The name comes from the beavers. Bevreli, beaver clearing, for the animals that gnawed the medieval woodland along the River Hull until the woodland and the beavers were both gone. The town that grew out of the clearing kept the name and eventually exported it. A group of English settlers from this Yorkshire town gave the name to Beverly, Massachusetts in 1668, and 240 years later a Boston banker who liked his summers in Beverly Farms persuaded a developer in Los Angeles to call a new subdivision Beverly Hills. So this small market town of 19,000 people in East Yorkshire is, in a roundabout way, the etymological grandparent of Rodeo Drive. None of which is obvious when you arrive on the train and find a place that has been quietly avoiding heavy industry since the Reformation.
Beverley railway station sits on the Hull to Scarborough Line, with services run by Northern and a limited direct service to London King's Cross provided by Hull Trains. By bus, the East Yorkshire X46 and X47 run between York, Beverley and Hull, hourly Monday to Saturday and every two hours on Sunday. Bus 121 runs hourly from Hull, continuing to Driffield and Bridlington. Bus 246 ambles from Hull every 30 minutes via Beverley to Hornsea. Long-distance coaches don't visit Beverley directly; you change in Hull or York. Drivers come up the A164 from the Humber Bridge, the road that runs through the medieval North Bar arch single-file under a set of traffic lights. The A1079 between York and Hull skirts the town to the west. Once you're in, everything is within a short walk.
Beverley Minster, at the south end of the town, is one of the largest parish churches in England and a Gothic masterpiece that nearly fell down in the early 18th century before Nicholas Hawksmoor stepped in. Its twin Perpendicular west towers inspired the rebuild of Westminster Abbey. St Mary's Church is the other Grade I-listed parish church, at the north end of town near the North Bar. The Bar itself, the only surviving entrance of four medieval toll-gates, was built of brick in 1409 and still funnels traffic. The Guild Hall, the Old Friary, the Market Cross of 1714, and a scatter of 17th and 18th century town houses fill the streets between the two churches. Westwood, the common heath just west of town, holds Beverley Racecourse, where a permanent racetrack has run since at least 1690.
Beverley Market is held every Saturday from 9 AM to 4 PM in Saturday Market, the same square that has hosted it under royal charter since the Middle Ages. The town fits four festivals a year into its quiet streets: Beverley Early Music Festival in late May, Beverley Fringe Festival in late June, the Folk Festival also in June, and Beverley Food Festival on the first weekend of October. Race meetings at the Westwood happen across the summer. For everyday eating, Kavanagh's tea-room on Toll Gavel serves breakfast from 9.30 AM; Tea Cosy on Highgate next to the Minster runs a conservatory open Monday to Saturday 11 to 4; TC's Patisserie on Lairgate does tarts and quiches Monday to Saturday 9 to 4.30. The Green Dragon on Saturday Market and The Foresters on Beckside both keep a rotating range of guest ales.
Beverley works well as a base because the trains and buses go to better-known places without much fuss. York, twenty miles northwest, has kept its medieval walls and a great cluster of museums. Hull, eight miles south, is the busy port city with the industrial history, the abolitionist museums, and The Deep aquarium. Selby, west of the Wolds, has one of the few medieval abbeys to survive intact, including a stained-glass window of the Washington family's coat of arms that was reused as the basis for the Stars and Stripes. Bridlington, on the coast, is an old fishing port and seaside resort with the chalk cliffs of Flamborough Head just north. Premier Inn on Flemingate is reliable budget chain; the Kings Head on Saturday Market is the traditional pub-with-rooms option.
Beverley sits at 53.8425 degrees north, 0.4316 degrees west on the gentle rise where the chalk wolds meet the flat carr land north of the Humber. From the air the twin landmarks are Beverley Minster at the south end of the town and St Mary's Church at the north end, with the North Bar arch between them. The Westwood common and racecourse spread west, with the chalk wolds rolling beyond. Humberside (EGNJ) is 18 nautical miles south across the Humber estuary; Leeds Bradford (EGNM) is 47 nautical miles west. Recommended altitude 2,500 to 4,500 feet AGL gives a clear view of the compact medieval centre and the open Yorkshire wolds.