Bradford-born engineer, industrialist and philanthropist who invented the corrugated boiler flue in 1877, founded the Leeds Forge Company in 1874, became Mayor of Harrogate for three successive years (1890–92), and donated £45,000 to build the Royal College of Music in London. Fox died in October 1903 — the same year the Kursaal opened. When the First World War began, the German name was dropped and the building renamed the Royal Hall.

location_on

lock

Turkish Baths HarrogateThe Grade II listed hydrotherapy palace at 5 Parliament Street, built by the Corporation of Harrogate at a cost of £120,000 and opened by the Duke of Cambridge on 23 July 1897. Designed by the London firm Baggallay and Bristowe, which won an open competition with 25 entries. Inside: Turkish baths, vapour baths, mud baths, needle baths, Vichy douches and electric treatments — around eighty different treatments in total. In August 1898 alone, 18,723 baths were administered. During the First World War the building was requisitioned as a military convalescent hospital; after 1945 it operated under NHS contracts providing roughly 150,000 treatments annually until the hydrotherapy programme ended in 1969. The Turkish baths section survives in operation today.

location_on

lock

The Old Swan HotelThe hotel at Swan Road, Harrogate HG1 2SR, operating under the name Swan Hydropathic Hotel when, in December 1926, the novelist Agatha Christie registered here under the false name Mrs Teresa Neele. Christie had disappeared from her Surrey home eleven days earlier, prompting a national search involving hundreds of police officers across four counties and thousands of volunteers. She was first recognised by Rosie Asher, a chambermaid who noticed her unusual shoes and American-style zipper purse — but Asher stayed silent, later saying the trouble was not worth her job. It was Bob Tappin, a hired banjo player in the hotel's resident band, who alerted the police. Christie had been 'enjoying dinner alone in the Wedgwood Restaurant, walking the gardens, reading the papers.'

location_on

lock

Royal Pump Room MuseumThe octagonal Grade II* listed building completed in 1842 over the Old Sulphur Well — the strongest-smelling of Harrogate's mineral springs. Designed by Isaac Thomas Shutt of the Swan Hotel at a cost of £2,249 0s 7d. The building could accommodate 150 visitors. Below it, the original sulphur spring still rises; visitors can smell it from the entrance. For roughly sixty years before the Pump Room was built, the well was tended by Betty Lupton (c.1760–1843), elected and crowned Queen of the Wells, who dispensed the sulphur water daily for small wages and tips. She was granted the title formally in 1837, the year Victoria came to the throne, and died in August 1843, within a fortnight of receiving her pension.

Veelgestelde vragen

Hoe begin ik de tour?

Download na aankoop de AudaTours-app en voer je inwisselcode in. De tour is direct klaar om te starten – tik gewoon op afspelen en volg de GPS-geleide route.

Heb ik internet nodig tijdens de tour?

Nee! Download de tour voordat je begint en geniet er volledig offline van. Alleen de chatfunctie vereist internet. We raden aan om te downloaden via wifi om mobiele data te besparen.

Is dit een groepsrondleiding met gids?

Nee - dit is een audiotour met eigen gids. Je verkent zelfstandig op je eigen tempo, met audiovertelling via je telefoon. Geen tourguide, geen groep, geen schema.

Hoe lang duurt de tour?

De meeste tours duren 60-90 minuten, maar jij bepaalt het tempo volledig. Pauzeer, sla stops over of neem pauzes wanneer je wilt.

Wat als ik de tour vandaag niet kan afmaken?

Geen probleem! Tours hebben levenslange toegang. Pauzeer en hervat wanneer je wilt – morgen, volgende week of volgend jaar. Je voortgang wordt opgeslagen.

Welke talen zijn beschikbaar?

Alle tours zijn beschikbaar in meer dan 50 talen. Selecteer je voorkeurstaal bij het inwisselen van je code. Let op: de taal kan niet worden gewijzigd na het genereren van de tour.

Waar vind ik de tour na aankoop?

Download de gratis AudaTours-app uit de App Store of Google Play. Voer je inwisselcode in (verzonden per e-mail) en de tour verschijnt in je bibliotheek, klaar om te downloaden en te starten.

verified_user

Tevredenheid gegarandeerd

Als je niet tevreden bent met de tour, betalen we je aankoop terug. Neem contact met ons op via [email protected]

Veilig afrekenen met

Geliefd bij reizigers wereldwijd

Duizenden tours gestart.
Genoeg meningen.

4.8 in de App Store en Google Play. Hier zijn er een paar die we blijven teruglezen.

starstarstarstarstar

Deze tour was een geweldige manier om de stad te zien. De verhalen waren interessant zonder te gekunsteld aan te voelen, en ik vond het heerlijk om op mijn eigen tempo te verkennen.

Jess

Tbilisi-tour

Dit was een prima manier om Brighton te leren kennen zonder je als toerist te voelen. De vertelling had diepgang en context, maar overdreef het niet.

Christoph

Brighton-tour

Begon deze tour met een croissant in de ene hand en nul verwachtingen. De app gaat gewoon mee met je, geen druk, gewoon jij, je koptelefoon en gave verhalen.