Sunset from Hill House, Mount Helen. February 2024

Monday, July 26, 2010

Change of pace. Collecting bridges and castles

We woke up yesterday morning to find that the hotel people had forgotten to replace the tea bags.  Not a problem.  I have taken to travelling with emergency supplies of tea bags!

They had also forgotten to top up the milk :-S  This was more of a problem.  I really do not care for black tea.  But there's a co-op in Gifford and it opens at 7 in the morning.  It's nearly 7.  I'll throw some clothes on and wander up for a supply of milk.  Oh - except the co-op doesn't open until 8 on a Sunday. I wandered back towards the hotel.  And ran across a gentleman who worked at one time in Rotherham but has lived in Gifford for over 30 years and who was out walking Jake, his Jack Russell, not in the woods as is his usual practice, but on the green because it's Sunday and much quieter than on other mornings.  And he was carrying a carrier bag with milk and bread.  This suggested that the newsagent (i) was open and (ii) sold milk.  And so it was!

I knew that there was a long viaduct in Berwick upon Tweed because I have travelled over it several times when heading to Edinburgh on the train.  I hadn't realised quite what a magnificent bridge it was until we were driving up the A1 on Friday. You can see it from the road but, of course, can't see it when you are crossing over the top of it.  I decided that we really had to collect it on the way home. So we detoured off the A1 into Berwick to see if we could find it.  You ought, after all, to be able to find an exceedingly large bridge if you try hard enough.

And we did find it.  And it is magnificent.  But tucked down over the river, and completely masked from the viaduct by the large and truly horrible concrete monstrosity someone saw fit to build, is a really beautiful smaller road bridge.  I had no idea it was there.  I can clearly see that there was need for a larger road bridge, but quite why anyone thought it was a good plan to build such an ugly structure in between two such beautiful ones is a complete mystery to me!

I had vaguely toyed with the idea of visiting Holy Island while we were in the area, but the causeway closed yesterday at 13:35 and didn't open again until 18:40.  We could, of course, have had a quick dash round. But I really didn't want to get engrossed in something, only to discover then that we were stuck on the island until well after we had hoped to be back home.  So we went to visit Bamburgh Castle instead.  Another thing that has long been on my list of places to visit, and no danger of getting stuck there.  Well, not under normal circumstances, at any rate.

And it was well worth the visit.  We had a potter around, admired the Farne Islands from the walls, waved at Holy Island (still on the list of places to visit), strolled through the grounds and the castle itself and had a more than acceptable steak and ale pie for lunch in the tea room.  We were extremely lucky with the weather.  We drove through a short but sharp shower on the way to Bamburgh.  And through another on our way towards Newcastle.  There were no showers while we were there.

And then we came down the Northumberland Coastal Road to Newcastle, passing beautiful beaches, pretty villages and a smattering of ruined castles. Then we rejoined the A1 and came home for tea.

Oh - and in addition to bridges and castles, we pretty much collected a hill fort.  We had noticed it on our way up to Gifford on Friday (hill forts not being the sort of structure it is easy to miss!!).  On the way home, we accidentally ended up on an A road which runs parallel to the A1 for a time and which has a viewing spot of Traprain Law. So we stopped to admire it.  I walked up to a viewing spot higher up the bank and discovered that I could also see North Berwick Law and Bass Rock out in the sea. It was a mighty view - and one which you wouldn't suspect was there from the road - it was completely hidden by the treed bank

It was a fabulous weekend.  And I have today off to take a breath before heading back to work tomorrow.

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