Mount Grace Priory is the best preserved Carthusian priory in Britain. Set amid woodland, the crumbling masonry and open grassland have become home to a collection of wildlife that has taken advantage of what previous owners, including the monks, left behind. The famous priory stoats inhabit the passages under Mount Grace and are possibly the best-known colony of stoats in Yorkshire and even the British Isles. The monks who lived as hermits, each occupying his own cell came together in the chapel only for the nocturnal liturgical hours, Sundays and feast-days. They were a silent order, and their diet was strictly vegetarian.
Entrance is via 13th-century manor house containing an exhibition and two newly restored arts and crafts rooms.
Staddlebridge
Northallerton
North Yorkshire
DL6 3JG
01609 883494
