North and South (of England)

Often, I take courses to further my research and teaching. Occasionally, those courses are held in other countries. This year, my course was held in the country where my beloved sister and her husband live. So it was off to Merry Old England for a week-long course in sixteenth-century typography at the London Rare Book School. It was riveting. I swear I have perfectly normal interests and hobbies!

With my sister and brother-in-law at York Minster

But before I learned about kerns, serifs, and fallen type, I got to spend a week with my sister and brother-in-law in Durham, visiting nearby castles and cathedrals and ruined abbeys. It was windy and occasionally rainy and I couldn’t have enjoyed it more.

Durham (the one in England, not the one in North Carolina)

Durham Castle was, sadly, closed to the public because it was graduation week for the university. (Why do they need the whole castle for the whole week??)

As close as I could get to Durham Castle

But I did get to visit the imposing clifftop cathedral, built in the twelfth century.

Durham Cathedral

Note the varied patterns on the pillars!

From Durham, we took day trips to other stunning sites in the area, starting with Alnwick Castle. Have a go at saying that name aloud; I’ll wait. If you correctly guessed “Annick,” you are far smarter than me.

Alnwick Castle, one-time home of Harry "Hotspur" Percy, for you Shakespeare fans

 

Aside from its refusal to acknowledge all the consonants in its name, Alnwick is one of the most interesting places in the North of England. It has gorgeous flower gardens…

I've never seen so many delphiniums!

 

…threatening statues on the ramparts… 

Don't attack Alnwick Castle!

…and a poison garden. That’s right: it’s got a garden made up entirely of plants that want to kill you. Or get you high.
 

Giant hogweed, which causes severe burns for up to seven years after exposure

Cannabis, which, unlike the hogweed, they keep in a cage

After Alnwick, we spent a day in York, probably my favorite city in England.

York Oratory, with the Minster in the background

The ruins of St. Mary's Abbey

 

I’d been to York several times but had never taken the Chocolate Story Tour. As a chocolate fan, I have to say I recommend it! York is the home of Rowntree, the company that brought us Kit Kats and Aero Bars. It’s hard to go wrong with a history like that.

The tour's double attraction: history and lots of chocolate!

Next up was Bamburgh Castle, which has been a fortification since the Anglo-Saxon period (which you know if you watch The Last Kingdom, where it goes by its historic name, Bebbanburg).

 

The pedestrian approach to Bamburgh Castle

Yes, they have absolutely jumped on the Last Kingdom bandwagon

One of the things I liked about Bamburgh is that, even though it’s a tourist destination, it’s not as crowded as the places near London. So instead of being hurried from room to room for the sake of crowd control, we could linger wherever something caught our interest.

A cheeky gargoyle

Our last stop in the North was Holy Island, a magical place you can only access between high tides. 

The Holy Island Causeway at low tide

 The signs warn you what can happen if you try to cross when the road is flooded.

"Warning: This could be you." The photo is of a flooded car.

On Holy Island are the ruins of Lindisfarne Monastery, home to St. Cuthbert, the patron saint of Northumbria. The shocking raid on the monastery in 793 is now often cited as the beginning of the Viking Age.

Lindisfarne Monastery

The ruins don’t date from that time, though; the monastery was rebuilt in the Norman period and only fell to ruin after the Dissolution in the sixteenth century.

The cross at the top of St. Mary's Church, seen through the monastery ruins

A half-hour’s walk from the monastery is Lindisfarne Castle, which dates to the sixteenth century itself.
 

Lindisfarne Castle

But the inside is fitted up to look as it did a hundred years ago when it was a retreat for artists. The writer Lytton Strachey seems not to have enjoyed the place very much: they have quotes from him all over the castle, complaining about the wind and the wet.

The desk in Lytton Strachey's room

 

After our adventures in Northumbria, my sister and I took the train south for London Rare Book School (she was taking a different course but at the same time, so we had a week of very nerdy fun together). 

Senate House Library, home of LRBS classes

We didn’t have a lot of time for sight-seeing, so mostly I took pictures of interesting buildings when we were walking from place to place.

Seven Dials at night

 

A vacant building given over to green space

Whimsical chimneys on Chancery Lane

Our last adventure (for this trip) was a visit to Leigh-on-Sea, hosted by my sister’s very kind extended in-laws. There we explored Belfair Wood…

Two roads diverged in a [green] wood....

…and Old Leigh…

High Street in Old Leigh

 …and the beaches along the Thames estuary.

Cockle boats on the mud flats at low tide

I couldn’t think of a better way to end my time in England. We had a little taste of everything, north to south, urban to rural. I can’t wait to visit again.