2023 England and Edinburgh Day 8: Alnwick Castle and Finishing the Drive to Edinburgh

The Cookie Jar's Bistro was the site for our quiet breakfast room, where we both enjoyed a continental breakfast (as we still didn't have much appetite for a hot breakfast) Corn flakes and toast for me, fruit, yogurt, and toast for E. Nice char on the toast – well done, English!

Alnwick Castle surprisingly wonderful. Arrived as gates were opening at 10A (making the long 100 ft? walk from our hotel). Quick detour to wrong area – the kids section devoted to living Harry Potter-ish adventures, since Alnwick featured in HP 1 and 2 – then finally found the inner bailey where we met the 1030A history tour. Very interesting! Landscape by Capability Brown incredible to see (and to think about the “making of” too). Post-tour we took in several other parts of the castle, including the public rooms of the Percy family home, the wall walk, and a couple of the towers. Had lunch there, where they had both a generic café as well as a fryery.

Statue of Harry Hotspur, who was (probably) born at Alwnick Castle. An heir of the powerful Percy family, he supported the usurper Henry Bolingbroke (later Henry IV) before rebelling and ultimately being killed by Henry V.

A view of Alwnick Castle from the Outer Bailey.  In the original design, the mound that the castle sits on would have been more obvious, for it would have been surrounded by a deep and steep dry moat filled with (among other things) stakes and other obstacles.

Walls around the Outer Bailey.  The Abbot's Tower, nestled in the corner, is now the Museum of the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers.

Many of the tower battlements have statues on them.  They are unusual in the fact that each statue is unique and performing an action that would have been appropriate for a castle inhabitant.

The entrance to the residence off the Inner Bailey.  We met our guide here for our tour of the exterior of the tower.  Following the tour we went inside, where no cameras could be used, to see where the Percy family lived (and still lives).

Around the top of the towers are both more statues and, under the battlements, coats of arms.  Essentially, those shields represented both Percy allies plus those they had defeated.  They were declaring to all comers the scope of their power by displaying these.  The shield between the two towers is the royal coat of arms, showing yet another powerful ally (when they weren't in rebellion, of course).

A picture from the river side of the castle.  The river was moved away from the castle around the 1780s by Capability Brown, but prior to that was much closer - perhaps near the foreground wall.  As such, it would have represented yet another formidable obstacle to anyone trying to capture the castle.  Although the castle changed hands several time in history, it was never taken by force.

The nine half-round towers were a later addition to the castle and increased its defensive capabilities because the rounded projections would have increased fields of fire for archers.

In the late 1700s the landscape architect Capability Brown completely changed the surroundings.  Dozens (hundreds?) of small patchwork farms would removed, the land leveled off (or hills created for landscaping purposes), the river moved, and every tree carefully planted with an eye to creating viewing lanes or blocking views.  Everything in this shot, back to the horizon, was part of Brown's work.

I believe this was a photo showing a later, Victorian-era addition, which included a library on the second floor.

A view of the main castle taken from the Wall Walk along the Inner Bailey.  The lower green area in the right foreground would have once been the home of the castle kitchens - the black streaks running up the walks are remnants of smoke from the kitchen fires.

A broader view of the Inner Bailey.  On this particular day we could have spoken to some of the construction/renovation experts at the popup tents.  In original use, this whole area would have been used as a field for military drill, plus it would have house a market and lots of bustling activities where the peasants would have taken part in castle life.

Decided that Alnwick Gardens would be lost on us, and the Bailiffgate Museum, immediately next door to the hotel (aka 40 feet from our car) didn’t hold any interest, so we got a headstart of our trip to Edinburgh. Debated whether we’d have enough gas to get there (we did). Journey took about 100 minutes, and we pulled into town during a light rain which had visibility at “early dusk” levels. Managed to not get flummoxed by Waze directions – which was good as driving to Waverley means driving on and around the Royal Mile and there was a LOT of road construction happening, including a detour around the street we were supposed to use. Had we missed one of the turns it would have meant a lot of extra work.

Finally got into New St Car Park/Rental Car Return and dropped car off w/o fuss. We apparently had 1/16th of a tank left – which was probably still good for another 30 miles or so. Rolled our suitcases up a couple of blocks and arrived at The Inn on the Mile. Room is nice, although not as luxurious as The Cookie Jar nor as warm as the Radisson York – but still nice.

When I booked the room I'd had a "treat yo-self" moment and purchased this bottle of Prosecco along with some chocolate cookies.  Both were waiting for us in our room when we arrived.

Our bedroom.  Those two windows looked out directly onto Lawnmarket AKA The Royal Mile.  As we were on the corner there was another window behind me looking out on South Bridge Road.

The bathroom.  Sadly, couldn't figure out how to get the towel warming rack to work!

The view immediately outside our window

We relaxed in the room before heading downstairs to their restaurant, which I’d booked the night before. We kinda snuck into the booking as most of the restaurant was booked for a group of tourists around about 7P – but we scheduled for 630P (and went down at 620P in case we wanted to duck out before tourists descended). I’d book here because a) I figured we might not want to tramp up/down the mile our first night and b) the Inn had a true Sunday Roast, and I wanted my Yorkshire Pudding. So I was crushed when they started off telling us all the things they were out of, which included the Yorkshire Pudding and all red wines by the glass. Sigh. So I ended up with a burger (boring) and Eileen with their Meat Pie of the Day (sans top crust, which they were also out of)!

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2023 England and Edinburgh Day 7: Beamish Open Air Museum and Brinkburn Priory

Having slept poorly the previous night we both managed a good night’s sleep this time. Our room had the World’s Smallest Shower. It was even smaller than the small showers we’ve had on some of the cruise ships. It was so small that I was forced to use the house-supplied soap and shampoo, as there was no room for me to bend over to pick my stuff up off the shower floor.

We went down for breakfast where I had a barely adequate Eggs Benedict while E opted for fruit and toast. While packing up back in our bedroom we had another moment in common with the last hotel – the fire alarm went off! Guess it REALLY is time to go! As we were heading downstairs with our suitcases the alarm turned off, and at the bar we were told that someone had burned some toast.

We drove over to Beamish Open Air Museum – for a place that opens at 10A, it was already busy when we arrived. We were quite surprised at the scope and scale of this place. There was a lot of stuff to see and a huge staff of costumed interpreters everywhere. I thought the staff might have been high because we were there on the weekend, but when I asked I was assured that they have about 400 employees and they are fully staffed 364 days of the year! We had a delightful time!

The main entry to Beamish.  They had a VERY large car park, which was already bustling when we arrived at the nominal opening time.

This was, IIRC, inside an 1840's middle-class farmhouse, in what would have been the master bedroom.  I took almost no pictures at Beamish.  I was started to get tired of taking pictures...

On this day they had a number of horse-drawn conveyances out.  This was a special thing on the day we were there that is not part of normal operations.  You can walk around Beamish (but distances are deceptively long and involve very steep hills), take one of the vintage omnibuses, or hop on the electric trolley that circles the museum on the tracks seen here.

We grabbed a coffee shop sandwich on our way out around 130P and drove to Brinkburn Priory and Manor House, sharing bites of the sandwich on our way there. Brinkburn is out of the way and (probably) not very popular. I chose it simply because it was one of the few attractions that was naturally on our path between Beamish and Alnwick.  There was only one other car in the carpark when we arrived, although we saw a bunch in the “staff” lot – many of which turned out to not be staff. There was a wedding Open House for folks considering booking the site for their wedding, and many of those “staff” cars were folks who considered it their right to park there rather than where us commoners had to park. They had a nice small guide book which was nice, but there was only about 45 minutes needed to exhaust everything they had to offer, so we were quickly back on the road around 3P heading for Alnwick and The Cookie Jar. We grabbed a random parking spot on the street and only then noticed that we’d parked immediately in front of the hotel!

Details from some of the windows at Brinkburn Priory.  The attached manor house is basically an empty shell with plywood covered floors.  Although I'm sure they have plans to renovate it seems like Brinkburn is likely low on the spending priority list for the National Trust and it wouldn't shock me if another decade passes before anything happens.

I was struck by the sight of plants growing on the low roof of the Priory.

Everything about The Cookie Jar was lovingly done. A lot of thought went into the design of all the interiors that we saw with an eye to elegance and comfort. There was a very nice reception area with a couple of common sitting rooms. We received a quick apology that their bistro was totally booked for the evening and that they hoped we had other dinner arrangements elsewhere. The receptionist took us up to our room and showed us key things, like how to control the towel heater and the bathroom fan, both of which we probably would not have figure out. Our window overlooked the castle and was far and away the best room of the entire trip. Fresh cookies in a jar on our desk. A nice little booklet telling the history of the building – it had been a convent from 1880-1985.

The quite posh bathroom at The Cookie Jar.  I suspect the nuns never had it this good.

The view of Alnwick castle from our bedroom.  Ancestral home of the power Percy family, they still use it as their residence (at least, when they are in Alnwick) and undertake constant renovations and repairs.  

A street scene in Alnwick.  We're on our way to The Market Tavern for dinner.

This is basically shot from just outside the entrance to The Cookie Jar.  Yeah, we stayed this close to the castle.  There's a gate just off the right side of the photo that is the main entry to the castle.

I called the restaurant I had preselected as our destination for the night (Lilburns)…all found them booked up!! I called our backup restaurant – ditto! End up with pub/steakhouse (Market Tavern/Steakhouse) that could take us, but no later than 530P – which I was glad to take given the rejections I’d just experienced. Not the best meal in the world – we both did steaks – but we had a good time.

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2023 England and Edinburgh Day 6: Georgian Theatre Royal and Durham Cathedral

We both slept poorly again, so dragged ourselves and our small appetites down from breakfast. E had pastries and toast while I opted for (thick) porridge with honey and a strawberry compote (which I ate around) for breakfast. While eating the fire alarm went off and whooped for about 15-20 seconds – “the basement is NOT on fire” our waitress assured us. Well that’s nice to hear.

After breakfast we packed up again and drove to Richmond where we found street parking that, coincidentally and appropriately, was directly in front of the Richmond Theatrical Society offices. From there we walked the short distance over to Georgian Theatre Royal where we found ourselves with a private tour of the theater. Was kind of funny to hear the operators having the same challenges as any other theater company – we shared some of our experiences with our guide. When we finished there were a half dozen folks in the lobby who had arrived to take the tour immediately after ours. 

A recreation of the original footlights at the theater.  These candles would be placed in bowls of water to enhance the illumination via reflectivity and then hoisted up to stage level.  The (tiny) orchestra pit is on the other side of this.  Out of view, just to the left of the guide, was the working trap door elevator used to lift an actor up through the stage floor.  In design and construction it was almost a exact copy of the elevator Hal Stephens built for our Iolanthe of so many years ago.

The oldest known surviving scenic elements in the UK.  These small (about 2' wide by ~7' tall) beautifully painted flats would be slotted into wooden tracks on either side of the stage and could be slid in/out of view for scene changes.  There were 4 tracks (still present), each with three slots, located OSL and OSR of the stage, allowing for up to 12 different scenes to be preset.  

The backdrop corresponding to the flats.

Our curiosity fulfilled, we then drove to Durham, making a stop at a Services turnoff along the way to add about 11L gas (about 2.5 gallons). We decided to do this on the way since the quick on/quick off access of the motorway services would be easier to navigate than trying to fill up at a station in Durham.

Pre-trip planning really paid off for Durham. In late June I realized that our plan for the Castle and/or Cathedral required parking in a place where there’s, frankly, no parking. Darn those tiny little medieval lanes! So I quickly reviewed their websites and concluded that the best solution was to use Durham’s Park and Ride system which is designed for just this issue. Basically, the city runs three different parking sites, one of which (the delightfully-named Sniperly Park and Ride) was very close to The Kingsbridge Inn, where we were planning to stay while overnight in Durham. So we’d park the car upon arriving in Durham, grab the bus that ran every 15 minutes, and make the short ride to be dropped off at Durham Market Square at the north end of the peninsula where the good stuff was. We’d have about a 10 minute walk to the Cathedral, but since we’d be getting to the area around lunchtime it was a good excuse to stop at Bell’s Fish Shop for our only (officially) scheduled F&C luncheon.

Some of the statues of Durham Market Square, as we're walking to lunch at Bells Fish.  The closer statue is Neptune, while the horse and rider is of Charles Vane.  Yeah, I don't know who that was, either.

The building labeled "Town Hall" is apparently the town hall.  See how I'm using context cues to draw conclusions as to what is around us?

A closer look at Charles Vane.  I assume he's the dude, but maybe he's the horse?

Got into Durham and drove straight to the park and ride where we caught one of the buses into the central core of Durham. From there we walked to Bells. At Bell’s we had a choice between restaurant and takeout…uh, I mean takeaway. Since we’re now old farts we decided for the more sedate pace of a sit-down restaurant. While waiting for our food I pulled out my phone and purchased tickets to a guided tour of the cathedral, as we’d realized from our experiences at York that having a guide made the experience so much more rewarding. Our food was quickly delivered (Cod for E and haddock for me) and we had more than enough time to eat, pay, and make the short walk to Durham Cathedral, arriving about 20 minutes before the tour was scheduled to start. 

Heading toward the Cathedral (and College) after lunch.  Even on this narrow street there were a small number of cars working through the crowds.  

As we got closer the street got a bit narrower and the slope got a tiny bit steeper.  Although a lot of umbrellas are in view, the "rain" was no more than a few drops.  It was mostly just a constant "damp" rather than "rain".  This was pretty consistent weather throughout the trip.  Although we had our 3-in-1 jackets we most commonly used just the rain shell as it wasn't 100% necessary to use the fleece, too.  I wore my fleece mostly because it was easier than carrying it, not because I really needed it.

The view as we approached the Cathedral.  One of the main College buildings is off to the right.  There was some kind of Open House event going on today for the College.  We're not sure if it was for prospective students to see the place or it was move-in day for the current term, but we did see a small handful of meeters and greeters at various locations we passed.  It is next to impossible to tell what functions different buildings had - we might have been passing lecture halls, dorms, offices, or apartments.  It just wasn't clear to us.

About to enter the Cathedral.  It is about 110P and we have a ticket for a tour that is slated to start at 130P.

I don't recall what this was a picture of.  Since we haven't yet gone into the Cathedral it is possible that I spun around and took a picture of the College, or this is some other corner of the Cathedral.

We slowly walked around for about 10 minutes before deciding to make a bathroom stop, after which we joined our tour group. Oddly, we were never asked to show proof that we had purchased tickets. This was another excellent tour. They were quite busy – there were at least 2 other tours running concurrent with ours, including one that was obviously a bunch of school kids on an outing.

During the tour the guide happened to make a passing comment that implied that student housing at Durham College was a challenge for everyone. It happened to be an Open House for students on the day we were there – or perhaps it was move in day? We weren’t sure. But it was an interesting thought to wonder how housing was handled.

We wandered a bit aimlessly in the 15 minutes prior to our tour, so this was a pretty window that I have no information about.

There were a lot of people milling about, but I wouldn't call the Cathedral "crowded".  By going in mid-September we managed to avoid a lot of the tourist crush.  Nice!

Several of the columns at Durham have simple geometric designs in them.  These were apparently carved at the quarry, and then shipped to the cathedral for reassembly onsite.  The guide mentioned that a builder had told her that this meant there was a whole lot of waste material that they did not have to deal with at the building site - all the debris would have been left at the quarry. 

There was a significant development in building mechanics during the construction, which can (barely) be seen here.  The oldest arches in the church, seen on the right side of the photo in the foreground, are rounded Roman arches with their carved tracery.  Just beyond that, on the other side of the decorated column, is a newer Norman arch, which comes to a peak.  Norman arches can support more weight than Roman arches and are what allowed for things like vaulted roofs.  From context clues such as these historians and archaeologists can pinpoint when various parts of the building were built.

A memorial found in a random aisle.  Everywhere you go you see (at least) a memorial to World War I, and most places have multiple memorials.

Prior Castel's clock, the only wooden object known to have survived the Civil War.  The building was used by Cromwell to house Scottish POWs, who burned most things for warmth.  The story (most likely apocryphal) is that Scots didn't burn the clock because there's a large carved (Scottish) thistle adorning the top of it.  In all likelihood the clock was probably hidden in storage.  The clock originally had only a single hand, which is why there are only 3 divisions between each number.  The hand would indicate x:00, x:15, x:30, and x:45 rather than individual minute intervals.

Part of the pipes for the great organ.  There are apparently more than 4600 pipes.

We're about to enter into the tomb of St Cuthbert.  The wall plaques list all the church officials through history.  Thomas Wolsey's name makes a surprise appearance - he was Bishop here during the days of Henry VIII, although he apparently never visited.

The grave of St Cuthbert.  The statue depicts St Cuthbert holding St Oswald's head.  Oswald's head was, indeed, buried alongside Cuthbert.  Cuthbert's statue lost its own head during the Civil War, when it was sawed off.

This is the newest window.  It was installed in 2019 as a memorial to a university student who had died unexpectedly.

The tomb of the Venerable Bede.  Bede had no real association with Durham, having been a monk from Jarrow.  However, in about 1000 a Durham-based monk was determined to bring as many notable Northumbrians to Durham as possible.  He visited Jarrow and essentially stole Bede's remains from there.

In tribute and memorium to the Durham Light Infantry

A better view of Neptune, taken on our way back to the park and ride bus stop

Anyway, we eventually made our way back to pick up the bus that would return us to the park and ride to get our car. Lots of traffic. While it was only about 330P we think it might have been the start of local rush hour. Retrieving the car, we drove over to Kingslodge Inn, missing one turn but not a big deal. Big onsite car park. Checked in at bar and get key to room 8 – again! We were in room 8 last night at the Royal Oak Hotel in Ripon, too. 

Relaxing in our room at The Kingslodge Inn before heading for dinner.  We both had our phones and tablets with us.  Additionally, I had taken my laptop so I could have easier browser access.  This turned out to be a smart choice!

Our room

A view of the car park from our room.  This was, by far, the largest onsite car park we had access to.  

We reviewed our various dinner choice and confirmed that we were OK with the ½ mile walk and eventually set off for dinner at Gusstos, crossing the river. There was an Interesting water feature we saw from the bridge – it seemed more decorative than functional, although who knows?. Since we were a few minutes early we walked a (very) short distance past restaurant to the end of block and were amazed to discover we were back at where the park and ride bus had dropped us off for the cathedral! No idea we were THAT close! Dinner, consisting of several tapas choices, was good but not great – but we remained happy with our choices.

Post-dinner we popped into a Tesco Express store that was next door and bought two varieties of biscuits to take back to the room with us. E got some kind of Lemon Ginger sandwich cookie while I got milk chocolate covered sugar cookies. As we were walking out of the central dining street where we’ve just eaten we were struck by how dark it is. Another US/UK diff – in the US this whole street would have been brightly lit and all the restaurants would have been spilling light onto the street, even if subdued. Here, if you aren’t paying attention you could easily think your restaurant is closed.

A view of (I think) Durham College as we're walking to dinner.  For some reason I didn't really have a good sense of the geography of Durham.  We were stunned to discover that dinner was just a stone's throw from Market Square - so hadn't really registered the idea that we were walking in the direction of the Castle and Cathedral at this time of the evening.

A view from the bridge over the river.  Whether or not the water feature back there was functional or purely decorative was unknown.

And now here's the Cathedral peeking over the ridge as we're walking to dinner.  Once again, it isn't registering on my brain that our walk is taking us right back to where we'd spent the afternoon.

And here was are, post-dinner, having just come out of the Tesco store that was next to the restaurant, and realizing that we're on the other side of Durham Market Square compared to earlier in the day.  The Durham Town Council is just to the left of that tower.  We couldn't believe how close Kinglodge Inn was to this place!

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