Easby Abbey & St Agatha’s Church at Sunset

There are few places in Yorkshire that capture the tranquillity of Easby quite like this. Set along a quiet bend of the River Swale, Easby Abbey was founded in the mid-12th century by the Premonstratensian canons — an order known for combining monastic life with active service. They prayed, farmed, and welcomed travellers seeking rest along the old route to Richmond. But like so many others, the abbey’s life came to an abrupt end in 1536, when Henry VIII’s Dissolution stripped it of wealth and purpose, leaving only the echo of its devotion in the ruins that remain today.

Beside the abbey stands St Agatha’s Church, a rare survivor that still serves its parish centuries on. Inside, medieval wall paintings still whisper fragments of faith from long ago — saints, angels, and fragments of scripture that somehow escaped the whitewash of time.

From above, the late autumn light draped everything in gold and rose, and the ruins seemed almost to glow from within. The shadows stretched across the green lawns, tracing outlines of cloisters and chapels now lost to memory. It’s a peaceful place, quietly breathtaking, and a reminder that even as centuries pass, the spirit of devotion lingers in stone and silence.