I've been busy working on my competition tea cosies this week and have literally just finished stitching it all together. I just need to take a nice photo or two and email it off to the magazine. I'll show it to you next time. But today, here are a few of my holiday snaps, with just a tiny bit of accompanying text. (I've resized them to save you waiting all day for them to load!!)
First up, the light house at Whitley Bay
This is somewhere on the edge of the Northumberland National Park.
This is at Gibbet Point - as in Hangman's Gibbet. It was very peaceful and you could see for miles.
Some of the locals!
We saw this shop while were out for a drive (I forget the town, sorry) and it made me think of Arkwright from Open all Hours, so I just had to take a picture!!
We spent a lovely day at Cragside - the view as you arrived looked like a mini Switzerland. Very picturesque. It was a lovely place and well worth the visit - I can thoroughly recommend it.
We stopped for a chat with a gentleman tending his garden in the house you can see on the hillside - he said he's been living there for 30 years and loves it. I can quite understand why!
This was the "big house" on the estate. A mixture of styles I thought - almost designed with the tourist in mind. In fact, none of the literature we looked at said who had built it or when, so I really think someone had the idea of building a tourist attraction in the early 1900's. Good on 'im!
We kept hearing bees near the house and thought there must be a swarm in a tree but then we spotted them around the chimneys!! This is on full zoom -
Driving through the countryside was lovely - the fields were small and many had dry stone walls, or hedges that were in flower. Very different from the HUGE fields we see down here.
We had a visit into Newcastle - this is the Millennium Bridge -
Walking around, I was surprised to see so many old buildings - fabulous architecture.
We had a flying visit to Lindisfarne Island as you have to watch the tide times. It was a pity we didn't have longer there as there was plenty to see and we only managed a fraction. Never mind, another time.
I like this shot of ancient and modern at the Priory ruins -
We took the Coast Road going home that day and went past Bamburgh Castle. I do love a castle and really want to go back to see this properly, rather than just a drive past, we didn't even park!!
And the beaches... They were breathtaking! And they were empty!! This shot is about 11am on a Sunday morning. It was a little breezy but wasn't cold.
If this was "down south" it would have been absolutely packed with barely an inch between one persons beach towel and the next!!
This was the only family on the beach. And I reckon they weren't locals either!!
In the odd spot on the beach, there were little patches of black "grit", which on closer inspection turned out to be coal! Apparently, back in the days of coal files, locals used to collect it and dry it for using on the fire.
Too soon it was time to go home and I got back on the train for another long journey - with my crochet! I sat looking through my photos on the camera for a few minutes as we left the station and glanced up to see the Angel of the North! I managed to get a quick snap - lucky I had my camera in my hand or I wouldn't have got it out in time.
And finally, this is the little collections of shells and stones I brought back with me. I was surprised by how dark the limpets were as they are very pale down here. Perhaps they evolved that way to blend in with the coal on the beach ??? There were lots of very red and pink stones too. The big pebbles have pink stripes as well as white - I'll have to ask a friend what causes the colouring as they were very unusual.
The stripey blanket I was making on the train is now finished and I just need to take some pics for a ta-dah reveal, then I can get back to my Cyclamen Shade Waistcoat. I keep seeing lots of fabulous blankets on Instagram and I'm now itching to go wool shopping ready to make an adult sized blanket!! And yesterday I bought THIS, as if I didn't have enough patterns.
But I also have the beautiful hand-dyed wool I bought in Ring-a-Rosie Yarns.... I mentioned last time the shawl I've decided on. Oh, so many projects and so little time!!!
Speaking of which, I'd better get on with something!! Til next time, T x
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