I had a diary malfunction (that's my excuse) for the 16th, so the meeting passed me by! I will be taking the Caravan and stopping at Nunnykirk, so will meet you all at the Bellingham Bunkhouse.

Meeting Places

Since we are all arriving in Newcastle at different times it might be sensible to nominate possible meeting places on the way to Bellingham. George Stephenson's Cottage is about an hour out of Newcastle along Route 72/Hadrian's Way, half a mile before Wylam. National Trust, £2.35 to see his birthplace, no charge to go in the cafe.

There is a cafe at the golf club on the way out of Hexham, just before R72 crosses the railway line.

There will be plenty of opportunity to see each other on the long, 10 mile, 200m, climb from Fourstones to Vindolanda.

This really is the summit

The cafe at Vindolanda would be a nice place to stop, but there doesn't seem to be any way in without paying the £8 or so entrance fee.

Beyond the pubs at Once Brewed/Twice Brewed there does not seem to be anywhere to stop before Kielder forest and Bellingham.

Incidentally, I have fitted a larger rear sproket (15 instead or 14 teeth) to my Brompton and stress-tested it along R72 between Carlisle and Newcastle. I also found out the hard way that too much faith should not be placed in Sustrans routing or Ordnance Survey gradient arrows.

For example the route via Bardon Mill drops 50m from Henshaw, which means an extra 50m climbing to get to Vindolanda. And the black arrow on the climb from Henshaw may be 14% but it is a very short distance to walk. The direct route does mean crossing the busy A69. but it is no worse than main roads in Derby. Anyway, I avoided the long uphill Sustrans loop before Hexham, between Fourstones and Bridge End.

Look forward to seeing you all Thursday, 7.30pm in the Brunswick.

Just to confirm

See my comment in the previous post about Wooler now just for one night. This should mean we are booked as follows:


Monday 25th and Tuesday 26th May at Bellingham booked by Shawn
Wednesday 27th May at Wooler booked by me
Thursday 28th May at Beal booked by Clyde
Friday 29th May at Amble booked by Maldwyn.


Logistics for travel and rendez-vous have yet to be arranged as the window for advanced rail bookings is not yet open. Perhaps one more meeting would be an idea to finalise arrangements (and maybe have a drink??). Clyde has suggested that he will be in UK on Thursday 16th April. Would that be convenient? - we could use the Brunswick again as it was OK last time and is near to bus and train stations.

Anybody fancy a variation on our planned trip?

I wonder if this cunning plan will find favour with any of you. After staying just one night at Wooler, we could continue on NCR68 up to Berwick (47.63 km according to Mapometer), and then ride 24.06 km on NCR1 down to Holy Island. There are (in principle - I haven't checked availability yet) some B&Bs and a pub in a village called Lowick, which is very close to the island. Prices of singles and twins work out at £27, £30 or £35 pp, depending on the place. The next day's ride would be 75.04 km to Amble. This leaves all the distances at much the same as they are with a Woller-HI-Wooler return trip, ie at about 75 km or less. The island itself could be accessed at the end of the ride from Berwick (up till late evening, or sunset to be realistic! - we could have a drink or a meal there before going back to the mainland and turning in at our hostelry) or in the morning of 29 May (up till 11:00 according to the table). What do you think? I will make tentative enquiries at the Lowick places - it could be they are booked!

Holy Island safe crossing times

This comes from the Northumberland CC website:

Mon	25	11:05 until 19:35	19:35 until 23:20	23:20 until 08:00 (Tue)	08:00 (Tue) until 11:45 (Tue)
Tue	26	11:45 until 20:35	20:35 until 00:05 (Wed)	00:05 (Wed) until 09:00 (Wed)	09:00 (Wed) until 12:40 (Wed)
Wed	27	00:05 until 09:00	09:00 until 12:40	12:40 until 21:35	21:35 until 01:10 (Thu)
Thu	28	01:10 until 10:00	10:00 until 13:45	13:45 until 22:35	22:35 until 02:20 (Fri)
Fri	29	02:20 until 11:00	11:00 until 15:00	15:00 until 23:25	23:25 until 03:35 (Sat)
Sat	30	03:35 until 11:50	11:50 until 16:10	16:10 until 00:00 (Sun)	00:00 (Sun) until 04:40 (Sun)
Sun	31	04:40 until 12:25	12:25 until 17:15	17:15 until 00:35 (Mon)	00:35 (Mon) until 05:40 (Mon)

Green is safe, red unsafe (as you'd expect)

Trains to Carlisle

Shawn:

The May Bank Holiday Monday, 4 May, timetable is now available.
Not looking good if similar engineering work is repeated on the Spring Bank Holiday Monday.
No through trains from Crewe apart from a 7.32, price has gone up as well
No trains from Crewe on the Sunday other than via Manchester.
East Coast route to Newcastle seems unaffected and may be cheaper.

If all else fails we could still leave early Saturday morning and be in Carlisle by Sunday night, only 200 miles?

Just 3 weeks to find out what adventures the 25 May timetable offers!

Garmin Connect - Bellingham to Keilder and back

Garmin Connect - Bellingham to Keilder and back

How does this look guys? I am just trying out drawing a route on Garmin Connect. Can you see it? Try clicking on Garmin Connect. Can you  transfer it to your Garmin Device? Let me know and try a route or two of your own to share and comment on.

 I cannot upload Mapometer files to the Garmin so writing routes on Garmin connect might be easier for sharing. What does everyone think?