Puffin spotting on Yorkshire's incredible coast brought back great memories - Julian Norton

The Farne Islands and Skomer have greater claims to being puffin perfection.

The appeal of seeing some of these stumpy birds with awesomely coloured beaks, brimming with small silvery fish was hard to resist.

From Thirsk, it was a longer car journey than we had expected. We can easily travel to Whitby, Sandsend or Runswick Bay (traffic permitting), within an hour.

But further south, the journey is more convoluted.

In my childhood, from West Yorkshire, Flamborough, Bridlington and Ulrome (which I suspect may, by now, have fallen into the North Sea – it was only just clinging on in the face of coastal erosion in the 80s) were easier places to visit.

I hoped it would be worth the wait. Replete with binoculars, we were both excited.

At first, it was guillemots galore, roosting precariously on vertical cliffs, flapping hectically across a cove or bobbing contentedly on the swell.

They bore a strong resemblance to the puffins that we were hoping to see. Just as distinctive in the air (their wing action was effective but haphazard), but without the classic colourful, wide-based beak.

They seemed to be everywhere, filling every nook and cranny on the steep cliffs. It seemed miraculous that their eggs didn’t roll off and into the sea.

As Anne, Emmy and I headed north, around headlands and up and down the coastal path, more and more birds became evident, for this area is not just the domain of seabirds.

Skylarks levitated high above the grassland and linnets, corn buntings, gold finch and meadow pipit filled the niche a few yards inland from the coastal cliffs.

Kittiwakes, gannets and other types of gull became more prominent as we travelled further, but the puffins remained elusive.

This trip reminded me of one many years ago, when I was a member of the Young Ornithologist Club.

My father had kindly driven me along with a couple of mates, around various bird havens to complete a sponsored birdwatch.

Memories came flooding back of that day over forty years ago, when I had identified a majestic gannet for the first time.

I regaled Anne with some of the stories. In hindsight, they were mainly rather tedious and not worthy of repetition here.

After about an hour of walking, we stopped and chatted with a couple heading back south.

“Are there any puffins to be seen up there?” I enquired. So far, there had been plenty of black and white birds, but not one with a multi-coloured beak.

“Oh yes. Just around that corner. You’re bound to see some,” was the enthusiastic reply.

It sounded like something my dad would have said to three weary 10-year olds, 43 years ago.

We plodded on, clutching our binoculars, ready to zoom in at the first suggestion of a puffin.

Before I spotted the birds, I spotted a cluster of people all with their binoculars pointing towards a cleft in the cliff. Surely, this was going to be a puffin sighting.

On an unfeasibly small and precarious rocky outcrop which could barely be called a ledge, a pair of puffins sat, oblivious to the onlookers and seemingly unaware of the ostentatiously bright colours of their beaks.

Like Joseph with his technicoloured coat, the rainbow stripes were incongruous amongst all the other birds. Nature has a wonderful way of making a spectacle.

There must have been about ten in total, at least on this part of the coast.

Hardly a plethora of puffins, but plenty to please us both.