Well that does it! Scotland is a mere 30 miles up the road from here. Here being Rothbury.
This picture says it all. My bench in the sun (bottom left). Our car parked immediately behind the bench and “Aria” the white-fronted dress shop… Say no more!
It’s a beautiful sunny day, but a little breezy and a lot cool. The mercury in the thermometer I just looked at seemed to be frozen. That would make it about minus 38 °C, so maybe it wasn’t completely frozen!
Lovely walk along the Coquet River. Past the golf course on the other bank and through the financially risky gate…
Well, that’ll make sure everyone shuts the bloody gate! I don’t think you can read the tiny print but it says “LNER”. So clearly we are on, or close to, an old railway. Hence the massive fine! Does anyone even remember the old money??? We weren’t exactly sure where the railway went, but it certainly wouldn’t have crossed the Coquet where we did…
Clearly we branched off at some point after the gate! Eventually the cold breeze got to us so we retreated. Later in the day we went on a drive to remind ourselves just how much COUNTRY there is in Northumberland.
First stop was Whittingham where Glenda spent so much of her horsey youth!
As we walked through the village there were so many cars, mini-buses and taxis parked up by the church we thought there must be a celebrity funeral going on.
But no. The church door was open and the church empty. We found the entry in the visitors book that we had left on our last visit in the Spring of 2015. And then the church warden came in muttering about us leaving the door open. Once we had convinced her that we had left it as we had found it, she moved the focus of her dissatisfaction to the carparking mayhem outside.
“It’s the school pick up time. Happens everyday at this time. Extremely inconvenient if we want to hold a funeral” (especially, presumably, if it’s a celebrity one!). “In my day, children used to walk to school – now they are all driven here”, we were informed. Probably, and this is just a thought, a little more tolerance might have reflected well on this Christian establishment. There is only ONE primary school serving several hundred square miles of darkest, remotest Northumberland. So how else are most of the school’s young customers going to get there?
Mind you, the perishers hadn’t left anywhere for me to park. So I’m with the church warden, maybe something should be done about the problem after all!!!
Later, we visited most of the villages which sent their young sproglets to jam up Whittingham. Coquetvale covers a huge, open area of magnificent countryside between Rothbury and the Cheviot Hills. Netherton, Biddlestone, Clennell, Harbottle, Sharperton, Holystone, Great Tosson and back to base via Whitton, Low Hestlehurst and the “three fords road” (cleverly named, because you have to paddle through three streams).
A short hesitation at Heighley Gate nurseries, which Wyvale have turned into a failing business, to check out their Christmas trees and bears. We discovered that all bears around here are white. I told you we were heading for the Arctic!
Many years ago, Glenda’s parents knew the then owners of Heighley Gate. It was a sort of chicken farm come market garden run by Sally and her husband. Now it’s a massive all-singing, all-dancing place about to be taken over by Dobbies of Ponteland as Wyvale struggle to control their costs…
Well, that was Wednesday. It was Alnwick on Thursday and Morpeth on Friday – yesterday as I write this. Getting behind again – must do better!
BUT FIRST…
When everybody on earth was dead and waiting to enter Heaven, God appeared and said, “I want the men to make two lines: One line for the men who were true heads of their households, and the other line for the men who were dominated by their women.” “I want all the women to report to St. Peter.”
Soon, the women were gone, and there were two lines of men. The line of the men who were dominated by their wives was hundreds of miles long and in the line of men who truly were head of their household, there was only ONE man.
God said to the long line, “You men should be ashamed of yourselves; I created you to be the heads of your households!” You have been disobedient and have not fulfilled your purpose! Of all of you, only one obeyed. Learn from him.
God turned to the one man, “How did you manage to be the only one in this line? The man replied, “This is where my wife told me to stand.”