On Yorkshire shores: dinosaurs, birds and beaches on a wild autumn tour

A car-free, off-season trip based on new itineraries for visitors reveals Jurassic period fossils, teeming seabirds, genteel villas, pubs and enormous beaches

“Look,” said Liam Herringshaw, pointing at a melon-sized bulge in the layers of rock fronting the prom in Scarborough. “There’s where a five-toed dinosaur walked 160 million years ago.”

It was probably an 11-tonne cetiosaurus (whale lizard), he said, digging from his bag a picture of a long-necked dino with a small head and trunk-like legs. Toe shapes are visible on the bulge’s outer edge, which means this would have been one of the creature’s back feet (front feet had a different toe arrangement).