Northumberland

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Last week, OH and I enjoyed a short break in my favourite English county. OH is from Tyneside, and that’s where we lived when we were first married, so it’s old stamping ground for us. In those days we had no car, and made intrepid forays north of the Tyne by public transport. Our journeys were often in old single-decker buses, involving two or three changes at places such as Morpeth, or Hexham. We visited a lot of castles and had a lot of picnics.

This time, we were very comfortable in our new (to us) car, staying in a hotel ideally situated for the places we intended to visit. We often visit the north-east, travelling there and back in one – long – day, so it was a luxury to have a local bed waiting for us.

We set off early, and decided to visit the Roman Wall at one of the less developed sites so that there would be no access problem at 8 am. Accordingly, we arrived at Cawfields, just east of Brampton. The car park is by the old quarry, where there used to be quite a large works, but which was decommisioned many years ago. When our children were small, we often stopped off here for a picnic and a run about on the way to/from visiting OH’s aunties (somewhere to finally let off steam being a priority!)

Cawfields Quarry

You may suspect that it was pretty cold – the wind was what you might expect it to be!

We walked up towards the wall from the quarry car park. It’s not far, but quite steep. The Wall is on the top of the Whin Sill escarpment – very dramatic. Every time I go there, I get a thrill. When we first visited, in the 60s, there were virtually no visitor centres, or information boards. You could scramble up onto the Wall wherever you wanted. OH had been taken there as a pupil from his school. Getting there by public transport was quite a challenge!

About 5 minutes walk away, you come across a milecastle. Milecastles were built, well – about every mile, as gateways through the wall, which was a border construction built to prevent the free movement of goods in and out of the Roman Empire rather than a defensive wall. This is rather a well preserved one. I think a lot of the walls around here must have been built of stones sourced from the Wall.

Milecastle

The gap at this side is the entrance from the south, and the gap at the far side is the entrance from the north. The far wall is the Roman Wall itself. The construction is amazing – strong, regular and remarkably well-preserved.

View north from milecastle

View west from milecastle with Roman Wall on left

The men who were stationed on the Wall must have been very tough. I understand that they were not necessarily from Italy, many were from more northern parts of Europe, but still…! We were freezing by this time, and hurried back to the car to continue our journey.

I just paused long enough to take one last picture

Length of Wall west of milecastle, all cleaned up and preserved

There are more spectacular lengths of Wall – near Housesteads in particular, and Walltown Crags. We were too early for any of those. In any case, we weren’t feeling quite strong enough for that!

By the time we arrived at our destination – by way of Hexham and our much-loved Corbridge, it was late afternoon. The weather was fine and sunny, so we drove across to the coast just south of Blyth.

Coast at Seaton Sluice (a lot nicer than its name!)

We had a very nice walk along the dunes here, and actually felt the sun warm on our backs.

Nothing very special, I suppose, but the sound and the sight of the sea always delights me.

St Mary’s Island

This is another old favourite. When we first came here, there was no car park or seats or anything, and the lighthouse was still operated by a live-in lighthouse-keeper. The lighthouse itself is just a hollow tower (pretty vertiginous to visit, I promise you. I wouldn’t do it now!) and the keeper lived in one of the houses on the island.

I’m afraid the rest of our visit, though thoroughly enjoyable, was not blessed by the best of weather! We spent the next day in Newcastle, then up to Alnwick (not the garden – it was pouring – horizontally!) and then meandered back.

Our journey back on the third day took us all day, via Jarrow, Sunderland, Barnard Castle, Penrith, Carnforth, Lancaster, Preston then home.

Did I enjoy it? YES! Did I take any more photos? NO!

• 19 May, 2013
• 12 likes

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