Northumberland and further North

Traveller, once you go North, you know when you will reach it by this sign:
the Angel of the North welcomes you.



The next destination was foreseen at this lovely place. Yes, we found it and yes, it looks so good from outside as from inside! Unfortunately, it would open only a week later and when I turned round I found out that Fred was not there, :-(. A quick lurk around and an envious look at that professional coffee machine...) Hélas, what a shame!



EG wanted to stop in Craster where he had spent happy holidays in his childhood. The air is smoky and smelly there as it is mainly known for its freshly smoked kippers. And it had another "sea garden"!



I found this picture so typical of the region - a sheep trailer next to us where we got fuel.



There was no time to visit Alnwick Gardens, there was no time left to visit Hovick Gardens but the tide was in favour to go quickly across to the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.



It seems that we are now real friends of old ruins and graveyards.



The only people we ever saw there were in the old church. Everything was quiet, sleepy and closed. On top of that, the scaffolding "disturbed" the lense of the camera a bit ;-).





A check for the tide tables and then back to the mainland before the tide came in.



Because, I had promised to make pictures of the loneliest beach in Northumberland.



Bamburgh Castle and its beach!



These pictures are dedicated to Denise. Because it is HER beach. Imagine, how fortunate to be friends with a lady who's beach it is. I wished I had been a "Burgfräulein", "une châtelaine", some many years before. Waking up there with the view on such a beach and being able to see in the far distance who was going to attack soon from the sea or to be friendly visitors... *sigh*.




As the beach had no opening times and no tide to respect and as we weren't disturbing anybody, we just stayed. And took it all in: the breeze, the salty air, the noises, every wave different and interesting, the light was tremendous and I only wished to have had a towel with me to get dried after a bath in that sea. But I hadn't and so we were just staying there and enjoyed it to the utmost, watching, listening, smelling, tasting and feeling it.



In the evening, we passed the Scottish Border and were not disappointed to find this cute little Inn, The Craw Inn in Auchencraw. A warm and cosy pub, nice company, fantastic food and a quiet room. The "full Scottish breakfast" was something, EG had been looking forward for since weeks and he got all what he desired. Really a place to be recommended!



After such a delicious start, we hit the road again, further North.
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