A Thanksgiving to Remember

We woke up early today and drove down to the coast to see the sunrise over Whitley Bay. We rolled down the windows and since the tide was out, the smell of the sea was strong and the gulls were circling loudly. I cried just a little; it's going to be hard to say goodbye to this beautiful coastline. Not to romanticize it too much: In the back seat the boys were like, "I'm cold! Can you roll up the window?" and "I'm hungy" and "Is this it? I'm bored." Ah, life with kids.

We drove back to the house for showers and breakfast and headed off to Hadrian's Wall for the day. We'd driven along it once before, but hadn't stopped because of the rain. (We were lightweights then.) Today we decided we'd walk a section of Hadrian's Wall, rain or shine.

Mike loves an open stretch of road so much, he pulled over to take a picture.

At a section of the wall at the Steel Rigg car park, near the town of Once Brewed.
The wall was built by the Romans in A.D. 122.

Our destination is Sycamore Gap, near the cliffs/water.

This stretch of the wall had four big climbs up and down. The boys did great!

The many easy walks along the ridge allowed us to catch our
breath after the steep climbs....

...just to lose it again at such breathtaking views!

Mike is thinking he might like to come back and hike the full 82 miles of the wall
for his 40th birthday. Sounds awesome. 

Merrit, our personal photographer. :)

More up-and-down climbs ahead. In the foreground: Ruins of a Roman outpost.

Sycamore Gap: We made it! Just one final descent and we're there!

Below, see the clip from the movie "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves" (yeah, saw this
about 999 times with Dawn Hill in high school/college). Can't believe I stood in the
same spot as Kevin Costner! Oh man, we used to crush on him. (Don't get it now.)

No deerhounds chasing Merrit today!

You can see why it's called Sycamore Gap.
Old well in the foreground.

Mike walked down the other side of the gap to take some pictures into the light.

This one is kinda cool. :)

After resting and playing for about an hour at the gap,
it was time to walk back to the car park. I don't know how
far the walk was; I'd bet it was about two to three miles, round-trip.

The wind was wild at certain peaks. Merrit is leaning against the wind in this pic.

Looking back at the gorgeous view and the wall along the ridge.

The hikers have worked up a nice appetite. This was a great little pub with
money from all over the world tacked over the bar and a large map literally
covered in pins from around the world. There were so many pins from the
southeastern U.S., there was no way we could have squeezed one more onto the
state of North Carolina!

Mike having a taste of a locally brewed cask ale.

The muddy, tired-out explorers warm up by the fire.

Windblown but loving this Thanksgiving day. 

Thankful for our time in England and for the beauty of God's creation.
And for my quirky family. 

Cragside

Welcome to the country home of Lord Armstrong. Wow, what a country home. While it was built as a two-story country lodge in 1863, it continued to be expanded and improved until Lord Armstrong passed away in 1900. As recently as 2007 - 2008, it was completely refurbished and its famous iron bridge restored to its former glory.

The boys and I on the iron bridge with Cragside in
the background. The path from the house to the bridge
was made up of steep rock stepping stones through
one of (said the guide book) Europe's largest rock gardens.

The rock gardens, on a steep slope down to the iron bridge.

What we already knew about Lord Armstrong is that he was an inventor and major benefactor to industry and philanthropy in England, particularly in the northeast. We learned this when we went to Bamburgh castle, which he bought when it was only partly renovated and finished the renovation.

Armstrong's country home, Cragside, used hydroelectric power to run a laundry machine, a rotisserie, and a hydraulic elevator. It later installed the first hydroelectric power station in the world, which powered a single (!) arc lamp in the gallery. 

Mike and Ollie in the art gallery.

One thing I loved about the interior of Cragside was how it was obvious that Lord Armstrong was a scientist at heart. Actually, it made me think of our little friend back in NC, Andrew, with his moth/butterfly collection in zip-lock bags. :) Armstrong had cases full of his collection of seashells and insects. There were taxidermied specimens of all sorts of birds (I think he particularly liked owls) under cloche jars. 

Seashell collection in case, flanked by birds of prey in cloche jars.
Marble busts and oil paintings, as well as early photographs and even
pen-and-ink caricatures were on display all around the house.

The other thing I really liked about the house was how it was "staged," if you will...as though someone still lived there; for example, opened newspapers and eyeglasses might be out on the side table in the grand room at the end of the gallery (see below). 

This impressive Italian marble fireplace was designed, crafted, transported, and
installed in 18 months to prepare for a visit from the Prince/Princess of
Wales. It weighs 10 tons, and had to be installed directly on top of the
mountain bedrock on which Cragside is built to support its weight.

Examples of this were found throughout the house--wooden toys on the floor in the childrens' rooms, crystal decanters half-full of scotch or some other amber liquid, Armstrong's microscope and specimen slides on the desk in his study--but my favorite signs of life were found in the series of rooms called the plunge bath, which was really about five rooms altogether. 

Going down the stone steps into the plunge bath.

A sauna with a cot for relaxing and fresh towels at the ready.

I'm reading the information sheet with one hand and
keeping Ollie from jumping into the Turkish-inspired
bath with the other.

Many of the objects in this room were souvenirs
from Armstrong's trip to Egypt. This house was
one of the first to have hot and cold indoor
plumbing (see faucet on the wall). 

 After we toured the house, we walked down through the rock garden,

...across the iron bridge,

...down a woodland path and past sheep fields, where we sat on a bench across from this view (below) and listened to the sound of the wind in the tops of the tall conifers, 

...up more stone steps,

...through a rabbit-proof gate,

...past the garden clock tower,

and into the formal garden.

What a view...

It must be said that most of the reason Cragside was so impressive was the weather. After a dreary morning, we packed a car-picnic (which has become our standby rainy day activity) and set off to find a pretty overlook. When we got to the Blyth seafront, the weather sort of lifted and, as we ate hot, sugary donuts from a beachside food truck (what a perfect way to finish off a picnic lunch!), we decided to keep driving north. I used my Trip Advisor iPhone app to see what attractions were nearby. Craigside was only 50 miles northwest. We were off.

The further north we drove, the more gorgeous the day became. We kept going up in elevation as we drove inland until we had just amazing panoramic views of sheep fields, cow pastures, and farmland crisscrossed with hedgerows and the most unreal expanses of sky. These are pictures taken from our moving car: