David St John Thomas: Walk on the wild side reveals the treasures of a county with a kaleidoscope of countryside

There is an extraordinary depth in the very concept and the development and character even between the cities, smaller settlements naturally more closely reflecting the landscape. Many, stone-built but yet soft, are among Britain's best.

Living as I do beside the Moray Firth on the fringe of the Highlands, and with a second home in the West Country where I spent most of my

life, I'm used to saying I love the extremities of Britain better than its core. I should add except for the North of England, especially Yorkshire. Friends are surprised how often we find ourselves here – and amazed that it figures so prominently in my book Remote Britain.

Parts of Yorkshire are really remote, as well as interesting in so many ways. There can scarcely be a greater difference than say between the inn at Tan Hill on the Pennine Way or the Buttertubs and – on a calm day – the tranquillity of Robin Hood's Bay as seen from Ravenscar, the town that never was, whose little-used station I recall our train struggling up to in pre-Beeching days and the crumbling cliffs steadily destroying whole streets toward the coast's bottom.

Many places along Yorkshire's remarkable coast have long been familiar, but we especially enjoyed our continuous journey down its kaleidoscope researching the book. There isn't a mile without fascination: how people used to earn their livings on land, beaches (where coal was found) and the sea, legends and traditions, great headlands and fossils. The first part along the Heritage or Dinosaur Coast, is

especially rich.

Every resort is a one-off, from Scarborough (possibly Britain's most improved) through sedate Filey to popular Bridlington close to Flamborough Head and its bird reserve, and more remote Hornsea with its mere and pottery heritage and Withernsea with its curious lighthouse built inland away from the invading sea. Beyond that we have the terminal of twin North Sea gas pipelines and, across a narrow isthmus, Spurn Head, Yorkshire's tear drop and Britain's most eerie place.

The people we met along the way were fascinating, too, from the party of cyclists at the caf in the square of (almost the only thing built) the planned town of Ravenscar to the lonely old gent wondering if his bungalow would outlast his days before being swallowed by the advancing sea at Aldbrough, to the lifeboat coxswain, one of a few residents at Spurn Head, home to Britain's only continuously-manned lifeboat station (a hundred ships daily enter the Humber), who said there was no better place to live: "It's a magic spot. In winter you don't see anyone".

One of many good things about Yorkshire is that folk aren't shy. Several told us about Spurn Head, whose shape has continually changed, the modern road crossing isolated remains of sections of the former railway at a sharp angle. After normal traffic ceased, there used to be a truck powered by sail to take home those returning from evenings out.

Another lifeboatman warned about the health risk of caterpillars of the brown-tailed moth just hatched from cocoons in bag-like things hanging from bushes. We had to wait for the next day's Yorkshire Post to learn full details.

"What is my favourite place?" is answered by "Where I am". But there are many happy memories of all parts of Yorkshire, where industry has always been gentler on the landscape and most towns better built than in Lancashire.

High Force; Garrigill (we stayed at the Post Office, under threat, as so many); Bolton Abbey; beside the river at Fountains Abbey (Yorkshire is luxuriously rich in abbeys and early Christian traditions); The Wolds which I see as typifying the best of unspoilt Britain; Whitby with its glorious setting, fish-and-chips, and steam trains of the North Yorkshire Moors Railway; always civilised Harrogate with its spa, gardens and Bettys tea rooms; York and its Minster and museums; driving beside bubbling streams at the bottom of the valleys in the Dales and admiring the stone walls of the fields stretching up toward heaven; catching a train at Horton-in-Ribblesdale for the Long Drag to Appleby, and the quite different rugged splendour of the North York Moors – they are among my favourite memories.

When can we come back?

n To order a copy of Remote Britain from the Yorkshire Post Bookshop for 18.99, call free on 0800 0153232 or go online at www.yorkshirepost

bookshop.co.uk. Post and packing is 2.75.

David St John Thomas is the author of Remote Britain, Landscape People and Books, published by Frances Lincoln Limited, price 18.99.