Day 4 (June 27th) – Bamburgh to Fenwick (13 miles)
Even though our plan was to walk to Fenwick on our fourth day, we left our ‘destination car’ at Belford, 6 miles short of Fenwick – the reason being that Gilli had felt quite tired by the end of the previous day, and wasn’t sure that she would be able to make it the whole distance (since she lives relatively just over the Scottish border, she at least had the option of coming back later to complete any section of the path she didn’t complete during our week together). Then we headed back to Bamburgh to start the day’s walk.
The weather forecast was for sun, and we were not disappointed – the weather was beautiful as we started out. After passing the golf course, we were treated to some lovely views of Lindisfarne (a.k.a. Holy Island) in the distance. We had a nice rest on some well-situated benches near Budle Bay, then headed inland – the next sections of the hike would take us away from the shoreline for a time. We slightly misplaced the path for a little while, which resulted in a longer-than-ideal walk along a busy road, but then we were moving westward through fields and woods. We passed through some beautiful wooded areas as we approached Spindlestone Mill, and encountered some hungry and hopeful (but ultimately disappointed) horses. Beyond Spindlestone, we passed the “Ducket”, an old dovecot converted to a holiday cottage, which looked like an interesting if isolated spot for a vacation. Moving through gradually ascending fields, including one that warned of a bull in the field (he wasn’t obviously visible anywhere close to our path, to our relief – unlike the one we encountered during our 2016 walk of St. Cuthbert’s Way), we eventually reached the railway lines that run up to Berwick and on to Edinburgh. This is a very busy line, so we had to call the signalman to get the go-ahead to cross – Allan was our official designated caller. We did in fact have to wait a few minutes until two trains passed, and then we were clear to cross – we had to call again on the other side to indicate that we had made it across safely. After that it was a fairly straightforward stroll into Belford.
Gilli was doing well enough that she felt she would be able to complete the final 6 miles after a rest, so she and some of our party now got a long break in a lovely tea shop while Allan and I moved cars — first driving back to Bamburgh to pick up our car there, then to Fenwick to drop a car there, and finally back to Belford. This all took a while, so we got a rather late start on the final section of the day’s walk. Once more we found ourselves ascending through fields, before getting a little confused again by the directions in the guide – what exactly is an “escarpment” anyway, and when you have to go along “the woodland edge,” which woodland is being referred to, and which edge are we walking along? Luckily there was one clear instruction, which was to go toward a telecommunications mast in the distance, so once we located the mast we were fine. After another long ascent through woods, we finally came over the top of Fawcet Hill and joined the St. Cuthbert’s Way path, which runs together with the Northumberland Coast Path for the next stretch – so we would be on familiar territory for the rest of the day! The final few miles were beautiful and relatively easy, as we descended through woods and along “Dolly Gibson’s Lonnen” (which was far less muddy than the last time we walked that way!) before arriving into Fenwick via the road. At this point we have walked 50 miles, and have just one day to go!
