Yardley Gobion
Poster drawing of the thatched cottages, white fingerpost and St Leonard's bell turret on the Green

Yardley Gobion

As visited by King Edward III

About 1,300 people, one canal, one moat. An independent guide run by residents, not the Parish Council. What's on Tomorrow, 8pm History Group AGM Sat 7 Nov, 7pm Fireworks night Tue 10 Nov, 2pm Chestnut Club See everything Poster drawing of the long white Coffee Pot pub at dusk with its windows lit Eat, drink, shop The Coffee Pot, the One Stop and the rest Poster drawing of the concrete water tower of 1934 against a blue sky Who to ring Bins, doctors, power cuts. 33,000 gallons not included. Poster drawing of brick Bridge 60 over the canal with narrowboats beyond Round here The map, the towpath, Bridge 60 Poster drawing of a cycle speedway rider leaning into a bend in front of a huge ace of spades Join something The Yardley Aces were champions in 1952 Poster drawing of the wooded island in the moat at Moor End, with the vanished castle shown as a pale ghost The story Since about 1160

Today Wednesday 4 November

Hours are the last ones published, and may have changed. Ring first if it matters.

It has a shop, a pub, a school and a moat.

Plenty of English villages have lost the first three, and never had the fourth. Yardley Gobion still has a One Stop with the Post Office inside it, the Coffee Pot on the High Street, a Church of England primary school and a pre-school on School Lane.

Add a village hall, a sports and leisure centre with a hall, bars and snooker tables, two playing fields, allotments, a pocket park in an old orchard behind the church, and the Grand Union Canal along the eastern edge with a working boatyard at Yardley Wharf.

There are thatched cottages on the Green, and the moat of a castle Edward III owned is still out at Moor End. People here run a WI, a History Group, Scouts, a football club and a monthly magazine that lands on every doormat, and the centre on School Lane puts on a big fireworks display every year.

Find your way around

And when you need to leave

Stony Stratford
about 4 miles
Towcester
about 7 miles
M1 junction 15
about 7 miles
Milton Keynes Central
about 8 miles
London Euston, by train from MK
35 to 40 mins
Northampton
about 11 miles

It really does look like this.

The posters are drawn from the real places, except the castle, which is our guess: only its moat survives. Here are some real photographs, from people kind enough to share them.

A huge horse chestnut in gold autumn leaf beside the High Street, with a red postbox and houses beyond
The High Street at Orchard Close, in November Stephen McKay, CC BY-SA 2.0
A long thatched stone cottage behind a sweep of grass, with a white fingerpost and the church bell turret behind
The Green, with St Leonard's behind Philip Jeffrey, CC BY-SA 2.0
Ladders against a stone cottage whose roof is half old grey thatch and half fresh golden straw
Rethatching a cottage in the village Phil Catterall, CC BY-SA 2.0
A brick canal bridge with a concrete arch and narrowboats moored beyond it on still blue water
Bridge 60 at Yardley Wharf, dated 1936 Andrew Abbott, CC BY-SA 2.0

Yardley's cows wore a horseshoe.

As a brand, that is. When Yardley was one of eighteen villages inside the royal forest of Whittlewood, its people could turn their animals into the woods from 5 April to 12 November, and every beast carried its village's mark. Yardley's was a horseshoe, which is why there's one at the top of this page.

After that come a king's castle, medieval kilns, a canal wharf and a champion cycle speedway team.

Read the story
Poster drawing of the wooded island in the moat at Moor End, with the vanished castle shown as a pale ghost