Hadrian's wall

The August bank holiday is the last long weekend of the year and that had to be used sensibly. C picked me up from work on Friday evening, from where we headed north to Darlington. This town was not our final destination, but chosen because it is more or less exactly three hours drive from Cambridge (enough for Friday evening on British roads) AND it has a parkrun.

The next morning, having run our 5k laps around the park, we headed further north to Northumbria, where we camped just below Hadrian's wall - the 'northernmost frontier of the Roman Empire'...

Somewhere along the way, C discovered by accident the delights of taking photographs while twisting the camera (works best in lowish light conditions and without a flash). Some good times were had trying to develop and improve our technique with these shorts. Here is a C-twist picture ... 

We had agreed to meet up with our friend L who is actually from this area, so on Sunday we went for a long one-way hike along the wall where we had great adventures hanging out with the locals: 

And, of course, not to be missed, jumping photos on Hadrian's wall

Finally, a huge thank you to L's parents who drove us back and fed us dinner (and lots of Whisky!). It was a comprehensively great day and a great evening too! 

Today we met up with L again and went to Vindolanda - an old Roman fort & village which is being excavated by a private trust. This place is wonderful to visit and see, the only slightly weird issue was that our tour guide (and any of the documentation) completely neglected to mention that there is a second Roman fort a mere two miles away, which is of identical size. From looking at the satellite pictures, both forts actually seem to have an identical building plan. The only difference seems to be that one is owned by the national trust and the other by a private trust ...