Warkworth Castle, Northumberland

Posted on 30 November 2024 by Katrina

So here we are back at Warkworth Castle in Northumberland, it’s a great place to visit but isn’t so accessible for disabled people like many of these places. It’s owned/run by English Heritage, it was owned by the Percy family in Tudor times. You can see my previous post here.

Parts of it are covered but others are open to the elements. I must say that the stonework looks in really good shape.

Below is quite a grand staircase.

But the stairs below aren’t for the faint hearted.

Below is a really lovely part of the castle which is roofed, it’s a sort of ante room and I can imagine people millling about in it chatting, and sitting on the window seats.

I really admire vaulted rooms although I’m always a wee bit nervous of them, I have to remind myself they’ve been good for centuries so are unlikely to fall on me!

I spotted this teeny wee iron lion rampant badge from the bottom of a flight of stairs, it seems to have been set above what looks like a stone sink, but it might have been a cupboard. The lion rampant was the Percy family’s emblem/badge, but is of course better known as Scotland’s emblem.

Below is a view of Warkworth village taken from just outside the castle. It’s a lovely wee place with plenty of eateries, but we were on our way further south so didn’t have much time to spend exploring the place, we spent so much time in the castle.

Warkworth Castle, Northumberland, England

Posted on 15 November 2024 by Katrina

A couple of weeks ago we were away in the north-east of England, just for a few days, seeing places we hadn’t visited before and catching up with old friends who live there. We had a great time, and the weather behaved itself beautifully, apart from heavy rain for about 15 minutes as we got to Seaton Delaval, an English National Trust property near Whitley Bay.

But it was Warkworth Castle that we visited first as we stopped off on our way down south. It’s a ruin, but a very impressive one. It was the home of the Percy family, I must admit that I didn’t realise that the Percys originated from Scotland with the first Earl being a son of King David of Scotland who gave it to his youngest son. That solves the mystery of why they have the Scottish symbol of the lion rampant everywhere. In fact when we were in a Carlisle bookshop I overheard two men talking about a local historian who believed that Scotland went all the way to the Lake District, and they agreed. One shopkeeper who enjoys holidays in Scotland told me that she thought that Scotland was like the Lake District – on steroids!

The setting of the castle couldn’t be better to my mind anyway, as you can see from the view below, through the remains of a large window.

There’s also a great view of the River Coquet from the other side of the castle.

There are really two separate ruins, with the one above being in much better condition than the one below as you can see.

I took quite a lot of photos, but I’ll leave it at that for the moment. If you ever find yourself in Northumberland and you enjoy a good castle/ruin you should definitely visit Warkworth, the village at the foot of the castle is very quaint, obviously a destination as it has lots of eateries.

The Church of Our Lady, Seaton Delaval, Northumberland

Posted on 7 November 2024 by Katrina

While we were in the north-east of England last month we visited Seaton Delaval Hall, which is quite an amazing place, part almost ruin and part stately home. The guide asked us if we were interested in seeing the ancient church, and he advised us to go straight there as that part of the estate closed at 4.00 pm.

The Church of Our Lady is as far as I can see just as it was when it was built, as far as the building is concerned anyway. It was consecrated by the Bishop of Durham in 1102. Although I’m not religious I appreciate the beauty and tranquility of the place. It’s a wee gem of Norman architecture, with a bit of Anglo Saxon apparently.

When reading the information sheet I was particularly amazed to see that they have a rare stained glass window depicting Prince Arthur Tudor, (below) Henry VIII’s older brother who of course died soon after his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. How different things would have been if he hadn’t died young, without issue. No need for a Henry VIII and six wives! No Elizabeth I of England. No imprisoned and executed Mary, Queen of Scots.

It’s definitely worth a visit if you are in the neighbourhood.

A Mithraic Temple, Carrawburgh, Northumberland

Posted on 19 August 2021 by Katrina

After we visited the Roman fort at Chesters we drove on to see the remains of a Mithraic temple which is in the middle of a field. I have to say though that the temple itself isn’t very well signposted, so we ended up yomping over a field full of indignant sheep towards what was definitely a ruin in the distance, but that turned out to be the ruin of a farm building. Oh well, it was all good exercise and we gave the sheep something else to think about other than grass!

We eventually got on the right track, the signpost was on a small fencepost just the width of the wood, so about 3 inches square.

This is the road by the car park at Carrawburgh, Northumberland, as you can see the road is very straight so presumably this was originally the Roman road.

The temple is quite small but as the god Mithras was popular with soldiers it was probably quite well used by the men at Chesters Fort.

</scri

You can read about Mithras here.

The middle column of the altar has a stone offerings dish and visitors have been leaving coins, sweets and a big piece of wood as worshippers would have done. I was a really big spender and offered up 2 pence!

Chesters Roman Fort part 2

Posted on 12 August 2021 by Katrina

The ruins that you can see in the distance below are what remains of the camp commandant’s house. As you can see the area that the fort is set in is scenic but I imagine it would have looked a bit different in Roman times, nearly 2,000 years ago, however the land here was very fertile even back then it seems and was able to provide enough in the way of crops for humans and horses. The fort was known to the Romans as Cilurnum.

Closer up you can imagine that it must have been a lot more comfortable than any of the other accommodation, and at least he had central heating, I think the bricks are part of that system.

The floor below would have had a mosaic pattern on it I’m sure, but what can be seen in the photo are the supports of the floor.

Annoyingly I don’t seem to have an info board photo for the commandant’s house, but the HQ info board below is quite interesting.

But as you can see there isn’t much left of it nowadays.

You need a good imagination!

The info board below gives you an idea of how grand and imposing this area would have been – all to keep those barbarians from the north out!

St Nicholas, Churchyard, Cramlington, Northumberland

Posted on 31 May 2021 by Katrina

Last week we decided to visit some friends down in the north-east of England, now that we’re allowed to travel outside our immediate area again. Cramlington Village was one of the places we wanted to visit down there as Jack has a very old book with his great-grandfather’s name written in it – in copperplate – Armstrong Besford, Cramlington. Sadly he didn’t write his whole address. Anyway, we made for Cramlington which seems to have expanded a lot in recent years, but we reached the old village, parked the car and had a walk around the St Nicholas Church graveyard, in the hope that we might find a family gravestone there, and Jack found it! The church dates from 1868 but many of the gravestones were older than that, obviously the original older church had been built onto in Victorian times, as often happened.

I must admit I thought it might be a bit unlikely as Armstrong moved to Scotland, I thought maybe the whole family had.

Anyway, the gravestone tells the story of what happened to John Besford. He was run over by a train on Stannington viaduct!! The mind boggles. You can imagine how devastating that must have been for the family though, and his wee daughter followed him just a year later. Annie was obviously a bad luck name for that family as the Annie in the following generation also died very young, that was Jack’s granny’s older sister.

It drives me mad that gravestones in England only have a woman’s married surname on it. In Scotland we traditionally put the woman’s maiden name on the inscription. An old English friend of mine had assumed that none of the women were actually married to the ‘husbands’ in the inscriptions. As if – in Presbyterian Scotland! Having the woman’s maiden name there makes it so much more interesting and easier for people tracing family trees.

Anyway, it was interesting to know a bit more about family history, it’s a shame we couldn’t get into the church though.

Cragside, Northumberland

Posted on 18 September 2015 by Katrina

On our way back up from our trip to the English Midlands in August we stopped off at Cragside in Northumberland again, it’s a National Trust property. The first time we went there we didn’t have time to visit the formal gardens, so we rectified that this time. It was a gorgeous day and there were loads of visitors there, but it was still possible to enjoy the beauty of the place. If you want to see my previous post on Cragside have a look here, here and here.

The houses in the photo above are estate houses which seem to be available for holiday rentals.

This display of sedums is very Victorian and labour intensive but very effective.

There’s a cute wee clocktower above the sedum display. You can see more images of Cragside here.

And the photo above is of the surrounding countryside, looking over to the small town of Rothbury, which was also very busy with tourists and is definitely worth a look as it has some nice independent shops. We didn’t manage to get past the old fashioned sweetie shop, all those sweetie jars just yelled at us to come in and buy, and the door was propped wide open too, we had no chance of eschewing them, we just had to chew!

Wooler, Northumberland

Posted on 10 December 2012 by Katrina

When we travelled down to England during the October holidays we passed a sign which pointed to the town of Wooler, it was described as a medieval market town. I thought it sounded lovely so we decided to take a look at the place when we were on our way back home. So after visiting Cragside we stopped off to take a look at Wooler, and here it is, well the main street anyway. If you’re interested in its history have a look here.

As you can see it’s just a typical stone built town, quite Scottish looking although it’s actually on the English side of the border, well it’s English now but it’s the sort of place which was always being fought over. We couldn’t find any signs of any medieval buildings, if they’re there they’re well hidden. But the surrounding countryside is lovely, have a look at their community website here to see some more of the area.

Although the town doesn’t look too promising shop wise I did start my Christmas shopping here in one of the several gift/antiques shops, and the owner was very friendly. She told us that it was Wooler weather, in other words the wind was absolutely freezing, a feature of the town apparently. There is a second-hand bookshop too, but sadly it was closed, I suspect we’ll be going to Wooler again when we go back to visit Cragside.

Cragside, Northumberland again

Posted on 5 December 2012 by Katrina

This is the lake at the entrance road which leads to Cragside in Northumberland. I think it’s called Tumbleton Lake and is man-made but it’s very pretty anyway.

And this one was taken on the terrace leading to the woodland walk which leads down to the power house which made the hydro-electricity for the house.

This part of the garden is just below the house, you walk through a rockery which leads down to the woodland walk. It’s a great place for kids to scramble around in, and bigger people too.

This was just a fallen tree but as you can see, part of it has been carved into an image of a Green Man. I think it looks fantastic and really quite scary. I wish I had been able to see the artist at work on it.

I think that’s just about all of the photos I took at Cragside. We’ll definitely be going back again because we want to see the gardens at their best, well I do and I don’t suppose Jack will complain. As it was October when we were there and we were actually on our way back home to Scotland and a bit pushed for time we didn’t even bother going to see the formal gardens, deciding that it would be best to see the plants in the spring or summer. So we plan to go there again next year. Meanwhile I’ll be popping the vitamins and keeping to my walking regime to be in optimum shape for it, you have to be quite fit to tackle the grounds, especially when it’s muddy underfoot which just about everywhere has been this year!

Cragside, Northumberland – again

Posted on 27 November 2012 by Katrina

I just managed to get this photo of the kitchen at Cragside with nobody in it, there must have been 40 people milling about the place, and there’s certainly plenty to see in the way of Victorian gadgets jelly moulds and copper. As you can see there are two kitchen ranges to deal with all the entertaining that they had to cope with, not to mention all the servants who would have been getting fed there too.

I can’t remember what this room was called but I would call it the living-room, the inscription above the fireplace is EAST OR WEST HAME’S BEST – which is fair enough I suppose. The fire is in a lovely comfy alcove with stained glass panels either side of it, as you can see, all very Arts and Crafts design.

And here is the other side of it, there are wooden settees either side of the fireplace too and I imagine that the place would have been full of dogs when the house was a home.

Another bedroom, this time with some of the clothes which would have been worn in the house’s Victorian heyday. On the table there were bits and pieces of sewing, just as if the original owner had left the room for a short time and was going to be coming back and taking it up where she left off.

Yet more stained glass, this time it was situated on a wide landing.
You can just see the very Victorian heavily embossed wallpaper, the bottom of the walls are covered with tiles.

And just as a wee taster, here’s a bit of the beautiful gardens, the burn running through it is quite a torrent and I can see why Armstrong decided to harness all that energy and use it to light the house. You can read about Lord Armstrong here.

Pining for the West

Meanderings about recipes, books, craft and more

Tag Archives: Northumberland