Northumberland Adventures

At home, it looks like either the rioters got caught, deterred, or simply have been rained out. There are a number of jokes going around about so-called fair-weather-rioters, also that they looted Tesco in Liverpool, while they had slightly higher ambitions in Birmingham and went for the Armani Store... Either way, as you probably know already, the mayhem from last week has largely stopped and my immediate area luckily did not get affected.

In any case, last weekend had more than one reason to get out of town so C and yours truly met in the "Jolly Fisherman" pub in Craster, Northumberland on Friday. From there we went for a short walk to Dunstaburgh Castle, which was built in the 14th century by a king's cousin to prove that he was just as important as the king himself. Unfortunately, the castle, as imposing as it might have been, had no strategic value whatsoever. In fact, it was making faces at us and made us laugh:

There are a lot more castles in the area, such as this one - less funny but more like an imposing and still occupied family home:

We stuck around the area on Saturday, with a few beach walks and the like, but then headed inland and a little closer to home on Sunday, to investigate another one of those building follys. I am sure you have heard about Hadrian's Wall, where a Roman Emperor got fed up with the Scots and built a wall across the entire island to keep them out. It took about 5000 men to guard this border, with 'mile castles' at every roman mile (just under an English mile today), two turrets in between each mile castle, and a fully occupied fort every 5 miles or so. Quite impressive once you go and see it. The wall actually was in operation for a few hundred years and eventually got abandoned when the Romans ran out of money or simply needed their men elsewhere. 

Here are a few impressions of a roman fort that is now a museum, for example an antique under-floor heating system: 

Not bad, I would say. I was also impressed by the 1900-year-old bathroom, which could to be very competitive with the hygiene in some of today's men's rooms around the area:

I particularly liked the idea of three (!) separate water basins: one to wash underneath (inlet is at the far left), some basins to wash your hands, and a small running water line all around the place to wash out any sponges you might be using. Very impressive. 

I will close with a few of Hadrian's wall in today's state - much lower than it once used to be and without any Roman legoins guarding it, but nevertheless ...