Fountains Abbey – Yorkshire, England
One of the more expansive and well preserved ruins in Yorkshire, built by the Cistercians from the 12th to 14th centuries and, like the others, dissolved by Henry III in the mid 1500s.
I visited Fountains when I was here last year, but arrived late in the day and only managed to patrol the perimeter, so to speak. I never got inside.
This time I spent almost 10 hours on the property. I arrived shortly after the grounds opened, had a private tour (nobody else showed up) for about two hours, and then stayed well into the evening.
I didn’t know when I decided to spend the day at Fountains that Saturdays in the autumn they light the place up, offer picnics and barbecue, and then a choir performs in the vaulted chambers beneath beneath the refectory.
The “Elysian Singers” perform in the cellarium at Fountains Abbey