Postcards From Across the Pond

Another holiday, another holiday cottage. I’m not going to say much about it except that there are two sorts of holiday cottage owners: those who wish to be good hosts, and those who wish to extract the maximum amount of money. This one was the latter. ‘Nuff said.

We went to Northumberland specifically so I could see the place where the sycamore tree in the (previously) aptly named Sycamore Gap used to be. (If you want to know more about that, check out my other post.) Fortunately, my wife, while totally on board with my preference, researched other attractions in the area, keeping the holiday from being simply a week of us standing in a field staring at a stump.

The first thing that impressed us was the location. We basically put a pin in a map and came up with Corbridge, but it is a wonderful little town with shops and cafés and independent bookshops and lovely architecture and friendly people and a large, free car park just outside of town across the one-lane bridge where we could keep our car for the week because the town is so popular you can never get a parking place. And, as we have found, the large, free car park is often full, as well.

But that’s because Corbridge is a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there; there’s too many tourists.

Our first stop was the Treeless Gap. We’d left the heatwave in Sussex and found cool temps, low clouds, and high winds in Northumberland. It was heaven. The hike to The Gap wasn’t long but it was rugged and if it had been 95 degrees I’m not sure I would have enjoyed it.

As expected, once we got to the place where the tree used to be, there wasn’t much to see, so we hiked back.

On Sunday we went to Beamish, a huge, historic recreation complex. Being a weekend, it was crowded, but our ticket allowed us to return so we did what we could and proposed to make another trip during the week when the crowds were thinner.

Back in Corbridge, we visited one of the many fine cafés where we were waited on by a young lady with the prettiest eyes. They were blue-grey, and so captivating I nearly complimented her. I’m glad I didn’t, not because I thought she’d think I was a creepy old man coming on to her—I was with my wife, after all—but because, over the next few days, I saw many other people with the same type of eyes. My wife said it was from Viking blood; I put it down to inbreeding, but it could be a bit of both.

The next day, we decided to leave the car where it was and walk the short distance to the Corbridge Roman Town, which is just outside Corbridge. It was impressive and interesting and not fully excavated—the actual Roman town is much larger than the site.

Roman Corbridge benefited from its proximity to Hadrian’s Wall and the Roman garrison stationed there. That put them on some major supply routes, allowing the town to grow to an impressive size and become quite advanced. Then, after a couple hundred years, the Romans left, the buildings deteriorated, the bridge fell into the river from neglect and the people abandoned the town and went half a mile east to start a new one.

(This was not a unique occurrence. When the Romans left London and took all their knowledge with them, the water stopped running, the sewers backed up, the roads fell apart and everyone left. For the next two hundred years, London was virtually deserted.)

Back in town, we had dinner at Casa Rosso so we could, as the sign promised, “Eat like the Romans,” and that was true, if the Romans ate calzones with a top layer baked turtle-shell-hard (I had to hack it off with a knife and leave it on the side of the plate) and New York style cheesecake with enough salted caramel topping to make you nauseous.

We also visited a few National Trust properties. You know, the big houses with lots of artifacts and massive, manicured gardens. But one had a feature I had never seen before: a room full of intricate, antique doll houses and the largest collection of leaden toy soldiers I have ever seen.

Our big event, however, was our return to Beamish for a more relaxing and less crowded visit. We did this on Wednesday when the hot weather, and a dozen buses carting school trips, arrived. Even so, it was a good visit, and we saw a lot more than we had on the weekend.

By the time we left on Friday, the heatwave was fully installed, yet, as we drove home, the thermometer rose, degree by degree, the closer we got to Sussex.

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BOOKS! BOOKS! BOOKS!
FREE! FREE! FREE!

I have a lot of books to shift.

I had them with a local shop that sold self-published books, but the owner is going in a different direction so all the books came back to me and they are taking up valuable space on my desk. Have a look at the sidebar or my book page (don’t forget The Talisman series) and if you see anything you think you might be interested in (or have need of a door stop or a table-leveller), send me an email (it’s on the Contact page) with your address and I’ll send you a signed copy of the book(s) of your choice.

I, and my desk, will thank you.

Offer good until surplus books are gone. Not valid with any other offer. Satisfaction with storyline, characterisation, or subject matter is not guaranteed. All transactions final. If you take a book, you keep it; no backsies.