That’s all, folks—I’m packing my bags and moving to York. Just change my return address to this coffeeshop.
The reason begins with “tea and tuna panini” and ends “while sitting on top of an ancient Roman gate in the floor.”
Meet the Croque Monsieur coffeeshop:
It’s next to York’s medieval Bootham Bar gate, which is built on the foundations of the much older Roman gate. You wouldn’t even know that there was a coffeeshop through that doorway (as opposed to a cellar or guardroom), except that there’s a sign.
When you walk inside, the coffeeshop looks like this. See that window in the floor?:
Look down through that window and you’ll see this:
(No, it’s not a terrarium—that’s the excavated base of the Roman wall. Right under the coffeeshop. So you’re drinking your coffee while hovering over a 2,000-year-old wall.)
Below is a diagram of why I want to live here:
Top left: Through the window, you can see the wall of a medieval house.
Top right: That is where you obtain the cheap coffee.
Middle: That is a hole in the floor with a Roman gate under it.
Bottom center: That is a cup of tea and a tuna panini.
