The front-page headline in the Darlington & Stockton Times set me on my way, it told of the possible redevelopment of Northallerton's cattle market. Now this has been a happy hunting ground for me, I have pulled off a coup or two, have landed quite a few bargains at the antiques (or otherwise) sales there.

Northallerton's capital stores proved something of a distraction, as they do. A one-day heatwave made for 'shop till you drop', and I missed the viewing for the china etc. The octagonal selling arena was chock-a-block with eager eyed buyers, the tiered slatted seats, normally home to agri-bums (literal not pejorative), all taken. The auctioneer was rattling through the lots in no-nonsense cattle mart machine-gun style, plenty of £1, £2 offerings, though an old style telephone of the sort you dial and it rings delightfully made £30; you can still use these, nice for those special calls.

I left the hot intense arena, with its aroma of animals past, had a pleasant lunch in the colourful courtyard of the bistro across the high street, and refreshed, wandered round the rest of the sale.

Wander is the word, space is the essence of this sale room, the acres and the access allow for so much that is large and heavy, objects some auctioneers would balk at taking in unless accompanied by a Chippendale desk.

Their selection of garden goods is usually splendid. There were benches, troughs, coping stones, even piles of bricks. Chimneypots, bootscrapers, flagstones, corrugated and galvanised Peggy tubs, urns and yet more urns, sculptures indeed. Wrought iron gates leaned against fashionable cast iron radiators; cement lions basked in the sunshine. Fleets of lawnmowers (some with notes to the effect that they started at the first pull) and ranks of bicycles, the sort you could loose with impunity.

Furniture is arranged in the numerous cattle pens. Certainly, as in any general sale, there will be a tonnage of horrible modern repro and inevitably pieces with the furniture equivalent of BSE, ie woodworm. But in amongst the run-of-the-mill were some tasty things, old pine, a proud bow-fronted mahogany chest, and 1950s desk with a 'Royal' mechanical typewriter, one could imagine Graham Greene tapping out The End of the Affair.

I delved into a box of books and found a 1934 edition of George Bernard Shaw's plays, including Man and Superman. There must be quite a few supermen in Northallerton to judge by the extraordinary amount of fitness gear on sale. Or perhaps they have overdone it, or moved on to the next gadget for the next muscle. Even a trampoline.

It is a pity if Northallerton Auctions' characterful saleroom gets redeveloped. I had a stroll round its environs. A fair percentage of the population lay sunbathing on the grass, and will it be eternally the Promised Land for the 1858 Zion United Reform Church