Tall tales and true: of Yorkshire moors and the byways of Surrey: Once upon a smuggler's time

Today, we drove out a winding cloistered country lane on to village seascape that took our breath away.

As we then followed a beach road twisting upwards, we could see at the left end of this picturesque bay a tiny wobbly stone inn, The Ship Inn, linked to some whitewashed fishermen's cottages lined up beside it along a small sandy beach. For the longest time in centuries past, this was all one would see as one headed out to the beach at Saltburn-by-the-sea. Here, the publican of The Ship Inn ran a lucrative but precarious existence selling wines, spirits, perfumes, cheeses and other luxury goods smuggled into secret cellars in his inn by fishermen all along this coast, all the while attempting to steer clear of the local agents hired to outwit them. Britain was being heavily taxed to fund wars but everyone, including local rectors and magistrates, was quite prone to being able to acquire some cheap brandy from France, if it just happened to fall off a cart in front of their home.

Iron stone was discovered in the hills behind, so a north-south railway line to move that stone was extended to Saltburn-by-the-sea. A pier was soon built, jutting out into deeper water. It remains today: the last pier in all of Yorkshire. This was completed in 1829 and bought day-trippers intent on spending time in the sun and sand. In the first 6 months there were some 50,000 visitors, which is quite amazing. Hence the need for growth to support future visitors.

Henry Pease, an influential industrialist whose family owned the railway, had a vision one day as he stood on the undeveloped beach around The Ship Inn. He imagined a thriving town atop the cliffs and inspired others in the family and the company to fund it. And being Quakers, the Pease family often considered those less fortunate than themselves. They then set about building a seaside town within the humanitarian framework they all lived by. As well as building gorgeous hotels and homes for wealthy Victorians, they built caring places for the underprivileged, including a vast Convalescent home for injured miners from around here.

So, Henry's grand vision quickly became a reality. Today, when you drive out to the beach and look up, where once there was nothing, these days it is quite stunning. There is that long lovely pier with its beach stalls at the bottom of the cliff, together with a small row of beach chalets for day trippers, all terribly on trend with the Victorian era. A funicular replaced an earlier lift from the beach up to town, or allowing access from the flower-bedecked railway down to the beach. The town above is a charming mix of Victorian and Edwardian styling with street after street of gracious dwellings and pleasant parks and gardens overlooking a sensational view, where once 17th century smugglers used to reign.