St Abbs and Bamburgh Castle

Today we continue our journey south towards Newcastle.

St Abbs is probably quite a pretty little fishing village to visit on a warm sunny day. Today it was cold, overcast and very windy. We stayed long enough for a couple of photographs and a coffee before leaving.

Crossing the border we stopped at Bamburgh Castle and this was well worth a stop, even though the weather was if anything even worse than St Abbs. The wind was funnelled down some of the passageways in the castle complex, so even stronger in intensity.

The visit exceeded my expectations, I had no idea it was so big. The castle interior was surprisingly well insulated and the wind stayed outside. It belongs to the Armstrong family, best known to me for the Armstron Siddeley cars, which were merged into the Rolls Royce.

The Castle was well worth a visit and we lingered here quite a long time. It was closing by the time we left.

We arrived in Newcastle without much problem. Rain had started in addition to the cold and wind. The hotel was not on my Satnav. I found the Sage theatre with no problem, but struggled to find the right combination of roads to get to the hotel itself, even though it is only a five minute walk from the Sage.

We made it eventually, hopefully without any fines for traffic violations, despite straying in to a bus zone.

In the evening we found a very nice pizzeria close to our hotel, just over the Millennium Bridge.