26th June                  Lindisfarne - Scottish Borders

Robyn writes: A busy day today! We've been really enjoying the Berwick area and have been really lucky with the weather for most of the time. This morning we were up at around 7.30 to another lovely, clear day, and much warmer than the 5 degrees that had been forecast (it was more like 15 degrees by the time we got out). We got ourselves organised to get out a bit earlier than normal, as we were planning to go over to the Holy Island - Lindisfarne.

 Lindisfarne Priory

Looking towards the castle from the priory

It's really dependent on tide times, as the island can only be accessed by a causeway across the sea at low tide. Today's safe tide times were from around 6.30am to 1.15pm, though they warn you should factor in a half hour safety buffer each side. As Lindisfarne Castle and Priory don't open until 10, we knew it wasn't much point in going too early, so we got over there at about 10 to 9, parked (4 pounds 40, not cheap!) and went off to explore the village a bit. It's a lovely little village, very pretty. We went and had a look at St Mary's church and the Lindisfarne Priory next to it - although the priory wasn't open until 10, it is in ruins and it was fairly easy to see it all anyway! The monks were there from the 600s and it was established by St Aidan and followed by St Cuthbert. In later years the vikings were very fond of raiding such a rich priory so St Cuthbert's remains were moved to Durham Cathedral. You could see that it was an incredibly imposing building in its day (the ruins date back to the 1100s, I think).

 Lex on the path up to the castle

 Wonderful views from the top of the castle

 

By now it was nearly 10 so we started heading up the hill towards the castle, incompany with heaps of other pilgrims/tourists! It's run by the National Trust, so we got in for free.The castle is built on the site of an old military castle/fort which dates back to the mid-1500s. In the early 1900s, it was turned into a wonderful holiday home and is still dressed as it was in Edwardian times. It's quite wonderful to see how the old fort was incorporated into a home perched incredibly high on an island hill! The view is, of course, to die for. We really enjoyed our look around the castle, then decided to set off for a walk along the coast at the top of the island.
We must have walked for several miles out and around a lake area; it took well over an hour and I was starting to fret about how long it would take to get back to the village (thinking of the 1.15 tidal deadline!) It was a lovely day for walking, at least, nice and warm and around 18 degrees with a light breeze. In the end, we were back in the village at about 12, so made a clear and easy exit from the island. We called in at the Spar supermarket at the Haggerston Castle Holiday Village to get some bread rolls then headed home for lunch.

After lunch, we went for a drive back across to the Scottish Border country to find some more of my ancestral family villages. We visited Swinton, Duns, Bonkyl Church and Allanbank/Allanton insearch of family names. I'll do a full post next week with family history info for my Thompson rellies, but I did find several graves for the Purves/Hately families, and we saw some beautiful countryside. I really liked the town of Duns, which has a really nice feel. We had a lovely afternoon tea in a little teahouse there.

Finally, we came home via Tesco's in Berwick where we got petrol and a few groceries. It was good to get home, get tea organised and now of course Wimbledon is on the TV (2 channels of it!), it's quarter to 9 and the sun is still shining. At the moment, Pat Cash is interviewing a group of rabid Aussie fans at the tennis!