White Rose Tourism Awards Delight For North Yorkshire

08th Oct 2010

North Yorkshire has shone at the White Rose Tourism Awards 2010, winning nine of 16 awards bestowed on North Yorkshire Hotels and tourism businesses.

Ryedale businesses won in every category they were nominated in said Anne Weasley Administrator of the Walled Garden at Scampston Hall, near Malton which is a major boost for the region’s tourism industry.

The walled garden, won the Small Visitor Attraction of the year, Ms Weasley feels the quality of the garden and the visitor experience is what won it for them.

‘We treat all our visitors as guests and try to make them feel special and we keep on trying to introduce new things next year.’
Last year the garden developed more variety for group visitors which included working with nearby attractions, developing a children’s play area and producing children’s activity sheets.

This was not the only winning category, Pickering’s 17 Burgate won Bed and Breakfast / Guest Accommodation of the year; The Dovecote Barns at Kelfield, won the self catering, Cruisers and Serviced Apartments Awards and Small Hotel/ Townhouse of the year went to Feversham Arms Hotel & Verbena Spa, Helmsley.

Malton Tourist Information Centre ( TIC) a four strong team, Julie Blanchard, Christine Barnard, Julie Blanchard, Julie Flinton and Patrick Swindell fought off competitive competition to be crowned TIC of the year.

Judges liked the co-location in the Malton Museum and said its staff offered a high level of customer service.
The Tourist Information Centre has been finalists twice in recent years and has previously won the title in Yorkshire and Nationally.

Amongst the other winners were York Maze for best tourism experience of the year , RHS Garden Harlow Carr in Harrogate for both the Large Visitor Attraction and Sustainable Tourism Award and The National Railway Museum in York won Business Tourism Award.

Events Manager Rachel Fox Creves said.

‘This is yet another superb accolade for the events team, who also won Conference Venue of the Year at the York Tourism Awards in April.’

‘Achieving world class service, launching a brand new website and significant investment in improvements to the events spaces all no doubt had their impact in helping to secure this fabulous result.’