Hadrian’s Wall, Sycamore Gap
© Carole Raddato

An absolutely beautiful spot! This iconic tree was made famous by the film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991). It is one of the best Hadrian’s Wall views and a much photographed point.

The walk from Steel Rigg to Housesteads is my favourite part of the Wall and offers the best views Northumberland has to offer. The scenery and panoramic views are just breathtaking!

From my mate’s in Hexham I was soon parking at the Housesteads car park which experience has shown is possibly the coldest part of any Wall walk. It was certainly a gloomy cold sleety morning and the National Trust man sat in his van looking grimly resigned to a quiet day. The few people out were wrapped up in duvet jackets however I trusted my 2 layer system of long sleeved ancient capilene thermal vest with a hooded Paramo windshirt. The start is always cold then once moving up onto the Wall it feels just right. Unfortunately views were limited today, the pics are from my phone and a bit washed out but the slight wintry dusting adds interest.

From the top of Hotbanks looking west, phone held up high to look over the Wall

Above Crag Loch

Looking down over Sycamore Gap

Sycamore Gap, featuring erm the Sycamore

Looking down to Steel Rigg with Winshields Crags up past the trees

Nearly 4 miles from Housesteads is Winshields Crags, the highest point on Hadrians Wall featuring a welcome trig point, which I sat behind for a little shelter from the cold breeze.

Winshield Crags, the highest bit and can be a bit nippy

After a few Tweets, some photos, a Breakaway & a cuppa it was time to head back. I wore my fingerless gloves for these tasks but left my fingertips exposed just a little too long so the descent involved stinging hands and a few tears in the eyes till I warmed up.

Winshield Crags

Looking West

Heading down from Winshields looking east and the return journey

The dodgy downward sloping slippy steps through the trees

Hotbanks Farm looking west before the last uphill pull on the return

The many little stops taking pictures and trying to Tweet them had slowed me down so I had to get a move on back to Housesteads to make the last food order at the Dipton Mill. This was thankfully successful as that pint had my name on & so did the Tomato&Veg soup

Pint of Hexham Berwery’s finest Whapweazel, sat next to the fire

Essential part of the day, the Dipton Mill Country Pub,

Phil, the nice man at Social Hiking retweeted my live GPS recording of today’s walk and linked up my pics – and I didn’t feel a thing! Here’s a link and a map below for today. I’ve done this walk well over 150 times & never tire of it. Or the beer. Thanks for reading

To the south of us, now, between the wall and the Military Road, are the remains of the Milking Gap settlement, a nucleated cluster of hut circles and enclosures that may have housed an extended pre-Hadrianic family of farmers (pottery from the site dated to the late 1st and early 2nd centuries AD). Although nothing is visible except from the air, it serves as a reminder that the Roman army were not the only inhabitants around here and how the Wall changed the use of the landscape once and for all and still has an effect today.

Milecastle 38, Hot Bank farm, and the angle in the curtain wall course

The modern stone wall is on top of the remains of the Roman wall immediately to the north of us. The course of the wall swings abruptly onto a more easterly course and we arrive at a kissing gate. Crossing the road leading to Hot Bank farm, we switch to the north of the wall and approach the plantation that clings to the slopes south of Crag Lough (pronounced ‘luff’). Just as the gaps and nicks through the Whin Sill were formed by glacial meltwater breaching the dolerite ridge, so the three prominent lakes north of the Wall (Crag, Broomlee, and Greenlee Loughs) are basins formed by the remnants of that same trapped meltwater. To our right, the ditch, inserted across Milking Gap between Milecastle 38 to Turret 38a to counter the absence of the defensive value of the crags along here, terminates. The gap was too broad to need a re-entrant.

Sufferers of vertigo would now be well advised to detour slightly south onto the Military Way, also a right of way and still clearly visible for the most part as that grassy strip.

To our right we can see Crag Lough (pronounced ‘luff’) and, as we enter a plantation, the path (and the wall immediately south of us) begin to ascend back onto Highshield Crags. Take the time to study the stones used in the field boundary to your left, since these are of course Roman stones reused. By now you are familiar with the size and shape of the regular facing blocks, but you may also be able to recognise narrower string course blocks, incorporated by the more recent drystone wallers. Along the central sector, the National Park maintains an impressive programme of recording and restoring these original stone dykes.

Crag Lough from the Wall

Once at the top, we leave the plantation and a series of impressive clefts shows how precipitous this part of the crags is. As the consolidated curtain wall returns, we start to descend the winding stairs, pausing only to admire the north face of that consolidated curtain wall as we go. We have entered the iconic Sycamore Gap. Unusually, the curtain wall incorporates some blocks of dolerite in the facing of the footings. Notice how some of the curtain is carefully levelled whilst other portions follow the slope. At the bottom, the path turns to cross the wall. Here we are able to see the dark and now shiny dolerite blocks incorporated in the core of the structure as we transit the monument.

Sycamore Gap and Mons Fabricius behind it

The eponymous tree is rooted amongst the fabric of the collapsed curtain wall. Its future has been ensured by planting a replacement slightly to the south within a circular drystone enclosure (called a stell; this is where it was originally situated when Jessie Mothersole walked past in 1921, so the new one is third generation; there was no tree here in 1907, when Maria Hoyer visited). This is the ultimate insurance against the day the main tree gives up the arboreal ghost and relieves the curtain wall of its burden. It is sometimes known as ‘the Robin Hood tree’, not through any folkloric association with that legendary character, but rather because it featured in the 1991 film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves during a journey supposedly undertaken by the eponymous hero from Dover to Nottingham!

We now have to climb the steps of the small hill known as Mons Fabricius, a name it gained in honour of the German scholar Ernst Fabricius, who visited the frontier in 1928 whilst in Britain to receive an honorary doctorate from the University of Durham. A leading light in the study of the Roman frontiers in Germany (the Upper German and Raetian frontier or Obergermanische-Raetische Limes), his is the singular honour of being the only scholar with a piece of the Wall landscape named after him.

The broad gauge foundation (left), the Narrow Wall (right), and shielings (top left) on Mons Fabricius

On top of the hill, the curtain wall abruptly turns onto a more northerly course to follow the edge of the crags. Amongst the grass on the peak, to the left of the path and at about waist height, there is a row of stones that are in fact the broad gauge foundation, set slightly back from the built line of the Wall. Yet again, we see evidence of pragmatic adaptation during construction of the frontier. Moving a bit further on, tucked up against the south face of the curtain wall to our right, there are some medieval shielings, or shepherd’s shelters.

Now, ahead of us, we are treated to the spectacle of Castle Nick and its milecastle.

Milecastle 39 (Castle Nick) [HB 257–8; haiku]

Milecastle 39 in Castle Nick

The remains of the milecastle originally gave their name to the gap, which has in turn given them back to the milecastle (once scholars got around to numbering and naming them); I hope that’s clear. The surrounding walls of this long-axis milecastle are Claytonized and it has been the object of the attentions of excavators in 1854, between 1908 and 1911, and most recently in the 1980s. The structures visible inside it are for the most part post-medieval (it is said to have been used as a milking parlour) and demonstrate again the re-use of milecastles for agricultural purposes in later years, a theme to which we shall return. It was not located in its measured position but further east, perhaps deliberately to place it in the gap.

The Twice Brewed Inn, Twice Brewed by Ian S

Feeling pretty terrible as a Mummy today. I have spent much of the last few days falling out with my daughter because she hasn’t been listening properly, hasn’t responded to a question repeated several times or has asked me something I’ve told her many times already.

It turns out that she has (hopefully temporarily) lost the hearing in one ear. I want to take back the crossness and tears and wrap her in cuddles.

It terrifies me when things happen to the children because it feels like, in life, when I’m happy bad things happen. I generally try not to be too happy with my lot in case it’s all taken away. Things like when I had a car accident, found out my dad had cancer, discovered my dad had died in hospital, these things all came immediately after a period of intense happiness. Like Commentator’s Curse. You know the minute a commentator says “this batsman is on fire, he can’t hit a thing wrong,” that he’s going to be out next ball.

Hadrian’s Wall – Sycamore Gap – photo by Xavier de Jauréguiberry on Flickr

It’s a silly superstition but one that feels real from repeated experience I know bad things happen and it’s how you cope that matters. But I can’t help but feel that if I hedge my bets rather than over-counting my blessings I can somehow prevent disaster.

My husband is taking my daughter to the doctor this morning.  I am waiting for them to tell me the results and I can feel the panic rise. Being unable to communicate with my children is one of my greatest fears. I have so much admiration for parents of children with autism or other things that hinder connection.

P.S. She has an inner ear infection. Nasty but treatable. Reading back through the post I wrote this morning I was tempted to delete it as it reeks of over-reaction. But it was genuine and real at the time and I think it’s interesting to read it with hindsight and see how things viewed through guilt and sleep-deprivation can seem HUGE.

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The trill of the phone rang loud in the silent lounge. Claire and Josh had the place to themselves, having got back from their walk early in the afternoon. Claire twisted in her seat so she could retrieve her phone from her back pocket, only then becoming aware of the numb patch where it had been digging into her skin.

Claire, sorry to text again. I’m not stalking you I promise. It’s just I rang AJC and they said you’d left. I hope that’s not because of what happened at New Year. I’m sorry if it was. Forgive me. Michael.

Left? How dare they? What have they been saying to my clients? Claire felt the blood heating in her veins, surging up her neck to her face. She read the message again. And why did Michael ring work anyway? I don’t care what he says, it sounds like stalking to me.

Her mind twisted like tights in a tumble dryer. She wasn’t aware that her emotions were anything other than internal until she heard a snigger from Josh. She looked and saw him watching her with a questioning look on his face.

“I’ve never heard someone actually grind their teeth before. I always thought it was one of those things you read in bad novels when the author can’t think of a way to describe irritation better.”

Claire unclenched her jaw and forced her muscles to relax. “Just some seeds from my sandwich stuck in my molars that’s all.” She watched Josh with narrow eyes, waiting to see if he would contradict her. The sandwiches had been on white. He merely gave a wink and went back to reading a tattered paperback, holding it in one hand with pages turned over.

Claire put the phone down and pulled her iPad onto her lap. She opened her blog site dashboard with a sigh. The blank page of the “New Post” dragged at her like a cliff edge. A mind that could generate award-winning one-liners for Press Ads was bereft of words when faced with the challenge of penning something entertaining about her day. The best part had been arriving back at the hostel and wrapping her hands around a mug of tea. She’d even managed to ignore the chips and cracks and the teak-colour of the brew. Eight hours trudging in a ‘bracing’ wind had erased her fastidiousness for the moment.

Damn you Josh for convincing me to do a second circular walk when we finished the first one in five hours. Yes the Sycamore Tree was pretty but I could have lived without it. Although Cuddy’s Crags and East and West Crindledykes are going to make great Tags.

She looked at the two maps of her walks with notes scribbled on, barely legible because of cold, numb fingers. It was vaguely possible she could write something about the two circular routes that hadn’t been said before but it was still lacking in heart, whatever that was.

At least I have the photos of Josh to upload. He’s fairly easy on the eye: that should win some likes. She flicked through the images on her phone, trying to find the ones with most impact. It was a bit different to working with a lightbox in an editing studio. She chose a couple that made her heart beat a bit faster and set them to upload to the Cloud.  I should probably check with him before I publish them to the world. He might be in hiding or something although if he’s writing a blog back home they must have some idea where he is.

“Hey Josh, can I put a picture of you on the blog? That one of you up to your knees in the mud would be cool.”

There was silence from the sofa in the corner and Claire wondered if Josh had fallen asleep. The book hadn’t looked particularly thrilling. She glanced over and was surprised to meet troubled eyes peering around the pages of the upheld book. The expression on Josh’s normally carefree face jolted deep in Claire’s stomach and she was conscious of a strong urge to offer comfort.

“Er, sure, if you want. Or you could use the one of me on top of the wall.”

The one where the sun is on you and your face isn’t visible? “Maybe, although I’m sure you’re not meant to climb the wall so that’s probably not a great idea. Don’t worry, I’ll find something. I think you took one of me.”

She turned her head back to the laptop as if concentrating on her post. Out of the corner of her eye she watched Josh. His face remained focussed in her direction for a few moments before he sank back into his previous pose. Only the constant movement of his twisting feet gave anything away.

This is my ‘training walk’ of 7.5 miles from Housesteads to Winshield Crags & back. Have done it over 150 times and will do a separate blog on the years spent up here, but this a quick ‘Trip Report’ as I haven’t posted for a while:-)

After picking my mate Alan up at Hexham we arrived at a cold Housesteads car park with the wind thumping against the car. There was none of the usual rush to get out and whip the boots on so we diverted ourselves by staring at the latest stage of the wind ravaged Visitor Centre refurbishment to add an extra floor (below),

Housesteads Visitor Centre, New Years Day 2013

We quickly got ready and headed round the Centre, through the gate and up the path past Housesteads Fort on the right to the main Wall path in the trees at the top.

Path from Housesteads Visitor Centre up to the Wall path and Fort

It’s always a slog to the top but is quickly reached & provides some shelter from that wind.  We carried on down to Hotbanks Farm for the view to Crag Lough. I’d actually never seen it quite so full, there was a LOT of water around. We were heading to the highest point on the Wall, Winshields Crags, in the middle below.

Hadrians Wall looking to Crag Lough

The path continues above Crag Lough then looks down over the famous Sycamore Gap, known amongst other things for its appearance with Kevin Costner & Morgan Freeman in the film Robin Hood Prince of Thieves.

Looking across Sycamore Gap to Winshields top right

Sycamore Gap, Hadrians Wall

Looking west to Steel Rigg car park in the trees and Winshield Crags above

The highest point on Hadrians Wall is Winshield Crags (below) there’s a trig point, great views, and sometimes you see the Solway Firth glistening in the west. It’s also not far from the Steel Rigg NT car park & Twice Brewed pub on the Military Rd – which is nice. This is me showing off my new Montane Terra Pants, I’m like a model me like.

Winshield Crags trig point at 1,132ft, the highest point on Hadrian’s Wall

The view east, Alan sheltering from that wind, time to turn back

Sycamore Gap and Crag Lough from the west in low sunlight

More Sycamore Gap – it’s a nice place

Crag Lough

The path goes through the ‘tree section’ up the hill past Hotbanks Farm on the horizon

Hotbanks Farm through the tree section

Slippy steps through the trees, descend with care!

Due to a crucial business meeting we decided to take the “by-pass” path above Hotbanks Farm which runs parallel to the Wall path but is flatter & gets you back a little quicker.

The by-pass path heading east with the Visitor Centre mid right

Houseteads Visitor Centre from the rear

We had to dash to the car park & quickly get the boots off to make that business meeting. Now when I say ‘business meeting’ I actually mean ‘pub’, it’s so easily confused. Anyway the pub normally stops serving food by 2.15pm & we were cutting it short so hurried across to the Dipton Mill Inn south of Hexham (my favourite pub). Normally late lunchtimes here are quite civilsed with many of the customers having eaten and drifted off, followed by a few locals & walkers popping in for a pint. What we didn’t realise was that New Years Day is one of their busiest days with a guest Piper, Scottish Ditty Singer and a pair of singing Guitarists all taking turns to entertain. The place was absolutely heaving full of families & people I’d never seen before, becoming even busier as the afternoon drew on.

A heaving New Year’s Day pub

Dipton Mill New Years Day Piper

We managed to get very lucky and sneak on to the end of a table, ordered some butties and had a beer whilst chatting to a local couple and watching the entertainment unfold. We eventually had to leave around 4.30pm (during a song break) with our seats being immediately and gratefully snaffled up. We weren’t sure when it all ended but this was yet another excellent Dipton Mill experience with a great crowd and a great end to the day. (PS; They brew their own beer, I’m a Whapweasel fan).

My favourite pub

Housesteads to Winshield Crags Route Map

Peel Crags from Steel Rigg

Me and D in particular were keen to see it having never been and this year was our chance. We were especially inspired as Mark and his kids had taken a summer hostel walk along the wall in the summer and were full of stories of how good it was. Armed with a plan Mark suggested we packed up the kids into the cars (I got most of them!) and headed to Steel Rigg to start the walk.

The weather looked “mixed”, possible sunshine, possible rain but in the end we only had one spell of drizzle while we were out, which alas coincided with lunch. We passed the remains of the first turret and then scrambled up onto Peel Crags.

Peel Crags

Peel Crags

The walking was superb and just right for kids, plenty of wall related stuff, scrambles and the like to keep the kids going and some wide open views for the adults to enjoy. For me it was great to see an area I’d never been before and one of Britain’s most famous landmarks. It’s not so much the wall itself that’s impressive but the concept of the wall and the effort it must have taken to build it. Such a long and immense construction (including the turrets, Milecastles and forts) in some pretty wild and inhospitable terrain. I kept reminding the kids that these features were all 2000 years old.

Crag Lough & Milecastle 39

We stopped of at Milecastle 39 for a rather damp lunch and for the kids to play.

L at Milecastle 39

From there we passed Sycamore Gap. I’m reliably informed that in the Kevin Costner film “Robin Hood Prince of Thieves” our hero is seen sitting at this very spot discussing what a naughty chap the old Sheriff of Nottingham is before popping over to Nottingham to teach him a lesson. Not sure why he needed to ride 300 miles from Sherwood Forest for this little chat but such is Hollywood.

Sycamore Gap

We continued on over a long section above Crag Lough, it’s cold dark waters looking, well, cold and dark.

Crag Lough

This was the most dramatic section for me and was the view I had in my head when thinking of the wall and it’s scenery.

D above Crag Lough

Crag Lough from Hotbank Crags

Crag Lough from Hotbank Crags

From there it was on to Hotbank Crags for what Mark reckoned was his favourite part of the walk he did in the summer.

The gang on Hotbank Crags

He was  right, it was top drawer. Easy walking along a high grassy ridge with the wall for company.

Wall walking along Hotbank Crags

The kids were having a great time and making light work of the walk despite the cold and windy conditions. As we approached Milecastle 37 the low sun came out lighting up the wall and it’s surroundings in a most becoming fashion.

Sunset at Hotbank Crags

Looking back along Hotbank Crags

Hotbank Crags and Milecastle 37

We took in a section of the wall that you can actually walk on (D was especially pleased about that part) and dropped down to one of the famous forts, Housesteads. I had it in my head that this fort would be on flat ground  down by the road but in fact it’s built on a hillside well up in the hills. It’s a huge and impressive roman site containing all the usual features you expect to see (underfloor heating, latrines, bath houses, granary).

Granary at Housesteads

Underfloor heating at Housesteads

Barracks at Housesteads

However it was already starting to get dark when we arrived so we were only able to give it a very cursory look (most of the kids had bailed to the warmth and fun of the interactive museum) before we called it a day. We’d finally seen the Wall and what a fascinating experience it had been, cracking walk and history lesson all rolled into one. It needs alot more of my attention if this little jaunt is indicative. If you want to read more of the history of the wall etc then what you need is to read an extensive account of summer stroll along the wall, taking in all the features. Luckily I know a man who has so pop over to Mark’s blog and read his account starting here. You can also read his own account of this day if you need more.

Sycamore Gap – Hadrian’s Wall

Spent a number of hours printing the other day after the chemistry I’d ordered from Bostick & Sullivan arrived. Both of these are pinhole prints, which fortunately came out how I’d visualised them when making the shot. There was plenty of contrast at these locations which I think suits pinhole photography.

Berwick-upon-Tweed

© Simon Howlett 2012. All rights reserved

Sorry for the lull in updates. I’m quickly realizing that if I go out all day seeing things and taking pictures, then sit down for an hour or two to edit photos, and then spend an hour or two writing posts, I will have no time to eat. That will end my trip VERY quickly. Besides, the backlog of photos from London is going to annoy me for awhile; and there’s no telling if I’ll run into the same problem at another stop. Oh, the wonders of blogging while you travel!

Anyways, I’m only going to write long post every few days. Other than that, I’ll try to get photo posts up more often. I’ll probably have to back track on my trip; case in point, I really want to get my Westminster and Greenwich photos up. So a slight change in how I planned to do this.

Now, on to the good stuff: on Thursday I said good bye to London and headed up to Newcastle upon Tyne; a fancy way of saying Newcastle. Every time I had mentioned this stop to Londoners, I got a laugh and a warning that the “Geordies” are an odd lot. And it has been an interesting experience. When I walked around the city, I got the impression that this place is a lot like Baltimore. It’s a former industrial city, with some dirty and rundown buildings among some real gems; quirky sort of people; but lots of art and culture if you get beyond it. I can’t tell if I like it (I can say the same thing about Baltimore) but I’ve enjoyed my stay.

But the real point of this post is about what I did on Friday: hiked Hadrian’s Wall. For those who don’t know what Hadrian’s Wall is, think the Great Wall of the Roman Empire. It stretched the width of Britain, from roughly Newcastle in the east to Carlisle in the west, and was built around 120AD by the Emperor Hadrian. The point of the Wall wasn’t to keep people out but to make a firm point about where the border was; to the south was the Roman world and civilization, while to the north was barbarian territory. Think the wall in Game of Thrones, just no ice zombies to the north.

Before I left the States, I had planned out a way to walk to certain sections from a specific village (Bardon Mill) train station. It was going to be a ton of walking but I thought it was novel and doable. As it turned out, it was both but it was also stupid. I ended up walking a total of about 12 miles and the land I walked on was upward sloping most of the way. I’m amazed I can walk this morning.

But I did it. My first stop was the Roman Fort of Vindolanda. This fort wasn’t on the Wall, but it was one of the first fortifications the Romans built on the frontier (~90AD); they occupied it continuously for 400 years (take a moment and think about that; that’s almost twice as long as the USA has been in existence). The fort and museum were interesting but they were just ruins; and foundations at that. Still, some amazing archaeological finds (wasn’t allowed to take pictures in their museum, but trust me, amazing).

The next stop was the Wall itself. It took me about another hour from Vondolanda to get up there, but it was worth it. As I found out, this section of the wall (from Once Brewed to Housesteads) has some of the best views of the entire Wall. I ended up climbing up three crags (Webster’s defines “crag” as a “a steep rugged rock or cliff”; I now define crag as a pain in my booty to climb), passing a beautiful lake, and coming upon Sycamore Gap, an amazing section of the Wall, between two crags, with a large tree growing in the middle of it (you’ll recognize the spot if you like Kevin Costner movies and cutting people’s hearts out with spoons).

You know how I mentioned what my Stonehenge experience was like (that post now has photos!)? This was nearly as good. Like with Stonehenge, I had been fighting the weather all day, only this was worse. A driving, cold, and continuous wind all day; periods of rain (at one point I noticed that my entire back was soaked, which faced west into the storm, but my front was bone dry); and then dealing with muddy terrain. But when I got up to Sycamore Gap, I was rewarded with the sun coming out and excellent light for the rest of the day; and an added bonus of storm clouds along the horizon.

There was a point, I believe it was at the highest point along my hike, where I just stopped and looked around. I was standing on the very edge of the ancient civilized world. Northumberland all around me. 1500 years ago, I would have looked north over that Wall and seen barbarism, and south I would have seen civilization. It’s hard to think of such a stark line in the world, even with modern borders, but there it was. I don’t believe there is anywhere else in the Roman World that had such an exact line; truly a sight I will not see anywhere else.

I finished my hike at Housesteads, which are ruins of one of the forts attached to the Wall. I decided not to buy a ticket to explore those ruins; I was very tired, and I knew I had at least an hour walk back to Bardon Mill. But as I walked away, I made a decision that one day I will come back and hike the entire length of the Wall, Newcastle to Carlisle. It’s on the list with the Appalachian Trail.

The walk back was tiring but uneventful. I did pass on the other side of Vindolanda and got a breathtaking view from on high. And then, I was at the train station and headed back to Newcastle. I’ve tried to figure out my total distance walked and I’m sticking to 12 miles (10 at a minimum); 9:30am to 4:30pm. I think that’s pretty good, but the moral of the story is that, while my plan worked, it was a lot more tiring than I expected. So, I don’t recommend doing it (be smarter than me and rent a car).

Next stop is York and it should be a major highlight. The Minster, the National Railway Museum, and the city’s walls; it’s going to be amazing.

BTW: I am currently organizing my post card sending; so if you want a post card (and didn’t buy a print), please tweet, e-mail, or FB-mail me your address. I’m trying to get just the right spot along my trip for each person’s card, so don’t be mad if you don’t get one for a while.

Resplendent in freshly laundered gear we climbed the lane from Once Brewed back up to the Wall, pausing only to admire this very obliging butterfly, which I think might be a ringlet. It was already fairly warm, if a little hazy. We would be back at Once Brewed that night, so the kids were able to leave their rucksacks at the hostel, and despite the addition of their water-proofs to my bag, I was able to lighten my load too.

Today’s walk would mostly be more of the roller-coaster ups and downs of the Whin Sill.

Along Peel Crags, overlooked by Milecastle 39….

…to the famous Sycamore Gap, which, as Hollywood knows, is perched on the outskirts of Nottingham.

I’d expected this part of the Wall to be busy, but we had it all to ourselves.

The sun-lit cliff-top walk above Crag Lough was perhaps my favourite single section of our walk. I’ve walked this way before, but I’d forgotten how beautiful it is.

On the climb up Hotbank we were distracted by what, this time, was unmistakably a ringlet…

We were revelling in the views. Back over Crag Lough to Winshields Crags with Cross Fell still dominating in the distance…

…and forward to Broomlee Lough and the final fling of the Whin Sill at Sewingshields Crags, which we would climb later in the day.

To me, this is one of the great pleasures of a linear, multi-day walk: the satisfaction of looking back to distant places already walked through or past or over and likewise the anticipation of looking ahead to landmarks on the route to come.

So the sun shone. We slowly reeled in Sewingshields Crags. It’s a very simple pleasure.

Every so often the Wall threw in a bit of a distraction to give us an excuse for a pause. Milecastle 38 had been an undistinguished mound in a boggy spot on Hotbanks crag. Milecastle 37 was a little more interesting…

Unlike other milecastles we passed, this retains some evidence of internal walls…

…and the remnants of an arched gateway on the northern side.

We did finally meet the crowds, when, at around eleven, we arrived at Housesteads.

We had a lengthy stop here, to watch a short  film and examine the exhibits at the museum, take a good look around…

…play a bit of hide and seek….

….lunch on ice cream…

…and cool and dress feet, both children having developed some red spots which suggested rubbing and foreshadowed blisters. Fortunately, a combination of Compeed and surgical tape seemed to do the job and any further problems were avoided.

Soon enough, we were looking back on Broomlee lough….

..and topped out on Sewingshields Crags, at 325m not much lower then our high point of the previous day.

From there a long steady descent to Sewingshields…..

….is followed by Fozy Moss. A slightly rising path, shadowing the road, took us across rather bleak, featureless moorland. It might have been rather dispiriting. In fact we passed several large groups of teenagers, heavily laden and heading in the opposite direction to us, presumably D of E victims, some of whom were singing to keep up their spirits, and some of whom were openly weeping. It was saved for us, bizarrely, by the fact that we regularly had to negotiate wet and muddy ditches running across the path, which the kids found perversely enjoyable.

At Carraw, where the path diverts slightly away from the road around a farm and a small woodland, the flagged path was bordered with nettles and the nettles were festooned with snails.

Rich brown, striped and flecked in pale yellow, I thought they were rather handsome.

I think that they might be copse snails?

I’d originally planned to finish at Chester’s, but it had soon become apparent that this was much too ambitious. That would have made for a much longer day then any of the others and time was against us. Whether we dawdled or, as I thought we had today, generally kept moving, we seemed to pretty consistently manage a mile and a half an hour. So, we chose a new destination: Brocolitia.

Brocolitia is another Roman fort. There isn’t too much to see – the grassy mound on the right of this picture shows how the unexcavated outer walls look. But outside the fort there is a small temple to Mithras, a god popular with Roman soldiers. The site is boggy and the conditions preserved the timber pillars, replaced now with concrete casts, as have been the three altar stones and a small headless statue.

More importantly for us, Brocolitia has a bus-stop for the AD122, which took us back to Once Brewed, where we would eventually get fed and watered and reconvene our card school.

My home made ultra-violet exposure unit set up ready for printing. Arches Platine paper is torn to size using the digital negatives as templates. The paper is then coated with a platinum/palladium solution. Once dry the negative and paper are sandwiched between two plates of glass and exposed under the ultra-violet fluorescent tubes for a few minutes. The resulting print is then developed, cleared and washed to complete the process.

Hanging to dry overnight. Ducks enjoy platinum printing too!

© Simon Howlett 2012. All rights reserved

When I arrived, the lovely Nicola Redman, who has accompanied me on many a gig on this tour, picked me up in her car and took me to Bush Nook bed & breakfast, which was not only the location for the evening’s gig but also where she lives; the B&B is run by Nicola’s parents, Malcolm, Jenny, and her brother Stephen, and it’s probably the only place on this tour that I’ll have played twice. Remember the post about the impromptu living room gig last November? Well that was there, but this time it definitely wasn’t at all impromptu as Nic’s dad Malcolm seemed to have done a good job promoting it!

The Redman’s had very kindly offered to put me up in one of the B&B’s rooms for two nights, so the first thing I did upon arrival was put my bag in the room I would be staying in. I went in, put down my stuff and turned to go out again, but not without noticing first something mildly odd: on the middle of the bed was… a wrench. I would like to think that this was quite a good joke (the kind of one that Nicola would probably make anyway) playing on the fact that one of my songs on the new album is called ‘Wrench’. Sadly it turned out that the wrench on the bed was actually an accident and had been left there after someone fixed something in the room, which is a bit of an anti-climax, so for the purposes of this blog, the wrench was left there because of the song. Got it? Good.

When everyone was seated, the living room had a good thirty or so people seated or stood. The audience were enthusiastic and very much up for singing when it came to ‘Go’. In fact, group two were possibly a little too enthusiastic… they got into their part so much that group three could not hear me at all to learn their part, so technically it was a two-part sing-a-long, but here’s the scores:

Volume: 9/10

Enthusiasm: 8/10

Accuracy: 6/10

Giving a total of 23/30, which actually means that they didn’t score quite as well as the last audience in the same location, but it was still a pretty good effort! And fun, to boot. Nicely done, especially to group two. I’m fairly sure I’ve lost a few frequencies in my left ear…

The interval meant that we all got the opportunity to try Nicola’s carefully prepared canapés, and since she has sampled a good many of the foodstuffs on offer with me at these gigs and she is a ridiculously good cook herself, the spread was fairly astounding. Her Twitter account (Irishpickle) in the two days leading up the gig had been awash with descriptions of food preparation, such as, ‘Went to Iceland, 1000 springs rolls & a prawn ring for £5. Bargain’, so as you can imagine, I was fascinated as to what sort of canapé-themed heaven we would be entering on Saturday night, and we weren’t disappointed: there was pineapple and cheese on sticks, mini pasties (obviously, after our desperate search for them in Devon), mini sausages dipped in honey and sesame seeds… the list goes on. It was impressive, to say the least.

Once everyone had happily canapéd themselves, we sat ourselves down in the living room once more and Stephen, Nicola’s talented writer big brother, performed some spoken word in the form of one of his own poems (of which I have shamefully forgotten the title of), followed by Nicola playing two of her comedy songs on the ukulele. The first was about being Irish (‘get over it’) and the second was themed around the subject of breaking it to a mother that her son is going to grow up to be gay; both had us all in stitches. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, check this girl out and go and see her live. She is very funny: www.nicolaredman.com.

Halfway through the evening, something happened that was a bit of a first for me at gigs: two members of the audience became grandparents! A phone rang halfway through a song, followed by the news the little Imogen Elizabeth Rose had just entered the world. Congratulations to Jan and David for your new roles in grandparenthood! Once the gig was over, everyone stuck around to be merry, polish off the canapés and toast the new arrival.

The next morning we were treated to an excellent full Irish breakfast by Malcolm (a full Irish seemed to be very much like a full English, but it contained a lot of different breads, including potato bread, which was very tasty) followed by partaking in Stephen’s suggestion of doing some ‘laughter yoga’, which was not so much ‘yoga’ as standing in a circle and… laughing. It was fun, but we all agreed that perhaps we hadn’t done it properly, as it didn’t really seem to have done anything. Never mind – worth a try!

Sycamore Gap

The rest of the day was spent walking around the incredible countryside that surrounds Hadrian’s wall with Nicola, Stephen and friends, Warren and Dan. We visited Sycamore Gap, also known as the Robin Hood Tree, a section of Hadrian’s Wall with a huge lone Sycamore tree between two crests and named for its use in the film ‘Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves’, followed by an old Victorian outside swimming pool in the middle of some woods, which would be a great location for a music video, or possibly a murder. Safe to say, it is no longer a functioning swimming pool, unless you’d like a particularly mossy swim. After exploring the pool and then playing some pool in a nearby hotel bar (see what I did there?), we made our way back to Bush Nook for an amazing roast dinner cooked by Jenny. It was a pretty ideal way to spend a Sunday!

Testing the waters in the old Victorian swimming pool

The next morning, I said goodbye and reluctantly left the lovely Bush Nook and the fresh air to head back to the Big Smoke on the train. I’m a big fan of long train journeys: they’re a great excuse to watch many, many episodes of 30 Rock, ‘I’m a star! I’m on top! Somebody bring me some haaaaam!’ When I grow up, I want to be Liz Lemon.

I’d like to say big big thanks to everyone who came to the gig on Saturday for being so enthusiastic and noisy, and a massive thank you goes to the Redmans: Malcolm, Jenny, Stephen and Nicola, for being such excellent hosts and making me feel so welcome at Bush Nook! If you’d like to explore Hadrian’s Wall or you’d just like to stay somewhere beautiful in the Northern countryside, I cannot recommend Bush Nook B&B enough: www.bushnook.co.uk You never know, you might even get to sample a full Irish Breakfast. :)

Next weekend is the final gig on my Living Room Tour in Poole, Dorset! Feeling rather sad that soon it’ll all be over…

Malcolm Redman (host): Just had a fabulous living room gig with lisbee… thanks for everything .. bush nook was very happy !

Entertainingly enough, I heard locals complaining about Twilight, and the name. The girl was convinced that the guy was just jealous of Edward.

I’m staying again at student dorms, which turned out to be within sight of Carlisle Castle. How on earth do these things happen? I’m back to a shared bathroom, but at least my room has a better mattress than in Wales… the one thing I didn’t adore about Wales.

For my first day I raced out and caught a bus to Housesteads, the site of a Roman fort. The number of the bus? AD 122. There you go, history nerds amongst us. From the fort, I joined up with the path of Hadrian’s Wall. I’d really been looking forward to it, and had been told this was the best section. Well, what do you think?

This section of the wall is one of the few to survive pillaging of farmers, and is remarkably intact. I passed very famous sites such as the Sycamore Gap, and various milecastles. At times I was quite convinced that only I and sheep remained alive in the world.

I do have skill, however. I chose a day with a windstorm that knocked out power to the area, and that I swear could do what you see in cartoons when someone holds on to something and their feet are up in the air.

I left the wall to visit Vindolanda, site of many layers of Roman forts, where they’re still currently excavating. Teams were actually working today, and visitors were free to wander about and watch.

Filled with curry and cloudy lemonade, the day ends. I wouldn’t have survived as a Roman soldier, I’m right worn out!