One of England’s most incredible sea-bird conventions is to be found on a rocky archipelago of islands about three miles offshore from the undistinguished fishing village of Seahouses. There’s a tourist office (01655-720884; Seafield Rd; 10am-5pm Apr-Oct) near the harbour in Seahouses and a National Trust Shop (01665-721099; 16 Main St; 10am-5pm Apr-Oct) for all island-specific information.
What exactly have the Romans ever done for us? The aqueducts. Law and order. And this enormous wall, built between AD 122 and 128 to keep ‘us’ (Romans, subdued Anglo-Saxons) in and ‘them’ (hairy barbarians from Scotland) out. Or so the story goes. Hadrian’s Wall, named in honour of the emperor that ordered it built, was Rome’s single greatest engineering project, a spectacular 73-mile testament to ambition and the practical Roman mind. Even today, almost 2000 years after the first stone was laid, the sections that are still standing remain an awe-inspiring sight, proof that when the Romans wanted something done, they just knuckled down and did it.
Long famed for its fine Augustinian abbey, handsome Hexham was awarded Country Life’s Best Market Town award for 2005, a fitting tribute to this bustling town interlinked with cobbled alleyways. It is the most substantial of the wall towns, with more restaurants, hotels and high-street shops than anywhere between Newcastle and Carlisle. The tourist office (652220; www.hadrianswallcountry.org; Wentworth Car Park; 9am-6pm Mon-Sat, 10am-5pm Sun mid-May–Oct, 10am-5pm Mon-Sat Oct–mid-May) is northeast of the town centre.
‘A strange and mystical island, ’ a local might whisper solemnly in your ear, suggesting even the possibility of magic. Holy Island is often referred to as an unearthly place, and while a lot of this talk is just that (and a little bit of bring-’em-in tourist bluster), there is something almost other-worldly about this small island (it’s only 2 sq miles). It’s tricky to get to, as it’s connected to the mainland by a narrow, glinting causeway that only appears at low tide. It’s also fiercely desolate and isolated, barely any different from when St Aidan came to what was then known as Lindisfarne to found a monastery in 635. As you cross the empty flats to get here, it’s not difficult to imagine the marauding Vikings that repeatedly sacked the settlement between 793 and 875, when the monks finally took the hint and left. They carried with them the illuminated Lindisfarne Gospels (now in the British Library in London) and the miraculously preserved body of St Cuthbert, who lived here for a couple of years but preferred the hermit’s life on Inner Farne. A priory was re-established in the 11th century but didn’t survive the dissolution in 1537.