Hey girls,” squeals Cosi, her nose close to the windscreen and hands about a yard apart on the steering wheel, “I think I’ve found my inner trucker!”

It is a breakthrough moment – and a massive relief for Sam and me (nondrivers).

We are on a motorhome mini-break in Yorkshire: Thelma and Louise meet the Brontë sisters. We’re here to have an adventure, catch up on gossip and eat our body weight in cake.

After a brief warm-up in a Harrogate car park, we are soon belting down Broads in our four-berth AutoCruise Starblazer LL motorhome, to give the 24ft-long vehicle its full name. Driving east, the ordered fields are replaced by wooded hills and heather-clad moors. As we head into the Hambleton Hills, we burn some serious rubber up Sutton Bank, climbing 500ft in three-quarters of a mile. As the signs point out, caravans can’t do it, but our motorhome can – a relief, as although our fledgling trucker thinks she is queen of the road, we haven’t tried reversing yet.

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The view is spectacular from the top and almost as good at our first stop, the Golden Square camp site, a lovely secluded spot in the Dales, where for £13.50-£28 per night for a pitch with an electrical hook-up, you can fling open the door and see the stars. In a rare Yorkshire tribute, the friendly owner doffs his flat cap to congratulate “the lady’s handling”. It turns out Cosi is good at reversing, too.

We spend way too much on organic goodies at Andrew Pern’s deli in Helmsley and also sample his Michelin-starred cooking at the Star Inn at Harome. Ensconced in the medieval longhouse, we indulge in risotto of hand-picked Scottish girolles with garden thyme, wilted curly kale and roast hazelnut pesto for starters (£8.50) and pot-roast local red-legged partridge with creamed Mount St John cavolo nero cabbage, braised chestnuts and rowan berries (£19.95).

In a motorhome, you get to take in the glorious Yorkshire Dales from an elevated position. The views are unobstructed by hedges or other cars. We reach cruising speed zooming down what must be one of the poshest roads in the country, the grand carriage drive to Castle Howard. In honour of the stately beauty spot, we put on the kettle and enjoy our very own fresh brew: Yorkshire Tea, of course.

Shut the door of the beast and you disappear into your own beige world. Blinds come down, shutters are drawn, seats slide sideways, a coffee table folds down and the whole jigsaw is rearranged into a double bed. The other double berth is accessed via a fold-down ladder and comes with a suede headboard and reading light.

At Bridlington, the inner woman is attended to in a new restaurant, the Naked Fish, just a side street or two away from the crashing waves. We enjoy admirably affordable and tasty portions of herb-stuffed sea bass and fillet steak, which we get to walk off trying to find our “paddock” at nearby Thornwick Bay, a resort just a few hundred yards from the cliff. Pitch prices here start at £16 per night off-peak, rising to £25 in midsummer.

It may not be what Thelma and Louise would do, but we enjoy the sun setting at Fountains Abbey (our second abbey after calling at the impressive 12th-century Rievaulx near Helmsley) and wander through the stones at dusk with the pheasants that come pecking among the soaring ruins. This is proper Romance and we continue the theme with a trip to Haworth parsonage and the Brontë museum, spending as much time buying soap as gallivanting up on the moors.

After a night’s recuperation at Rudding Holiday Park (£15.50-£30 per pitch), we are ready for the genteel charms of nearby Harrogate. It offers beautiful Georgian architecture but, more importantly, shopping, and the queen of all teashops, Betty’s, where we stuff ourselves silly with scones and yet more tea.

Then we take the waters in the newly renovated Victorian baths. We’re advised to go commando for best effect. So, losing our inhibitions along with our clothes, we try to skip daintily from steam room to solarium to plunge pool, but the beautifully restored tiled floor is also slippy. We end up with a quick waddle over the floor from heated chambers separated by deep red velvet curtains. As one bather remarks: “It’s so hot in ’ere you could bake a meringue.” It’s that sort of day and that sort of an adventure.

Motorhome Information Service, 01444 458 889, www.motorhomeinfo.co.uk; Golden Square Camping Park, 01439 788 269, www.goldensquarecaravanpark.com; the Star Inn, 01439 770 397, www.thestaratharome.co.uk; Rievaulx Abbey, 01439 798 228, www.english-heritage.org.uk; Castle Howard, 01653 648 444, www.castlehoward.co.uk; Thornwick & Sea Farm Holiday Centre, 01262 850 369, www.thornwickbay.co.uk; the Naked Fish, 01262 400 266; Fountains Abbey, 01765 608 888, www.fountainsabbey. org.uk; Rudding Holiday Park, 01423 870 439, www.ruddingpark.com; Brontë Parsonage Museum, 01535 642 323, www.bronte.info; Betty’s Cafe Tea Rooms, 01423 502 746, www.bettys.co.uk; Harrogate Turkish Baths & Health Spa, 01423 556 746, www.harrogate.gov.uk/harrogate-1100; Rural Escapes brochure, www.enjoyengland.com/ruralescapes

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