This is a very popular alternative/gothic music festival usually held around May and early November.

Ian also includes in the book a chapter on Whitby’s other ghosts and legends, quite appropriately as they all add to the mystery and atmosphere in the town. he seemed more intimidated by me when I stared back at him after he turned his head and tried to scare me. Follow the route taken by Dracula as he flees the wreckage of his ship up into the graveyard and abbey ruins. Isabel and Marjorie Smith and their friend Miss Stokes would become Mina, Lucy, and Mrs Westenra and live on in the pages of Dracula. The owners have spent twenty years perfecting their lair and you can stay in one of their artisan four-poster bedrooms that are a work of art.A unique tour through this spine-chilling story, the Dracula Experience is not for the faint hearted.

That Black Dog is a transformation of Count Dracula, a deadly vampire, who is then unleashed upon Whitby in England! Coffin chocolates, vampire teeth, blood bags of syrup, count Dracula lollies, and black and red Dracula rock are just to name a few.Thompson devotes a chapter to Whitby’s Goths, who bring a lot of colour and character to this seaside resort (see our earlier blog on Whitby Goth Weekend).

From the grounding of the Demeter at Tate Hill Sands to the first attack of Dracula on Lucy on the ‘suicide seat’. Whitby’s windswept headland, the dramatic abbey ruins, a church surrounded by swooping bats, and a long association with jet – a semi-precious stone used in mourning jewellery – gave a homegrown taste of such thrilling horrors. In addition, he visited the public lending library on the Harbourside (now the Quayside fish and chip restaurant).Twice a year Whitby is overtaken by goths from around the country and across the world for this alternative music festival. I have visited Whitby more times than I care to remember and this book has introduced me to so many places and details that I never knew existed. If you have more information on Dracula and the connections to Whitby, please let us know in the comments. This too is based on real life events; 5 years earlier a Russian boat had run aground on Tate Hill Sands, rearranging the name, Stoker created Demeter from Varna, the novel’s doomed vessel. As we reach the Duke of York pub, to our left you will see the foot of the 199 steps – The time and distance seemed endless, and my knees trembled and my breath came laboured as I toiled up the endless steps to the Abbey.