The North East of England

[Lat-Literal]

Part 4 - Lindisfarne to York via Berwick in Tweed

So I thought this section would be shorter and I am glad it isn't because it was my main reason for departing Old Coulsdon and I did it. It was short and yet it wasn't short. Anne Marie would have been proud of my spirit in her constituency but that is a take it or leave it affair. I can see where she is coming from - and a little surprised knowing what I now now that Mr Beith held on for so long - but doubtful about the people she supports. The man in the taxi was very pleasant but he may have been a bit different had he known he was talking to a hermitage fanatic. As we crossed onto the mainland, he spoke about Bamburgh and Dunstanburgh castles. I said that with respect it was a bit of a sore point as they were tantalisingly close but I couldn't get there or indeed do the wonderful walks this time around but I was very, very happy. I will say here what I think of the insights I have now had into the north Northumberland coast. I love it every bit as much as I had hoped. I have a real taste for it. It is just so far out from me. I haven't entirely ruled out future walking but if I were a younger man with no medical issues, I'd stay on the island for a while in a retreat. Shortly before we got back to Berwick, the driver - another man who can't cope with cities and loved the local countryside - said that it had been a difficult year for him. He had been diagnosed with cancer. "I'm so sorry to hear that" I said and added tentatively "and you are no age either". 40. These things happen. You just have to get on with it. That was his line. The chemo is not so bad and the medics are happy with his responses. "I thought chemo was very difficult - when did you have it?" "Ah no, the steroids are the worst of it. I've lost all me' hair. Two days ago. Had to be there for five hours. I'm jus' glad to be back now on these roads."

I doubt that Berwick as a town is pretty. I'm not so sure it is rough or even especially tough but I am very sure by instinct it is gritty. Near to the station, I thought there was football on but as I peered through failing eyes I didn't recognise the abbreviations although one said "Liv". I thought of Liverpool but that threw me. No, this it seems is ostensibly a rugby town - the likes of Hawick aren't that far away really - and culturally it has more than one foot in Scotland but not quite two feet. I am intrigued by it and came away from it thinking I could like it very much from the outskirts of the station side. It is a place which on paper stimulates the imagination and as the train pulled out and I chose to look inland, I was spellbound by the attractiveness of the countryside which surrounds it. On this day, and on balance, the wide range of people I met were - and as with everywhere there are exceptions - probably the best of the bunch on this break. I am moved by how one person's extremity is another's localism and he wouldn't wish to be anywhere else. I am going to say England because it is the only country I know fairly well, although there are still massive gaps, albeit many of the key ones for me now having been fast filled. I could equally say Britain. If I had a second life, I would want to spend more time in Scotland which has an immense coastline, see a bit more of Wales and venture into Northern Ireland. I won't have that and all I can say to my mother and others who wish they had seen more of abroad is that the language, the history, the food, the music and the differences in terrain all make other countries interesting.

However, you happen to have been born in a place where the scenery takes some beating. Hold onto that notion as I truly believe it. Politics and culture - they ebb and flow, alas often in seemingly a downward fashion - but to fashionably prefer elsewhere is at the very least doing our geography a disservice. If I am proud to have been born here, it is because of the nature of our wonderful islands at their most timeless. Obviously man - and woman - made more places accessible. With it all came risks and the necessity of constructing in certain ways. Some arrangements are short. Others are long. It might say a lot about me but that main north to south route is even today as scary as it is great. Fall asleep and rather than getting to where you are wanting to, you could end up in Edinburgh or London or even Penzance. There are fewer pressures in that sense but more limitations on a branch line.

I was very worried as we got past Newcastle that I would overshoot York and end up in Kings Cross. The bloke next to me said, on enquiry, that he would be getting out at York and now that I had given him permission he would happily give me a shove if I was out for the count. But I did stay awake. Sometimes I had to stick my nails into my hands in order to do so. One is more vulnerable in that situation. I just hoped that on exiting it would all be a bit more sedate. Luckily it was but then it was a Sunday and only 5.30pm. Ironically, I couldn't have gone out for a meal anyway as it was hard to put one foot in front of another on the way back to the Travelodge. For three hours, I was on the bed. I can't call it sleeping. It was an in and out weird dreamscape. Almost feverish. But later I got myself across to a Sainsbury's local and bought some chicken pieces, a pot of salad, fruit and a plastic knife, fork and spoon. Certainly it was more nutritious than the average eating out thing. It still felt a bit sad. What a terrific day, though, and checking out time on Monday wasn't until midday.

[Jonathan]

...another nearby - the Golden Ball or the Golden Slipper? We felt that they were for the locals which today in my mind could be an invitation to enter. My favourite went years go. The legendary, cosy and slightly unkempt John Bull which was leftist, perhaps surprisingly in view of its name, and a haven for folk and jazz types and all manner of other individuals, some a bit odd. It wasn't for everyone and it was way up beyond Foss Islands Road.

Indeed Lat-Literal - The Golden Ball used to be our local. It's a bit further down the same road as The Ackhorne, over the 5 crossroads and keep going. It's now a community pub and one of the receptionists from the garage I used to take the car to was a part time barman there. There is a band in there fairly frequently (or at least there was, when we lived nearby 4 years ago) and it's just got a nice atmosphere. I'd never heard of John Bull but we only moved to the York area in 2006 (and into York itself in 2008) so it had long gone by then.

[Lat-Literal]

Indeed Lat-Literal - The Golden Ball used to be our local. It's a bit further down the same road as The Ackhorne, over the 5 crossroads and keep going. It's now a community pub and one of the receptionists from the garage I used to take the car to was a part time barman there. There is a band in there fairly frequently (or at least there was, when we lived nearby 4 years ago) and it's just got a nice atmosphere. I'd never heard of John Bull but we only moved to the York area in 2006 (and into York itself in 2008) so it had long gone by then.

Thanks Jonathan. So I was approximately right. You say that you were living at/on Southbank. This is not a term with which I am familiar although, again, I am there or thereabouts. The internet implies that Southbank is Race course/Knavesmire ish but I would have thought from your descriptions that you were closer than that to the centre. Were you?

Neither of the two pubs you mention were in Camra's 1984 North Yorkshire guide. I have just checked and it would be another explanation as to why they were not on our radar. This was the period when some breweries had introduced real ale and others had not yet done so. In York, that distinction was most notable in the Sam Smith and John Smith chains. The two going way, way back had been competitive members of the same family - that's real history - but by the 1980s Sams were in the business of the real stuff and Johns were keeping to the 1970s line that it wouldn't ever take off in a substantial way. I mentioned Tetleys earlier - the beer; not the tea - which I seem to recall tasted slightly real while not being real but I may be wrong on that point. Not sure. None of this mentions what were then some stand out names including Theakstons, as they were and Timothy Taylor. It was said that there were 365 pubs in York - one for every day of the week. I wouldn't be at all surprised if in our three years we visited 150 ish but the claim which may have once been true always seemed a bit mythical. I have also heard it applied to other places. Incidentally, those two pubs are not in the 2018 UK Camra guide either but these days any inclusion is so haphazard.

On this visit, I was struck by the number of churches in York. On paper, it would be quite possible to base a trip on visiting these and it would be interesting but I fear that many would be padlocked as is the way now. On walking towards Lawrence Street, I also noticed the sign to the Early Music Centre. I knew where it was located, again approximately. But I wasn't quite sure if it was a place to which the public would at any time be given general admission. Additionally, I took Gavin Mist's e-mail address as it appears on the internet but it didn't seem like my visit coincided with events of the music appreciation society, although those, I think, are only monthly. Stanley - I will private message you on some aspects of this.

[Lat-Literal]

I have just realised that in the last 36 days (although I was away from home for just 17 nights : 5, 7, 2 and 3) I have been to: London, Lowestoft, Southwold, Cromer, Sheringham, Wells Next the Sea, Cley, Reading, Exeter, Liskeard, Looe, Polperro, Seaton, Lyme Regis, Crediton, Bow, Barnstaple, Ilfracombe, Mortehoe, Woolacombe, Ipswich, East Bergholt, Flatford, Dedham, Manningtree, Brantham, Colchester, Shenfield, Hockley, Canewdon, York, Durham, Newcastle, Monkseaton, Whitley Bay, Tynemouth, Berwick and Lindisfarne.

I must be raving mad.

[Lat-Literal]

Day 4 - Monday -

Part 1 - Travelodge, York to "Campus East"

The good thing about having an unusually late checking out time along with a train ticket for no earlier than 11.30pm is that it is possible to have a morning of activities if able to get up early. After breakfast, I was out of the hotel by 7.30am and with no need to carry a rucksack, walked along a part of the city walls. It was sunny but there was a sun early autumnal feel to the morning as people were starting to head off to work. Perhaps here more than at any other time, York seemed to be more like the York of old. It is how I remember it most at the beginning of any new academic year when there is a distinctive feeling of sounds around all the bustle being slightly dulled and something indefinably unique about the air in this part of the north. Next I got on a bus to the other side of the city. Having missed the chance to see Campus East on Friday, this I decided was the time to do it. Its initial appearance was simply flabbergasting. I just didn't know what to make of it because actually I couldn't believe it but my reaction was not what one could call positive so far as I could comprehend it.

Across the extensive car parks, it was the tallest buildings which caught the eye. These are a part of the new version of Goodricke College now that the Goodricke buildings on what was "the campus" have been demolished and that entire area turned into James College. They are very far from being skyscrapers but when I think of the university's architecture historically, low level buildings would be a phrase that would come early to me in any description. Consequently, I felt initially that this new campus was not at all in keeping with its style. The other striking aspects were of the extent of building on the new site and the sense that it felt windswept in a bleakish, slightly remote, sort of way which perhaps the old campus had done to an extent when we were there but now the tables had been turned. This took it all a step further while simultaneously the original site had become if anything cosier in its architectural atmosphere even if that was offset by new "corporate" leanings. One could have been forgiven for thinking that Campus East was a hospital or a business park.

In the hour and a half that I spent there, some of these early assessments changed along with the idea that there was nobody actually there. Well, that is not quite true. I suppose in my first 30 minutes of walking it I spotted about 15 other people. That added to the strangeness of it and it couldn't merely be explained away on the basis that the term might not quite have started yet. The first person I did encounter was so nicely bizarre that he hardly seemed real. It was the voice I was aware of first. A "can I help you mate?" in the broadest of York accents anyone could muster. On seeing him, I would have said he was around 68, facially he looked like he had had the hardest of lives and in a different context I would have been in no doubt that he was a tramp as they used to be in past times. But he was leaving one of the many student accommodation buildings and healthily getting onto a bicycle as if he were 19. I just couldn't work out who he was or what his role might have been - student, lecturer, professor, porter, an adopted down and out...….I haven't a clue. I said that I was back at the university after many years and just looking at what had been built. It was, I said, all hard to take in. "It's alright over 'ere actually", he cackled, "all lovely and clean".

From the slight severity of Goodricke one moves into what might be termed "business central". Massive buildings which were the homes to the law school, computer science and television and media which looked like it could easily house BBC North and one called something like "the catalyst" or "the hub" although it wasn't quite either of those things which presumably is to promote cross-disciplinary approaches and innovative thinking. All the while, not a soul around. One could have heard a pin drop. On moving next towards the new Langwith College, there is, though, truly a bit of a "wow factor". Oh my God. It's another lake. Ducks happily swimming and quacking around. Well, yes, and as the maps subsequently reveal it is a larger lake than the one on the original campus which as much as anything perhaps was notable for making that campus distinctive. Beyond it, one sees and indeed reads from noticeboards the efforts that have gone into making it significant for nature and in its tranquillity it is all rather beautiful. The buildings at the new Langwith College turned out to be reassuringly more in the style of the old Langwith and Goodricke, albeit updated, so those then provided another plus on the plus and minus sheet. The third college, Constantine, is new and seemed reasonable enough. A bit neither here nor there, maybe, and more on a limb though towards the new sports centre. A thought flashed across the mind. There is still a lot of space here. This may be Campus East today and arguably secondary to Campus West as it is now but this could ultimately be the centre of the entire university. Is that the plan?

[Lat-Literal]

Part 2 - Reflections : "Campus East"

The return journey to home commenced slowly from Constantine. Very slowly. On returning to the area where new Langwith meets new Goodricke, I became aware of two further gigantic buildings which from outside appearances seemed similar in role, albeit being virtually opposite each other, although I am sure their distinctive purposes are clear to those in the know. These are The Piazza and the Ron Todd Hub. Both appeared to do food and drink. Both appeared to have large numbers of meeting rooms and even conference rooms although I could be wrong on these points. Certainly the latter does. From the signs outside it, it appeared to be open to the general public so I walked in. The ground floor café area, if it could be called that, is cavernous. Breathtakingly so. I reckon at most there were four other individuals in there, all were on their own wearing headphones and all were probably students. I asked the woman serving there if a member of the public like me could buy a coffee. Her reply was "anyone who is willing to give us their money......we are open to you all". And as I took my seat probably 30 odd feet away from the closest other person, I looked up and could see all of the rooms upstairs which they clearly hire out regularly to private companies. I was thinking "now, this reminds me so much of something but what is it, what is it?" and then it all became crystal clear. It reminded me of the massive modern wing of the UN Palais des Nations in Geneva where I used to drink my coffee on committee breaks. It doubled the size of that particular affair and was all paid for with Soviet Union money.

On taking my coffee cup back to the counter to save her from walking the equivalent to, say, Osbaldwick, I said to the woman "this might be a funny question but where is everybody?" She gave me an old fashioned look. "Probably still in bed - I don't know - I've only just started working over here". I knew that this was about as much change as I was going to get from her. So I left via a glance at a stand of leaflets designed for the students - mostly dull in the extreme and to me at least oblique other than the one asking for demonstrations against "Israeli fascists" and not one but several in Chinese. It transpired that being at the bus stops some time after 9am was the way in which to go from one extreme to another. Buses rolled in as if it were a bus station, a free shuttle apparently for the students. It is, after all further from the city centre but mostly they were being used so that they didn't have to walk the 15 minutes between West and East. I have never, ever, seen so many students in one small place in my life. Literally hundreds were running off from or onto these things, all serious looking to the point of appearing miserable, and heading off to what for them wasn't so much academia as the daily workplace. It was actually a great opportunity to get a better grasp of the range of people there. Yes, there were a lot of Far Eastern people but there were a lot of all other kinds there too. One thing that struck me was that probably the women outnumbered the men by two to one whereas in the 1980s those figures might well have been in reverse. But, of course, later one reads the other stats. The university's population has increased from possibly 4,000 in our time to over 18,000 people. That fourfold increase has very much been replicated at most other universities across the country.

One can see how it all pans out in the round. The British contingent was effectively doubled by the Blair Governments. One further quarter comes from the EU and the other quarter is non EU, predominantly Chinese, at a time when in fact the numbers from India and similar are falling. People will tell you that there are university buildings all over the city now though they are not clearly labelled. Halifax, the only official college that I didn't see and which I think is viewed as "Campus South", was built in the interim. 2001. I had assumed it was peripheral. It is actually the one which has the greatest number of students - some 6,000. I do think there are some issues here. One might question if it is healthy for a university population to represent one sixth of any place's total population. I have today read that in Durham where there are precisely the same trends that there is a genuine worry and annoyance that the non-university population is becoming outnumbered. Such things have social and cultural implications, especially if and when done rapidly. They also have political implications so as to lead me to the conclusion today that we may need separate political constituencies for groups of universities. One further shift is interesting. Given the profit making motive, it is certainly the case that universities are more accessible now to the general public than they often were in the 1980s. Our group - we were a little unusual.

That is, we made a point of going to them when the campus would have said to them symbolically in many ways "we don't especially want you coming to us". Consequently, we were in the city itself a lot. The reception wasn't always great. There was an understandable element whose attitude was "bloody students". Often it came via a joke which may or may not have had meaning. On this break, I found that the very idea of me once having been a student there was in the main responded to with acute frostiness. That said little about me and it said a lot about today. Beyond the numbers, the problem, I think, is that the sort of new openness in these newer style universities is not of a character that is easily welcomed by average members of the public. It speaks to them of big business. In doing so, it may well inadvertently rub in aspects of the economic crash. Culturally the gap is if anything getting considerably wider and, actually, not least because culture itself is now so diluted and lacking in prioritisation that it doesn't have the means to provide a stronger old style bridge.

[Lat-Literal]

Part 3 - "Campus East" to Old Coulsdon

On getting on the return bus, I was the only one who had to pay, Students barged past behind me without showing their passes until the driver's patience was tested beyond the point of tolerance. "Now hold on love, just stand there behind this man for a moment, there is a queue you know". Further along the road before Heslington, some old women on sticks stuck their arms out and looked pained as we flew past their stop. The bus was full so it was just plain hard luck that they couldn't walk up to the first stop at the university. I suppose on the other side of the coin, more buses probably now come along. In the city centre, York - what shall we say? - "Inner" looked absolutely magnificent. People were getting into their working and leisure days. The sun was shining. The atmosphere was so good that I looked around at the people and the environment and felt that if one has to be in an urban area this was still in such moments the best one. Just before the market - it is an extension of it really and it has been for three years - there are a few specially made sheds containing food and drink shops with tables and chairs under umbrellas. I think it thinks it is the Turkish quarter but it is ostensibly cosmopolitan and it has a lovely feel. I had a coffee there before going to the station to get my first train. I was at the larger version of it between Kings Cross and St Pancras in just over two hours. The walk across to St Pancras is so easy and the Thameslink train came quickly. It also travelled at speed and, ultimately going to Gatwick Airport, I am sure it is being given priority. I got a bus from Purley to Old Coulsdon where I did some basic shopping and then walked for another ten minutes to home. I was back by 3.30pm. In total, it was four hours for considerably more than 200 miles but it could have been cut down to three and a half hours with minor adjustments. A quicker changeover. A cab from Purley. No shopping. That is also a very big change since the 1980s. It is also a minor miracle.

[Serial_Apologist]

For me the great thing about getting back home is always, however, the relief of finding that it is still there.

Most interesting personal travelogue, and a labour of love, for which many thanks, Lat.

[gradus]

For me the great thing about getting back home is always, however, the relief of finding that it is still there.

Most interesting personal travelogue, and a labour of love, for which many thanks, Lat.

Me too.
By the way S_A as a teenager I used to deliver beer, wine and spirits on a bike for Victoria Wine around Denmark Hill, Red Post Hill and surrounding area, thanks for the opportunity to revisit memories.

[Cockney Sparrow]

Harking back to the Northumberland Coast - if anyone is visiting in future, you could check the site of the Northumbrian Pipe and Fiddle duo Andrew and Margaret Watchorn for their occasional concerts on Lindisfarne and a few other venues.

http://www.pipesandfiddle.co.uk/index.html

[Serial_Apologist]

Me too.
By the way S_A as a teenager I used to deliver beer, wine and spirits on a bike for Victoria Wine around Denmark Hill, Red Post Hill and surrounding area, thanks for the opportunity to revisit memories.

PM me if you happen to be in the 'hood, gradus.

[HighlandDougie]

Lats

As ever, deeply grateful that you have taken the time to share experiences which we can try to live through, if only vicariously. You really ought to try Scoterland (as they say in Osaka etc) next.

[Lat-Literal]

Lats

As ever, deeply grateful that you have taken the time to share experiences which we can try to live through, if only vicariously. You really ought to try Scoterland (as they say in Osaka etc) next.

Thank you to all very much for your kind comments.

I know it went on a bit!

[Lat-Literal]

I would welcome comments from other people on the following.

In no particular order:

1. The best sections of walking on the Northumbrian coast
2. The merits or otherwise of the town of Berwick on Tweed and the countryside around it
3. North East mining and shipbuilding museums, especially small ones
4. The main orientation around Newcastle actual - all the key points that would be described as central
5. Any parts of the County Durham coast that might be worth exploring plus any inland rural walking
6. Durham University - are the grounds sufficiently interesting for someone who is simply visiting there?
7. Witton Gilbert and Langley Park

Also Anton, I would be interested to hear if you live in Tynemouth as I wasn't sure on that point.

I have to say that what is being skipped in my thoughts here, much as most of Teesside which I have visited tends to be skipped in favour of North Yorkshire, is the south of Tyneside, Sunderland and similar because my identification, such as it is, is with the north of the Tyne. But I am wondering if this is wholly fair and whether there are aspects there about which I should keep an open mind? Either side of this trip, there was some confusion on recalling Lindisfarne's "Sunderland Boys". It didn't make sense to me given that Alan Hull was from Benwell, Ray Jackson was from Wallsend and its writer Rod Clements was from North Shields. I'm still not sure what to make of this - but they didn't seem to have a problem with it!

[teamsaint]

I have just realised that in the last 36 days (although I was away from home for just 17 nights : 5, 7, 2 and 3) I have been to: London, Lowestoft, Southwold, Cromer, Sheringham, Wells Next the Sea, Cley, Reading, Exeter, Liskeard, Looe, Polperro, Seaton, Lyme Regis, Crediton, Bow, Barnstaple, Ilfracombe, Mortehoe, Woolacombe, Ipswich, East Bergholt, Flatford, Dedham, Manningtree, Brantham, Colchester, Shenfield, Hockley, Canewdon, York, Durham, Newcastle, Monkseaton, Whitley Bay, Tynemouth, Berwick and Lindisfarne.

I must be raving mad.

You’d be a sales managers dream, Lat.