By David Gourley
This was a rather unusual holiday for us, a driving holiday
that took us to all the component countries of the British Isles.
This was
also in fact our first visit to Ireland, North or South. We had been fortunate
enough to travel to many far-flung places but hitherto had not been to this
country on our very doorstep.
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| Alnwick Castle |
We first headed to the North-East of England, or
more specifically Hexham in Northumberland, a long drive as we live in Surrey.
We detoured into Durham, something of a nostalgia trip as our daughter had gone
to university there. We'd gone up there quite frequently, especially during her
first two years when she'd lived on campus and had to remove all her belongings
during vacations as rooms were needed for people attending conferences or
whatever.
We'd grown rather attached to what is one of the nicest of British
cities, a place that changes very little over the years. We briefly stepped
into the cathedral. A service to commemorate the Queen's Golden Jubilee was
about to start and we had a quick chat with one of the ushers - who had once
been our daughter's year tutor! Having so far driven along motorways or fast
roads, we took a scenic route via the Derwent Reservoir. Our hotel was Slaley
Hall, not in Hexham itself but out in the countryside. This is part of the De
Vere chain which is fairly upmarket (albeit owned, a tad incongruously it might
be thought, by a Warrington brewery) though one does not necessarily pay
upmarket prices since they do some very good offers. We were well pleased with
our stay here and indeed have been back for a return visit.
Northumberland is
maybe one of England's least well-known counties, at least if one is a
Southerner, but it is one of the most beautiful. It is also a good county if
one likes old-fashioned castles. On both our days here we headed for the coast.
On Day One we first visited Alnwick Castle, which has since gained a high
profile as Hogwarts in the Harry Potter films. Its pride and joy at the time of
our visit was the newly opened water garden, designed by the Castle's very own
Duchess, with a bit of help from Charlie Dimmock. However, Chatsworth had had
the idea about three hundred years earlier! Alnwick Castle is still owned by
the Percy family, who have an ancient pedigree. In lawless days of old, during
the Wars of the Roses and so on, they vied with another great family, the
Nevilles, to be top dog in the Northeast. I don't know what happened to the
Nevilles, though their name lives on in Nevilles Cross, on the outskirts of
Durham.
The real highlight of the day was our visit to Holy Island, also known,
no less romantically, as Lindisfarne. We had not long, at this time, been on the
internet and had been pleased that we could simply look up the times when the
causeway to the mainland is open. At other times it is submerged by the tide.
The times vary from day to day. We had lunch in the delightful Crown and Anchor
Inn, including an interesting and rather tasty dessert made with dandelions. We
spent some time at the marvellous old castle, which is still privately owned.
The next day we had another look at Holy Island, just to see how it looked when
still surrounded by the sea. Unbelievably a car was nevertheless driving along
the still submerged causeway. I don't know whether the driver, whose passengers
included young children, thought he was being bold; we and others thought him a
chump.
We carried on to Berwick-upon- Tweed, England's northernmost town. As is
well known, it changed hands between England and Scotland many times. There is
a Scottish feel still: its football team plays in the Scottish league and it
gives its name to a Scottish county. We then drove back down the coast to explore
another fine Northumbrian Castle, Bamburgh.
During our second stay at Slaley
Hall, we returned to Alnwick Castle (which had become a bit too commercialized,
I rather thought) and Holy Island, and also did a trip into Newcastle, going by
train from Hexham's impressively preserved station. Newcastle gets my vote as
the most attractive of England's large provincial cities. My first visit many
years previously had dispelled any view that this is a grim industrial city,
for it has a fine Georgian centre. Now the riverside, here and over the
Millennium Bridge in Gateshead, has been impressively redeveloped. We crossed
the Bridge and had an excellent lunch at the Baltic Centre, based in a former
flour mill, with fine views back across Newcastle.
We returned to the city
centre by one of the city's novel electric buses. Actually until the mid sixties
Newcastle had plenty of electric buses: they were called trolleybuses.
Reverting to our British Isles round trip, we headed the next day into
Scotland, hurrying past Gretna Green which looked anything but romantic with
its main road and meandered along the Solway coast, with its fine views back
into England.
I was struck, as we left the small town of Annan, by the road
sign exhorting us “haste ye back”. Annan, along with nearby Carlisle, was for
many years remarkable in that the pubs were state owned, the result of a
decision in World War 1 when there were lots of munitions workers in the area.
They were privatized in the early seventies. We spent some time at the picturesque
Caerlaverock Castle, which has an unusual triangular shape.
Our next stop was
in not- Dumfries. This is one of those smallish towns which can
punch a weight greater than its population because it is the centre of a fairly
large region, in this instance Dumfries and Galloway. It is nothing very
special - we only stopped because we needed to make one or two purchases. The
riverside might be attractive, were it not given over to a sprawling car park.
Our abode for the next two nights was a B&B in the Galloway region, a few
miles south of Stranraer. We had again used the internet to find this and the
lady of the house, clearly something of a technophobe, seemed rather impressed.
It is a fine Robert Adam building and we had good accommodation, though the
breakfast was somewhat stingy for what was supposed to be a fourstar
guesthouse.
Our hosts had, at time of booking, recommended a restaurant in
nearby Portpatrick, which turned out to be fully booked when we rang them. But
we headed to Portpatrick anyway and found that they could give us a table after
all. We had a first-class meal there. Portpatrick is about as close as mainland
Britain gets to Northern Ireland, which can be seen very clearly on a fine day.
We debated what to do with our one full day here. One possibility was to
explore the eastern part of Galloway - the old county of Kirkcudbrightshire -
which is said to resemble the Highlands in miniature. The countervailing
attraction of Culzean Castle, involving a scenic drive along the Ayrshire
Coast, won.
First we diverted to a lighthouse, right at the tip of the more
northerly of Galloway's two peninsulas, or Rhinns. This has been transformed
into a rather classy hotel, which we had considered staying at, but was rather
pricey. We did book dinner there. This drive took us through Stranraer, which
presents two faces to the world: an attractive resort in the west, a rather port
in the east. We spent several hours at Culzean and could have done with more
time still, as there is plenty to see, not just in the castle itself but in its
extensive grounds. President Eisenhower was given a flat here in appreciation
of his services to Britain as a general in World War II and apparently found
time actually to stay there.
Whilst walking around, an American couple asked us
to take a photo of them. We thought nothing of this until, the next day, they
appeared at the breakfast table in our guesthouse! Dinner at the lighthouse did
not disappoint. We were continuing the next day by ferry to Northern Ireland,
departing from Cairnryan, a little to the north of Stranraer. There was still
the morning in which to explore locally and we headed for the tip of the southern
Rhinn. One is supposed to be able to see into England, Wales, Northern Ireland
and the Isle of Man, but it was misty and we saw none of them. We then visited
the Dunskey Gardens, the description of which led us to expect a mini-version
of the Lost Gardens of Heligan. They weren't, however, of much interest.
In
Stranraer we had a sandwich lunch and attempted to visit the main attraction,
the small Castle of St John. I was indignant to find it closed as it was
supposed to stay open for another twenty minutes or so. But the chap heard us
try the door, presented himself and let us look round for free.
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