0:00:34 > 0:00:37There's an energy to this coast that's infectious.
0:00:37 > 0:00:39A bracing sense that people here
0:00:39 > 0:00:42know how to grasp opportunities and turn them to their advantage.
0:00:45 > 0:00:48Nowhere embodies this more than Saltburn.
0:00:53 > 0:00:54I like this place.
0:00:54 > 0:00:59It feels washed clean every day by the wind and the sea.
0:00:59 > 0:01:03But the fact that it's here, is literally down to one man's vision.
0:01:05 > 0:01:07Like many Victorian industrialists,
0:01:07 > 0:01:10Henry Pease had a strong religious sense.
0:01:17 > 0:01:20After seeing an apparition of a heavenly city above the cliffs,
0:01:20 > 0:01:23Pease built this coastal spa town from scratch.
0:01:26 > 0:01:29His Saltburn Improvement Company had the noble aim
0:01:29 > 0:01:31of restoring the jaded spirits of his work force.
0:01:34 > 0:01:37As Pease was teetotal they had no public houses,
0:01:37 > 0:01:40but they did have their very own stairway to heaven.
0:01:40 > 0:01:43Powered by nothing more potent than water.
0:01:45 > 0:01:47And to reflect the purity of his vision,
0:01:47 > 0:01:52Pease had the town clad entirely in a distinctive white brick.
0:02:01 > 0:02:05The bricks are certainly very striking.
0:02:05 > 0:02:09They were made at a factory in Durham owned, oddly enough,
0:02:09 > 0:02:13by the very same Henry Pease who set up the Saltburn Improvement Company.
0:02:13 > 0:02:17Thousands of tonnes of material were required.
0:02:17 > 0:02:20And the most efficient way to move it all was by railway.
0:02:20 > 0:02:24A railway owned and run by the Pease family.
0:02:25 > 0:02:28The whole thing was a money-spinner.
0:02:28 > 0:02:31Clearly, Pease believed that God helps those who help themselves.
0:02:31 > 0:02:35But on a day like this, Saltburn is so picture perfect,
0:02:35 > 0:02:38that you could almost buy into his dream.
0:02:38 > 0:02:41The jewel in the crown of his heavenly town
0:02:41 > 0:02:44was this magnificent hotel.
0:02:44 > 0:02:46But the grand guests have long since moved on.
0:02:46 > 0:02:48The hotel has been sold off for flats
0:02:48 > 0:02:51and it's the meek who've inherited the earth.
0:02:55 > 0:02:56And the sea view.
0:02:56 > 0:03:00I wasn't expecting this! It's like getting up onto the crow's nest
0:03:02 > 0:03:04What do you say about a view like that?
0:03:04 > 0:03:07You could talk about the coast till you're blue in the face,
0:03:07 > 0:03:09but this is all you need to see.
0:03:09 > 0:03:12And that is why the British coastline is a bit special.
0:03:28 > 0:03:33Just eight miles south of Saltburn is the tiny fishing port of Staithes.
0:03:33 > 0:03:39The beauty of this town owes nothing to man, and everything to nature.
0:03:39 > 0:03:42It was the boyhood home of the great navigator, Captain Cook.
0:03:42 > 0:03:47It's hard to understand, how he could bear to leave it.
0:03:47 > 0:03:52Small wonder then, that 100 years ago, Staithes acquired its very own artists' colony.
0:03:52 > 0:03:55They were painters who'd studied in France.
0:03:55 > 0:04:00They wanted to build the sort of bohemian artists' commune they'd seen abroad.
0:04:02 > 0:04:05Staithes seemed the perfect place.
0:04:07 > 0:04:09'The Staithes group took their art seriously.
0:04:09 > 0:04:12Like the French Impressionists, they believed in capturing
0:04:12 > 0:04:17the vibrancy of real life, by painting in the open air.
0:04:17 > 0:04:21But the French never had to cope with the Yorkshire coast.
0:04:24 > 0:04:27That's the North Sea there, that can bring in some furious weather.
0:04:27 > 0:04:29It must've made it hard for painters,
0:04:29 > 0:04:33more than enough to blow the bristles out of the stoutest brush.
0:04:35 > 0:04:41And yet the Staithes group not only survived, they thrived on wind, rain and salt spray.
0:04:41 > 0:04:46Even today, the world they captured seems almost within reach.
0:05:14 > 0:05:17But on one day of the week, painting was never tolerated.
0:05:17 > 0:05:21Whatever else they did, the artists seldom made the mistake
0:05:21 > 0:05:24of putting brush to canvas on a Sunday more than once.
0:05:24 > 0:05:29Those that tried it, learnt in these parts, the reward for such lack of respect for the Sabbath,
0:05:29 > 0:05:32was a bowl of rotting fish heads to wear for a hat.
0:05:41 > 0:05:44Whitby.
0:05:50 > 0:05:53The town lies at the heart of Yorkshire's Jurassic coast.
0:05:53 > 0:05:56A seven-mile slice of exposed sedimentary rock,
0:05:56 > 0:06:02formed when the dinosaurs around here were paddling through tropical swamps.
0:06:02 > 0:06:08Alice Roberts is on the trail of a dark legacy of the Dinosaur Age,
0:06:08 > 0:06:12which gave Whitby a Victorian claim to fame.
0:06:14 > 0:06:18This is a bit of Whitby jet, its name embodies darkness itself.
0:06:18 > 0:06:21It is jet black and it's been used to make jewellery since
0:06:21 > 0:06:23at least the Bronze Age.
0:06:23 > 0:06:26The Venerable Bede thought it kept serpents at bay
0:06:26 > 0:06:30and it became a must-have fashion accessory, when Queen Victoria
0:06:30 > 0:06:33adopted it as part of her mourning attire.
0:06:33 > 0:06:37Victoria wore Whitby jet for 30 years as a sign of her grief,
0:06:37 > 0:06:40after the death of Prince Albert.
0:06:40 > 0:06:43For her, Albert's loss was a tragedy,
0:06:43 > 0:06:47but for Whitby it signalled boom time.
0:06:47 > 0:06:50Suddenly, the town's fishermen were outnumbered by people
0:06:50 > 0:06:56carving the strange black substance into ever more elaborate shapes.
0:06:59 > 0:07:04The Victorians loved jet. They used it to make very ornate pieces of jewellery like this,
0:07:04 > 0:07:08which to the modern eye, can look a little over the top, but this was the height of fashion.
0:07:08 > 0:07:11So jet was a very valuable commodity.
0:07:13 > 0:07:16'It must have been a bit like a Yorkshire Klondike,
0:07:16 > 0:07:19'everybody wanted to get their hands on Whitby Jet.
0:07:19 > 0:07:24'So, what is it? And why do you only find it here on the coast?
0:07:24 > 0:07:30'I'm joining the Whitby jet-set, with local geologist, Will Watts.'
0:07:30 > 0:07:33These collapsed bits are the roofs of the Victorian jet works.
0:07:33 > 0:07:35Once, there'd have been a big hole in the cliff
0:07:35 > 0:07:38where they were quarrying to find jet.
0:07:38 > 0:07:41And you've got pillars on either side and the collapse in the middle.
0:07:41 > 0:07:43Right. Quite a major undertaking.
0:07:43 > 0:07:46- And unique to this part of the coastline.- What is jet?
0:07:46 > 0:07:48It's monkey puzzle tree.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51Lumps of the tree that floated out to sea and then sank,
0:07:51 > 0:07:54and were buried at the bottom of the sea and come back as jet.
0:07:56 > 0:07:58'Now, there are only a few monkey puzzle trees in the area.
0:07:58 > 0:08:02'They're native to Chilean Argentina, where it's much warmer.
0:08:02 > 0:08:08'But 180 million years ago, when this coast was much nearer the equator,
0:08:08 > 0:08:10'monkey puzzle trees were in abundance.'
0:08:10 > 0:08:13What sort of clues are there to help us find the jet?
0:08:13 > 0:08:16We might find some nice, black material.
0:08:16 > 0:08:20- We're more likely to find a hole in the cliff where somebody's already found some.- Like this?
0:08:20 > 0:08:24Yeah, here we go. Here we have a hole in the cliff,
0:08:24 > 0:08:28and if we look at the bottom of it, we've got some wonderful black jet.
0:08:28 > 0:08:31There is, yes, there's a layer of it.
0:08:31 > 0:08:34Imagine seeing driftwood on the sea. That sinks to the seabed,
0:08:34 > 0:08:39and must be found as a fossil. When someone finds a bit in the cliff, they're only working a single log.
0:08:39 > 0:08:42We've got a bit here, which is similar in thickness.
0:08:42 > 0:08:44It's only about a centimetre thick.
0:08:44 > 0:08:47- Yes.- It's not the biggest layer of material in the world.
0:08:47 > 0:08:49It's like a thin plank of monkey puzzle.
0:08:49 > 0:08:52It would have been round, it's been squashed down.
0:08:52 > 0:08:55- On top, you can see the pattern of the wood.- Yes.
0:08:55 > 0:08:57- You can see the grain. - That is actually
0:08:57 > 0:09:01the side of a fossil seashell, I think it's a little fossil oyster.
0:09:01 > 0:09:04At some point, that was living on this wood.
0:09:04 > 0:09:07Why is jet particularly found in Whitby and nowhere else?
0:09:07 > 0:09:10We only find it on a seven- or eight-mile coastline,
0:09:10 > 0:09:13because of the way the rock's laid out in the UK and the world.
0:09:13 > 0:09:16They're not horizontal, they dip ever so slightly.
0:09:16 > 0:09:21If you go too far south, they're way beneath us and too far north -
0:09:21 > 0:09:22they've been eroded.
0:09:22 > 0:09:27It's probably a million-in-one chance that we find jet in Whitby,
0:09:27 > 0:09:30but we do and we have a long history of it being worked.
0:09:44 > 0:09:47Almost 150 years after jet took off in Whitby,
0:09:47 > 0:09:50the business is still going strong.
0:09:50 > 0:09:54Which is strange because jet isn't mined much here any more.
0:09:54 > 0:09:58The fact is, that alongside the local jet
0:09:58 > 0:10:01there's a certain amount that's been imported from abroad
0:10:01 > 0:10:07from places like the Ukraine. And as anyone form Whitby will tell you, it's just not the same.
0:10:07 > 0:10:09So, if you want authentic Whitby jet,
0:10:09 > 0:10:11how can you be sure of getting it?
0:10:11 > 0:10:16Mike Marshall knows the real thing when he sees it.
0:10:16 > 0:10:20It's amazing how elaborately it can be worked, this here is amazing.
0:10:20 > 0:10:23How would I know it's made out of local,
0:10:23 > 0:10:25good quality Whitby Jet and not a cheap import?
0:10:25 > 0:10:29- Obviously, it all looks black to me. - There's a simple test you can do.
0:10:29 > 0:10:35Whitby Jet, if you get a piece of wet and dry sandpaper,
0:10:36 > 0:10:39if you mark it on there - that's a gingery brown
0:10:39 > 0:10:42- which is good quality, hard jet.- Right.
0:10:42 > 0:10:47You can also get poor quality jet around Whitby.
0:10:47 > 0:10:50Again, if you mark it on a piece of paper, that's almost black.
0:10:50 > 0:10:55- It's softer, almost like charcoal, isn't it?- That's probably sea coal.
0:10:55 > 0:10:59What about the Ukrainian, how good is it? Is it as good as Whitby Jet?
0:10:59 > 0:11:05It isn't really, no. It's probably going to be similar to the poor quality jet.
0:11:05 > 0:11:08You can make the jewellery of it, but it will crack and craze over time.
0:11:08 > 0:11:10It is very poor quality jet.
0:11:10 > 0:11:16It's buyer beware, really. It is jet, but it's not Whitby jet.
0:11:27 > 0:11:30If it's authenticity you're after, few places on this coast
0:11:30 > 0:11:36offer a more authentic British seaside experience than Scarborough.
0:11:36 > 0:11:39Cheap flights have changed our view of the world,
0:11:39 > 0:11:42not always for the better.
0:11:42 > 0:11:45Some locals would have you believe that Scarborough's a match
0:11:45 > 0:11:49for Monte Carlo or the Bay of Naples.
0:11:49 > 0:11:51Giorgio Alessio is well-placed to judge.
0:11:51 > 0:11:54He's an Italian chef, who's lived here 25 years.
0:11:54 > 0:12:01He's passionate about food and even more passionate about Yorkshire.
0:12:04 > 0:12:06'Every morning I go to the fish market.
0:12:06 > 0:12:10'The beauty of that is you just pick and choose what you want.
0:12:10 > 0:12:13'I get quite a wonderful halibut,
0:12:13 > 0:12:15'this is about one-and-a-half, two kilos valuable.
0:12:17 > 0:12:21'One of the ugliest fish ever is the monkfish.
0:12:21 > 0:12:23'They've got teeth like sharks.'
0:12:37 > 0:12:42The best things you can find about Scarborough is the Englishness.
0:12:46 > 0:12:49It's a very different part of the world here.
0:12:49 > 0:12:56At 12 o'clock is in the middle of the sun. English people get very excited about it - sunbathing.
0:12:56 > 0:12:58You never see anything like that in Italy,
0:12:58 > 0:13:02at this time they're all outside having lunch until the fierce sun goes away.
0:13:02 > 0:13:04A lot of English people got to Italy
0:13:04 > 0:13:08because they say they're all wonderful, beautiful people in Italy.
0:13:08 > 0:13:11Very good! That's why I'm here. I'm the only one.
0:13:11 > 0:13:15No competition at all. Look how good-looking are the women here.
0:13:15 > 0:13:18MUSIC: "Let There Be Love" by Nat King Cole
0:13:31 > 0:13:35People think it is the Bay of Naples, people think it is the Bay of Monte Carlo,
0:13:35 > 0:13:38bloomin' heck, it's Scarborough. What d'you think of that?