Haltwhistle to Aesica Roman Fort and Housesteads

We were staying two nights at the Ashcroft Guest House which gave us a shorter walking day (though quite a lot of ups and downs!), the chance to explore Housesteads Roman Fort and - unexpectedly - the opportunity to follow a delightful short 'link' route which will fill a useful gap in our meanderings from home in Norfolk to the Scottish Border. These journeyings had reached Garrigill, south of Alston, and our plan had been to walk up the Pennine Way to near Greenhead on Hadrian's Wall. However, yesterday we realised that it might be better to follow the South Tyne Trail to Haltwhistle, then to use today's link from Haltwhistle to the Hadrian's Way Path and beyond. However it wasn't until today that we discovered the full delights of the link path.

After a lovely breakfast at Ashcroft Guest House, we headed back through Haltwhistle to the point at which we left Haltwhistle Burn yesterday. We walked back alongside the delightful wooded Burn, and today we kept going alongside the Burn past the point where we joined it yesterday. Although the path took us past industrial remains, including a chimney, it was in some ways difficult to imagine the bustling activity of coal mining, brick making and woollen mills in what is now a peaceful valley.

There was a lime kiln towards the top of the valley, and close to the remains of this, the path cut across open moorland to emerge onto the Military Road (the B6318). For anyone else looking for a link path from Haltwhistle to Hadrian's Wall, I would strongly advise you to go straight across the road and continue alongside Haltwhistle Burn to join Hadrian's Wall Path at Burnhead. However, we'd left the Path at Aesica Roman Fort yesterday, so we needed to return to the same place. This was quite easy to do on this occasion; we walked a short distance along the Military Road then turned right on the same farm road we had used yesterday. This took us back to Aesica Roman Fort; we sat down at the remains of the Temple we had stopped by yesterday to put on suncream etc., then we resumed our walk along the path. We soon reached Burnhead and Burnhead B&B (which gets glowing reviews and is right on the path, but our two nights in Haltwhistle worked well for us).

We continued alongside the wall on the roller-coaster ridge, passing remains of turrets,crossing the Caw Gap road  and eventually climbing to a triangulation point to top of Winshields Crags, at 1132 feet (345 metres) the highest point on the walk. There were lovely views in all directions, including the mesmerising well-known views to the crags ahead of us.  We could see Twice Brewed Inn and the Once Brewed National Park Centre and Youth hostel, in the process of being rebuilt, to the south. So what's with the names? Well, when the military road was being constructed in the 18th Century, a farmer established a small brewery here, but demand for beer outstripped supply, so he watered down the beer, leading his outraged customers to demand that it was brewed for a second time; "twice brewed". In contrast, rumour has it that when Lady Trevelyan was invited to open the Youth Hostel, she agreed with the proviso that only non-alcoholic beverages should ever be served here. So "once brewed" would be plenty strong enough...

We were approaching the Steel Rigg car park, and the number of other people was increasing. Past the car park, the eye is drawn to the famous view of Peel Crags with Crag Lough in the distance. But there were people everywhere. Initially it was amusing: We found a spot to stop for lunch and watched a (foreign) group being told all about Hadrian's Wall, and how they could touch it. They had 20 minutes or so and if they wanted they could climb up Peel Crags. Inevitably this meant that when we had finished our lunch and continued up to the top of Peel Crags, they were coming down, too fast and inappropriately equipped and prepared. I want to laugh but I should probably cry; these are quite steep little scrabbles and it seems amazing that people don't get hurt.

Similarly, as we descended to "Sycamore Gap" (where a sycamore tree sits in a gap), a man came climbing towards us with a whinging child some distance behind. The child then decided he wanted to return to his mother, who was picnicking by the tree. He simply turned round, pushed past me and scrambled down to the woman, who - along with the father - either didn't know what was going on, didn't understand the risks, or didn't care. I meanwhile had to hold back to avoid the danger of knocking the child and sending him tumbling. 

The final frustration was a group of teenagers who took great delight in walking along a section of path which was closed for 'recovery' purposes. Ah well, when they are grown up and I am either dead or a really grumpy old woman, if Hadrian's Wall Path is no more, it will be their own fault and I won't care... [and as a sad postscript  to what I wrote here in 2016: vandals cut down the Sycamore Gap tree in 2023.  It is thought that it will regrow, but it will take  about 150 years to get to a similar stature].

Past the end of the lake and the end of the crags, we turned left towards a house (Hotbank Farm). Again the views from here to Crag Lough were lovely. We continued alongside the wall past Hotbank Crags; there were fewer people about and the wind had got up; the walking felt somehow rougher. The Pennine Way, whose route we had been sharing since north of Greenhead, left us to continue on its journey north towards Kirk Yetholm. We meanwhile continued along Cuddy's Crags and Housesteads Crags to the Vercovicium Roman Fort, also known as Housesteads.

We are National Trust members but not currently members of English Heritage; fortunately either will do to get you free entrance to Housesteads. We started by visiting the little exhibition and watching the video about Roman life at the fort, which was interesting. Then we wandered around the fort itself, once a busy garrison of 800 men rather than a busy tourist attraction. Outside the fort walls there would have been a settlement of civilians and traders, and the remains of the settlement was visible too.

Because we had approached Housesteads from Hadrian's Wall, we hadn't arrived at the fort in the conventional direction i.e we hadn't walked up from the visitor centre and car park down by the B6318 (the military road). However we had to walk down to the visitor centre in order to catch the bus back to Haltwhistle and we had plenty of time to spare, which gave us time for an ice cream! We had some difficulty finding out where the bus went from. Everyone we asked said "in the middle of the car park". This is true, though they could perhaps have made it clearer that the bus stops apparently arbitrarily in the car park, but at the far distance from the visitor centre. It's quite a long way from the visitor centre, so if you were waiting there you might just miss the bus.

I'm talking here about the Hadrian's Wall Bus, the  AD122. It was rather expensive (£5 each for the journey back to Haltwhistle, which really isn't that far). However for that we got a commentary and a visit to the (outside of) the Vindolanda Fort, which we didn't have time to visit, but which everyone recommends. There is an archaeological dig going on at Vindolanda this summer and one of the archaeologists is staying at our B&B.