I'm back home again, after an improbably rain-free week in Northumberland. If you want to read about some of the places I've visited, look below (I'll be filling in the six-day gap bit by bit over the weekend). If you don't care about where I've been, come back on Monday (you miserable Londonophiles).
The north Northumberland coast forms one of England's official Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. There are no major towns or industrial estates along this coastline, just dunes and rocks and beaches and several tiny fishing villages. One of these is Craster (population 370), whose shell-shaped stone harbour is protected from the fiercest North Sea storms by a natural rocky breakwater. The local economy was based on the humble herring, unladen at the quayside and cured in smokehouses above the harbour. They still smoke Craster kippers here today, but the herring is imported (and the seafood restaurant nextdoor is unexpectedly unwelcoming). Almost all of the cottages along the harbour are now holiday homes, which is all very well at this time of year but sadly bleak and soulless during the windswept winter. It seems that we tourists are busy destroying the very communities we've come to see.
A mile and a half north of Craster lie the ruins of DunstanburghCastle. You can't drive there, so the coastal footpath is awash with ambling tourists. A National Trust volunteer lies in wait at the start of the walk, eager to pounce on passers-by and sign them up for long-term heritage membership (direct debit preferred). It may be several minutes along the path, especially in misty weather, before the long wall of the castle appears spread across the headland in front of you. Don't get over-excited - this one long wall is all you're going to get. The rest of John of Gaunt's fortress was destroyed during two sieges in the Wars of the Roses, so the only buildings standing within the invisible ramparts are the ticket office and a couple of portaloos. A single spiral staircase ascends the crumbling gatehouse tower [photo], through whose arrow-slit windows dart hungry swifts in search of food. From the top storey you can look back along the coast to Craster, or maybe out across the pristine sandy curve of Embleton Bay (if the mist isn't too thick). Oh yes, this is truly Natural Beauty. Outstanding.
Also worth a visit... Howick Hall: Ancestral home of Earl Grey (yes, him, the Prime Minister who introduced bergamot-blend tea to Britain in the 1830s). The gardens are exquisite [photo], the new arboretum is extensive, and the tearoom serves proper Earl Grey. Unexpectedly adorable.
Alnwick (pronounced 'Annik') is a market town on the Great North Road which owes its importance to a large Norman castle. It's the second largest inhabited castle in Britain, after Windsor, and you'll have seen it many times on the small and big screen. The first Edmund Blackadder lived here, as did Kevin Costner's arch-enemy the Sheriff of Nottingham. More recently it's doubled up as Hogwarts in the Harry Potter films - many's the Quidditch lesson that's taken place on the pristine lawn between the main keep and the Barbican tower [photo]. Alnwick Castle is home to the Duke of Northumberland, one of the more important British noblemen, who graciously allows the public to troop around his state apartments to see how the other half 0.001% live. Every room on the tour is over-ornate, über-showy, and littered with old portraits and modern family photographs. The ubiquitous photos feel like a Hello centrespread ("In medieval magnificence we meet Ralph, Lady Isobel and their utterly gorgeous offspring") and no opportunity is missed to point out that the family are jolly good friends with the Queen and several of her ancestors. The view from the battlements [photo] is of a totally unspoilt verdant valley and, after the tourists go home in the evening, this must be a magical place to live. Don't be jealous now.
A new attraction just down the road is the AlnwickGarden, the horticultural brainchild of the Duchess of Northumberland. She's created a new green public space for locals and tourists alike, complete with water features, sculptures and acres of plants. The garden has only been open since 2002 and isn't quite finished yet, but there's still plenty to see. Centrepiece is the Grand Cascade which tumbles valleyward with choreographed fountains spurting half-hourly into the sky [photo]. At the top of the slope is a well-tended Ornamental Garden, and lower down a series of smaller themed areas. Particularly popular are the sweet-smelling pergolas of the Rose Garden and the metal water sculptures in the Serpent Garden[photo]. A deadly Poison Garden has been established behind locked gates, inside which tour guides delight in pointing out all the killer plants that lurk unnoticed in your own back garden. Toddlers play happily on the mini-tractors at the foot of the main fountain, scooping water from the cascade and dumping it unceremoniously on their parents' feet. Older children, meanwhile, are more likely to enjoy swaying across the rope bridges of the big wooden Treehouse. It's a glorious half-day out, especially in midsummer sunshine, but you're probably better off coming back when the place is finished.
Also worth a visit... Barter Books: a huge second-hand bookshop housed inside Alnwick's disused railway station [photo]
If you want to visit the cradle of English Christianity, you need to pick your time carefully. A three mile causeway is the only road link between Holy Island and the Northumberland mainland, and for ten hours each day it lies underwater. Cross at the wrong time and you'll have to abandon your vehicle and climb a ladder into a wooden refuge above the incoming waves. There are no traffic lights, no warning signals, just a set of tide tables in a glass case at either end of the causeway. If you and your submerged car end up splashed across the local press, it'll be your own fault.
Alternatively, if you're even more careful, you can walk across the bay by following a line of tall wooden posts. A monk called Aidan came this way in 635 AD, sent to the island on a mission to convert the Anglo-Saxons of Northumbria to Christianity. Modern Britain bears the stamp of his religious legacy to this day. His monastery's most famous treasure are the ornate LindisfarneGospels, rescued from the island when the Vikings invaded and now to be seen... ah, damn, 350 miles away in the British Museum. Benedictine monks returned to Holy Island in 1082, founding a Priory whose imposing ruins still stand today [photo], just down the road from the post office, two pubs and several gift shops. Don't come here today expecting peace and spiritual solitude.
The southwest corner of Holy Island has evolved into a tourist-orientedvillage. Coach parties stream across the causeway between high tides. Visitors wander the narrow lanes clutching ice creams and tea towels. The street down to the parish church is lined with holiday cottages. A hoppa shuttle ferries elderly visitors a few hundred yards from car park to interactive Heritage Centre. The boathouses by the harbour are swarming with artists and amateur photographers [photo]. The beach is infested with schoolkids munching crisps and sandwiches. And yet, against all the odds, a tangible sense of spiritualenlightenment remains.
The southeast corner of the island is very different. Here, atop a lone rocky crag surrounded by sheep, sits the lonely outpost of Lindisfarne Castle[photo]. There's nothing overly special about the outer structure, an old Tudor fort, but the inside is quite spectacular. 100 years ago this crumbling pile was transformed into an intimate holiday home for the founder of Country Life magazine by renowned architect Edwin Lutyens. He converted the internal space into a series of arched rooms and twisty passageways, with steps and low ceilings which no doubt today would be banned under Health and Safety legislation. From the roof you can look out in splendid isolation across the village, harbour and bay [photo]. From the bedrooms the view is a little bleaker, but offset by the Gertrude Jekyllgarden - a stone-walled quadrilateral of hardy plants. You'd probably love a stately pile like this, but the original owner sold up after just ten summers and the "Castle" is now under the ownership of the National Trust. Don't stay too long yourself either, you don't want to have to swim home.
Back in industrial Victorian Britain, Sir William Armstrong was an all-round inventive genius. He was an expert scientist with an interest in electricity and hydraulics. He was a successful engineer who designed ships and weapons of mass destruction. And in 1880 his Cheviot moorland house, Cragside, became the first anywhere in the world to be lit by electricity [photo].
Sir William's thirst for invention led him to design several labour-saving devices which kept his household ticking over more efficiently. In his kitchen he installed an automatic rotating spit and an elementary dishwasher – not bad for the 19th century. To help his staff to move around the house quicker he installed a fully functional hydraulic passenger lift. And to power all of these appliances, in an age well before the National Grid, he created a series of artificial lakes and used them to generate a steady supply of hydroelectricity. Which is how, in 1880, he became the first person to adopt Joseph Swan's brand new electric filament bulb to light his house. Thomas Edison may have been first to the patent office, but William Armstrong was first to flick the domestic switch.
The original four table lamps – resembling glowing glass globes perched on top of elegant china vases - still light the drawing room today. Most visitors fail to notice their significance, preferring instead to ooh and aah at all the fixtures and furnishings preserved throughout this vast 100-room house. Cragside's setting is spectacular, perched halfway up a hillside overlooking a thick coniferous valley. At this time of year Sir William's 400 acre estate is resplendent with pink and purple rhododendrons (not all of which have yet wilted, not quite). The National Trust faithful come in their hundreds to enjoy the heady combination of horticultural expertise and engineering brilliance. And a very nice teashop, of course.
A couple of miles off the north Northumberland coast, close to Bamburgh Castle, lie a chain of 28 rocky islands with a population in the hundreds of thousands. Seabirds, that is, who flock to the FarneIslands in early summer to breed and to nest. And for less than £20 you can sail out to see them, and walk amongst them, and even get aerially bombarded by them. What a treat.
Pick your day carefully (becalmed and blue sky-ed is perfect) and head for the small coastal resort of Seahouses. Down by the harbourside are the ticket offices of fivedifferentboatcompanies, each fighting for a share of the seasonal tourist trade. Some appear to be doing rather better than others (although the more popular your tour operator, the more squashed you'll be in the boat that takes you out around the islands).
On the chugging journey across to the islands you start to notice cute little birds bobbing in the waves, and scudding low over the North Sea like tiny guided missiles, and soaring with wings outstretched over the boat, and... good grief, there are puffins everywhere! These adorable little birds are the most populous on the islands, but they share the rocks with guillemots, kittiwakes, cormorants and gulls. In May and June the cliffs of the larger islands are covered with squawking breeding pairs (and a nasty smelly white substance whose origin you can all too readily imagine). The boat sails right up close to several of the larger colonies where parents are nesting, chicks are hatching and neighbours are squabbling. It's like starring in your very own episode of Springwatch.
Out on the furthest islands the boat pauses beside a colony of grey seals. The seals stare back at the human intruders with a mixture of disinterest and disdain, before flopping inelegantly into the water or closing their eyes for a good long bask. Just round the corner is the Longstone Lighthouse, from which GraceDarling and her father set out in a tiny rowing boat in 1838 to rescue nine survivors from the wreck of the Forfarshire. Had Blue Peter been broadcast in those days, 22-year old Grace would undoubtedly have won a gold badge for her endeavours. As it was, sadly, she dies from tuberculosis just four years later. It's a tough life living in a windswept wavestruck tower in the unforgiving waters of the North Sea.
Highlight of my tour was a landing on Inner Farne – an NT-owned historical site and utterly-teeming bird sanctuary [photo]. It's chick-feeding time at the moment, and the island is a seething mass of avian life. And dangerous too. Walk up the boardwalk from the harbour and you can expect to be repeatedly dive-bombed by angry Arctic terns [photo]. They're enraged that you've ignored their angry guttural squawks and have dared to intrude so close to their nests. Down they swoop, aiming for the top of your head, ready to peck and poke in the hope that you'll move away quickly. And ouch, that nip hurts. Well-prepared trippers wear a protective sunhat, or wave an arm above their head in an attempt to keep beak away from bonce. Meanwhile the island's four semi-resident bird wardens walk around serene and unperturbed beneath guano-splattered headgear.
St Aidan lived on Inner Farne back in the 7th century, and very sensibly he built a small stone chapel which provides refuge from aerial attack. But don't hide away, be brave, because the footpaths further up the island are all perfectly safe too. You can walk right up to the clifftops and look down on guillemots and razorbills packed and stacked across the rockface [photo]. Some are nesting only a few feet away, with greedy gaping beaks peering out expectantly from beneath their parent's black oily wings. Meanwhile in the grassy centre of the island are crowds of lovable puffins, guarding over the burrows in which their single offspring are busy hatching [photo]. Off flies Dad across the sea, returning with a mouthful of sprats which he attempts to get back to Mum before a diving gull snatches them away. You could easily stay and watch this natural spectacle for hours, but the boat'll be leaving soon. Good luck getting back to the harbour unassaulted.
Of all the pitched battles fought between the English and the Scots (eg Bannockburn 1314, Wembley 1977), the largest and bloodiest skirmish took place nearly 500 years ago on Flodden Field. King James IV of Scotland thought it would be a good idea to declare war on England while King Henry VIII was away fighting in Italy. And so, on a damp September afternoon in 1513, a huge Scottish army assembled high above the Tweed Valley on the eastern edge of the Cheviot Hills. Their defensive position was strong, but a cavalier advance down from the hilltop proved a costly mistake. Within just three hours the advancing English army had slaughtered ten thousand men, and one of those was the King himself.
They grow barley in Flodden Field today, beneath a tall stone cross which commemorates the dead from both sides [photo]. Standing atop the ridge you can look out across the battlefield, now verdant farmland, towards the slopes down which so many Scottish pikemen made their final charge. A narrow boggy gully divides the enemy positions, once running with blood, where skylarks now play. Recently a mile-long walking trail has been established around the heart of the battlefield, with a series of excellent information boards relating different chapters in this sorry tale of mass inter-national carnage. A couple of miles to the north the Scottish border weaves invisibly across a silent valley. The site has an eerie silence, and an inappropriate beauty.
It's been a year since I last took a week's holiday, so I thought it was about time I did the same again. I'm not going quite as far as Scotland this time, but nearly. I'm off to the toppermostcounty in England which, scandalously, I've never visited before. I'll be staying in a fishing village along the utterly gorgeous coast, with a bedroom view straight out across the North Sea. Let's hope it doesn't chuck it down with rain too often.
I have severe doubts that this rural location will be blessed with leaky wi-fi connections, so blog updates are unlikely until I return (but you never know). In the meantime I shall attempt to provide you with a steady stream of Twitters by uploading text messages direct from my mobile phone. Don't expect thrilling hourly updates, but I'll try to bring you a flavour of the glorious North East whenever the opportunity arises. Because I'd hate you to think that you were missing out.
If you get bored while I'm away, here are some other things to look at:
• The Millennium Dome reopens on June 24th as a mobile-sponsored entertainment hub - The O7. A new public space has just been opened outside, called PeninsulaSquare, and I've been along to take some photos. To see 20 of them, either click on the photo link in my sidebar or click here. It'll never be this empty again.
• You could always go and Walk the Olympic Park.
• There's plenty of olddiamond geezerstuff to look through instead. This blog now has 58 monthly archive pages listed in the sidebar, so you could pick one of those at random every day and re-read it. That'd keep you busy until August (but I promise I'll be back a lot quicker than that).
I'm back home again, after an improbably rain-free week in Northumberland. If you want to read about some of the places I've visited, look below (I'll be filling in the six-day gap bit by bit over the weekend). If you don't care about where I've been, come back on Monday (you miserable Londonophiles).
The north Northumberland coast forms one of England's official Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. There are no major towns or industrial estates along this coastline, just dunes and rocks and beaches and several tiny fishing villages. One of these is Craster (population 370), whose shell-shaped stone harbour is protected from the fiercest North Sea storms by a natural rocky breakwater. The local economy was based on the humble herring, unladen at the quayside and cured in smokehouses above the harbour. They still smoke Craster kippers here today, but the herring is imported (and the seafood restaurant nextdoor is unexpectedly unwelcoming). Almost all of the cottages along the harbour are now holiday homes, which is all very well at this time of year but sadly bleak and soulless during the windswept winter. It seems that we tourists are busy destroying the very communities we've come to see.
A mile and a half north of Craster lie the ruins of Dunstanburgh Castle. You can't drive there, so the coastal footpath is awash with ambling tourists. A National Trust volunteer lies in wait at the start of the walk, eager to pounce on passers-by and sign them up for long-term heritage membership (direct debit preferred). It may be several minutes along the path, especially in misty weather, before the long wall of the castle appears spread across the headland in front of you. Don't get over-excited - this one long wall is all you're going to get. The rest of John of Gaunt's fortress was destroyed during two sieges in the Wars of the Roses, so the only buildings standing within the invisible ramparts are the ticket office and a couple of portaloos. A single spiral staircase ascends the crumbling gatehouse tower [photo], through whose arrow-slit windows dart hungry swifts in search of food. From the top storey you can look back along the coast to Craster, or maybe out across the pristine sandy curve of Embleton Bay (if the mist isn't too thick). Oh yes, this is truly Natural Beauty. Outstanding.
Alnwick (pronounced 'Annik') is a market town on the Great North Road which owes its importance to a large Norman castle. It's the second largest inhabited castle in Britain, after Windsor, and you'll have seen it many times on the small and big screen. The first Edmund Blackadder lived here, as did Kevin Costner's arch-enemy the Sheriff of Nottingham. More recently it's doubled up as Hogwarts in the Harry Potter films - many's the Quidditch lesson that's taken place on the pristine lawn between the main keep and the Barbican tower [photo]. Alnwick Castle is home to the Duke of Northumberland, one of the more important British noblemen, who graciously allows the public to troop around his state apartments to see how the other
A new attraction just down the road is the Alnwick Garden, the horticultural brainchild of the Duchess of Northumberland. She's created a new green public space for locals and tourists alike, complete with water features, sculptures and acres of plants. The garden has only been open since 2002 and isn't quite finished yet, but there's still plenty to see. Centrepiece is the Grand Cascade which tumbles valleyward with choreographed fountains spurting half-hourly into the sky [photo]. At the top of the slope is a well-tended Ornamental Garden, and lower down a series of smaller themed areas. Particularly popular are the sweet-smelling pergolas of the Rose Garden and the metal water sculptures in the Serpent Garden [photo]. A deadly Poison Garden has been established behind locked gates, inside which tour guides delight in pointing out all the killer plants that lurk unnoticed in your own back garden. Toddlers play happily on the mini-tractors at the foot of the main fountain, scooping water from the cascade and dumping it unceremoniously on their parents' feet. Older children, meanwhile, are more likely to enjoy swaying across the rope bridges of the big wooden Treehouse. It's a glorious half-day out, especially in midsummer sunshine, but you're probably better off coming back when the place is finished.
If you want to visit the cradle of English Christianity, you need to pick your time carefully. A three mile causeway is the only road link between Holy Island and the Northumberland mainland, and for ten hours each day it lies underwater. Cross at the wrong time and you'll have to abandon your vehicle and climb a ladder into a wooden refuge above the incoming waves. There are no traffic lights, no warning signals, just a set of tide tables in a glass case at either end of the causeway. If you and your submerged car end up splashed across the local press, it'll be your own fault.
Benedictine monks returned to Holy Island in 1082, founding a Priory whose imposing ruins still stand today [photo], just down the road from the post office, two pubs and several gift shops. Don't come here today expecting peace and spiritual solitude.
The southeast corner of the island is very different. Here, atop a lone rocky crag surrounded by sheep, sits the lonely outpost of Lindisfarne Castle [photo]. There's nothing overly special about the outer structure, an old Tudor fort, but the inside is quite spectacular. 100 years ago this crumbling pile was transformed into an intimate holiday home for the founder of Country Life magazine by renowned architect Edwin Lutyens. He converted the internal space into a series of arched rooms and twisty passageways, with steps and low ceilings which no doubt today would be banned under Health and Safety legislation. From the roof you can look out in splendid isolation across the village, harbour and bay [photo]. From the bedrooms the view is a little bleaker, but offset by the Gertrude Jekyll garden - a stone-walled quadrilateral of hardy plants. You'd probably love a stately pile like this, but the original owner sold up after just ten summers and the "Castle" is now under the ownership of the National Trust. Don't stay too long yourself either, you don't want to have to swim home.
Back in industrial Victorian Britain, Sir William Armstrong was an all-round inventive genius. He was an expert scientist with an interest in electricity and hydraulics. He was a successful engineer who designed ships and weapons of mass destruction. And in 1880 his Cheviot moorland house, Cragside, became the first anywhere in the world to be lit by electricity [photo].
A couple of miles off the north Northumberland coast, close to Bamburgh Castle, lie a chain of 28 rocky islands with a population in the hundreds of thousands. Seabirds, that is, who flock to the Farne Islands in early summer to breed and to nest. And for less than £20 you can sail out to see them, and walk amongst them, and even get aerially bombarded by them. What a treat.
Out on the furthest islands the boat pauses beside a colony of grey seals. The seals stare back at the human intruders with a mixture of disinterest and disdain, before flopping inelegantly into the water or closing their eyes for a good long bask. Just round the corner is the Longstone Lighthouse, from which Grace Darling and her father set out in a tiny rowing boat in 1838 to rescue nine survivors from the wreck of the Forfarshire. Had Blue Peter been broadcast in those days, 22-year old Grace would undoubtedly have won a gold badge for her endeavours. As it was, sadly, she dies from tuberculosis just four years later. It's a tough life living in a windswept wavestruck tower in the unforgiving waters of the North Sea.
Highlight of my tour was a landing on Inner Farne – an NT-owned historical site and utterly-teeming bird sanctuary [photo]. It's chick-feeding time at the moment, and the island is a seething mass of avian life. And dangerous too. Walk up the boardwalk from the harbour and you can expect to be repeatedly dive-bombed by angry Arctic terns [photo]. They're enraged that you've ignored their angry guttural squawks and have dared to intrude so close to their nests. Down they swoop, aiming for the top of your head, ready to peck and poke in the hope that you'll move away quickly. And ouch, that nip hurts. Well-prepared trippers wear a protective sunhat, or wave an arm above their head in an attempt to keep beak away from bonce. Meanwhile the island's four semi-resident bird wardens walk around serene and unperturbed beneath guano-splattered headgear.
Of all the pitched battles fought between the English and the Scots (eg Bannockburn 1314, Wembley 1977), the largest and bloodiest skirmish took place nearly 500 years ago on Flodden Field. King James IV of Scotland thought it would be a good idea to declare war on England while King Henry VIII was away fighting in Italy. And so, on a damp September afternoon in 1513, a huge Scottish army assembled high above the Tweed Valley on the eastern edge of the Cheviot Hills. Their defensive position was strong, but a cavalier advance down from the hilltop proved a costly mistake. Within just three hours the advancing English army had slaughtered ten thousand men, and one of those was the King himself.
