The Castles, The Wall and the Angel (Part 2)

After taking the not-so-quiet approach to leaving the Newcastle University dorms, I hopped in the car and headed for Hadrian's Wall. I needed to exit the A1 at A69 going west. Unfortunately, I couldn't, because this bastard shot a police officer at that junction only 6 hours before. I did eventually find a way around and got on the A69, but it's not fun when you're lost and there's a gunman on the loose who was known to be in the area only six hours earlier.

Hadrian's Wall was not what I pictured it would be. Most of the wall has collapsed and where it is standing it is rare for the structure to be over three feet high (having collapsed down to it's base). Yet, it was still impressive, especially when you consider the terrain that it was built on. Though the prevailing rumor is that the Romans built Hadrian's Wall to keep out the wild Scots, that's only partially true. It actually acted as a border control to limit the number of people coming into England from Scotland . . . especially those that didn't have their green cards. ;)

To bring my trip to Newcastle and Northumbria to conclusion, I had to go see the iron icon of the area that is The Angel of the North. This piece of artwork was built by Antony Gormley in 1998. It welcomes all the visitors to the North that drive past it on the A1 . . . or if you live up North it welcomes you home. It is a most impressive structure. The wingspan is the same as that of a jumbo jet. You can see the scale in the picture below (a photographer in the bottom right and a person standing up next to the sculpture).


One more drive past the A1/A69 intersection (which was now open to traffic) and I was back at the airport. After a long week of work, it will be nice to fly home tomorrow and see my wife and son.

Incidentally the picture at the head of the post is the "new castle" that Newcastle Upon Tyne is named for. Not quite as impressive as the others.

The Castles, The Wall and The Angel (Part 1)

If you want to see some freakin' cool castles, go to Northumbria, England. There are other things to see like Hadrian's Wall and The Angel of the North, both worth seeing, but the castles were absolutely phenomenal. Last weekend, I flew over to Newcastle Upon Tyne and had an interesting weekend, which included avoiding a disgruntled convict with a gun.

On Saturday, I did the all-castles-all-the-time tour of Northumbria. The first castle that I saw was on Holy Island, Lindisfarne Castle. Holy Island is an island that you can drive to at low tide. A causeway opens up, just don't get caught trying to drive across when the tide is coming in.

The town was neat and I would have liked to stay a little longer, but I had a tonne (that's the British spelling) of castles to see and only one day to do it! Here is Lindisfarne Castle on Holy Island:


Next it was down the coast toTHE most amazing castle that I have seen to date: Bamburgh Castle. This one deserves two pictures.

From the park:
From the beach:


And, although I have many other pictures of castles, I cut it off after this one as it's a good one to end on. This is Alnwick Castle, but you might know by it's other name: Hogwarts. This castle was the featured backdrop for Harry Potter as Hogwarts in three of the six films already released.


After my tour of the castles of Northumbria, I toured the cities of Newcastle Upon Tyne and Tynemouth. There really isn't anything spectacular about the city other than it attracts stag parties and hen parties from all over the United Kingdom and Ireland. For your reference stag party = bachelor party, hen party = bachellorette party.

I found cheap accommodation staying in a dormitory at the University of Newcastle. I'm such an old fart. I was in bed by 10pm. I first woke when the loud and raucous stag parties returned from the pubs (obviously of the same mind for cheap accommodations) at 2:30 am. I next awoke to my alarm and to extract my revenge, being loud (though not raucous) at 6am when I got up to start my Sunday adventures.

To be continued . . .