The first blizzard hit at 9pm. It was Friday 26 November 2010 and I was working, as usual, behind the bar of the Lion Inn, at Blakey Ridge, North Yorkshire. Built in 1553 in the heart of the North York Moors, the Lion is reckoned to be the fourth highest pub in England and is certainly one of the most remote. Surrounded by miles of wilderness in every direction, the pub’s nearest village is Castleton, six miles down the valley. On a normal night, you can spot its lights glimmering in the distance – a reassuring reminder to those of us who work at the Lion that we are not completely alone. But that night they were gone, hidden behind an impenetrable wall of white.

I stepped outside, with chef Danny, 18, only to be beaten back by the howling wind. I took one step into the road and sank to my waist in snow. Then the voice of our waitress, Katie, also 18, echoed from inside: “The radio says they’ve stopped ploughing the roads. We’re stuck!” I shuddered as the reality of our isolation set in – suddenly the Lion felt like the last place left on Earth.

The evening shift comprised Katie, Danny and me, fellow barman Rob, 22, and 25-year-old head chef Stuart. We’d worked together for years and were good friends. The landlord was away that night, and our only guests were a friendly couple in their 50s from Sheffield.

The next morning I awoke in a guest bedroom to an eerie calm. The heavy snowfall and strong winds meant drifts of up to 16ft blocked the windows and doors, and the roads were too treacherous to drive on. Even if they hadn’t been, our cars were buried under 9ft of snow. Mercifully, the phone still worked, so we could keep the landlord updated and let our loved ones know we were safe.

For the next nine days we worked by day, looking after our guests, and by night we ate and drank like kings, feasting on all the finest food from the specials menu – steaks, pies, roasts – washed down with an ale or five. After all, if we didn’t eat the food, it would go off, as would much of the ale. We stoked the fires until they roared louder than the wind outside and had a party every night. We drank, laughed, watched movies and played Monopoly before staggering drunk up to bed in whichever guestroom took our fancy.

The guests handled it well. They went on walks around the car park and didn’t once complain. They joined us for a drink each evening and even helped out by peeling veg.

One evening Stuart worked out that we could sledge on serving trays from the roof of the outhouse, which was completely buried, right to the pub’s back door. We sledged every night after that, while Katie made snow angels and the guests built snowmen. It was as good as any ski resort.

It was also strangely liberating being cut off from the world; the pressures of daily life ceased to apply. But when we ran out of cigarettes on the eighth day, the smokers – Katie and me especially – began to suffer. The novelty was wearing thin. I remember wondering if anybody outside was thinking of us. At first the phone had rung constantly, but now it was silent.

On the ninth day I’d had enough. I was determined to get back to my life. Perhaps I’d gone stir crazy, but I could see the snow had begun to thaw a little, so I went outside to dig out my car. I dug for seven hours until I could get inside. Then, as I turned the key, I heard the chug-chug of a diesel engine and two yellow lights appeared through the mist. The snowplough had arrived to dig us out.

It turned out we hadn’t been forgotten. In fact, the whole of Yorkshire was talking about us – our ordeal even made the national news.

Four years on, I still work at the Lion, as assistant manager. Even now, people come in, asking about what happened then. I tell them it was hard and we were scared for our lives. But the truth is, I’ll treasure the experience for as long as I live. Looking back, I remember mostly how we laughed, cocooned inside the pub, the seven of us, with drinks in hand under flickering candlelight. I’ve not felt so cosy since.

• As told to Matt Blake

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