Coast & Castles Day 2 - Amble to Berwick-Upon-Tweed
With the alarm going off at 7.30, I was awoken to the sound of an 80 year old miner with emphysema and a heavy cold trying to evacuate his lungs, sorry, I mean a very poorly Frankie…He hadn’t had a good night and was feeling much worse than yesterday. Knowing today was the tougher of the 2 days (10 miles further and 3 times the climbing…) things weren’t looking good. Before we went down for breakfast, we had a look at the options. 1. Ride to Bamburgh (30ish miles) get the train to Berwick from Chathill. Only there are no trains from Chathill on a Sunday. 2. Ride to Alnmouth (8 miles) get the train to Berwick. No trains this Sunday, rail replacement bus service, bikes not allowed. 3. Get a bus from anywhere to Berwick. No bikes allowed on any bus service. 4. Frankie had to grit his teeth, use his stoic superpower and just try and get on with it, with the possibility of a taxi from Seahouses to Berwick when and if we get there. Option 4 it was then!
To further darken the mood, the coffee machine in the hostel provided Frankie with, and I quote, “the worst fucking cup of coffee I’ve ever had” and a self service breakfast of toast and cereal and we were out and ready to set off for 9am as we knew we might need the extra time today. I further pissed him off by not being able to find the start of the route as we cocked around the harbour at Amble before taking to the road instead to Walkworth and its magnificent castle.
Following quiet roads with me giving quiet encouragement to Frankie who was coping admirably with his streaming nose and hacking cough, we were in and through Boulmer and past the big RAF base with a quick photo stop for the phantom fighter parked at the entrance. As I was saying that considering it entered service in 1969 it looked remarkably modern, Frankie pointed out it was, in fact, a relentless killing machine probably responsible for many deaths…it was a good indication of how he was feeling!!! The sun had just started to break through the clouds and right on queue we were pulling into beautiful Craster, down to the harbour and up the other side to the famous Jolly fisherman’s Inn, just as they opened at 11am. I’d promised Frankie one of their famous crab sandwiches only to be told they don’t start serving food till 12…all was not lost though! They were serving coffee and cake, so plonking ourselves in one of the worlds great beer gardens, we half and halved a lemon muffin and blonde brownie and had some coffee somewhat better than Frankie’s at the hostel this morning! It was so good, we were back at the bar getting another 10 minutes later!
With us both off our tits on caffeine, things seemed so much better until I abruptly turned right coming out the harbour to take a photo with Frankie right behind me, forcing him to slam his brakes on and lose all momentum…it’s a good job we’ve been mates for 35 years as he was on the brink of killing me! We’d decided that we’d stop more often to allow Frankie to hockle out his insides and have a drink and it worked pretty well on the 14 miles to Seahouses, and much to Frankie’s surprise I think, it wasn’t as bad as he had expected. Certainly we were making better progress than yesterday as although there was more climbing, we were on quiet back roads, not shared paths or bike paths so we were going much (!) faster (i.e 11mph not 6…) and just after 1pm we were going through North Sunderland and heading into lovely Seahouses!
Now this was most definitely my manor! I’ve been coming to Seahouses and Bamburgh since I could pretty much walk, and it is without doubt the most beautiful place on Gods green earth ( in my humble opinion!) locking the bikes up, we had a lovely lunch at Rosemary’s cafe by the harbour (soup and another cheese scone for me) with Frankie having a quick trip to the toilet block by the roundabout to come back all excited to say he’d just seen the actor Ian Hart. Who? I said. He was adamant I should have heard of him, getting his picture up on his phone. Nope never seen or heard of him. He then asked all the guys on the cycling chat, and all confirmed they’d never heard of him either! So much for his brush with celebrity! Just the obligatory photo down the harbour to match the photos I’ve taken of the camper over the last 15 years or so, and a picture outside the best tat shop in the world (Farne gift shop) It was time for the best 3 miles of road along to Bamburgh and it’s majestic castle!
The next 15 miles kind of went without incident, the sun on our backs, some regular stops for expelling snot for Frankie, and me being Edmond Slackbladder, seemingly stopping at every farm gate for a wee, we even managed to get up the 17% slope of the first real steep climb into the North of Belford with relatively little drama. We had planned on stopping here for another cuppa and a snack, but the town centre was back down the hill and we decided we’d manage and plough on. Coming down the other side we got to see Lindesfarne and Holy island in the distance looking lovely in the sun and the massive causeway linking it to the mainland spread out before us, lovely!
Suddenly however, as always, the demons were back for the last 10 miles. The sun had gone in, it was genuinely cold, we eschewed the chance for some food and a drink at Belford and there was nothing else on the route until Berwick. Dropping down for 400 terrifying yards along the A1, we were straight up and onto the steep climb from Lindesfarne services and it was tough. We then joined another busy road and it had ceased to be fun (for me at least, I’m pretty sure it had ceased to be fun for quite a while for Frankie!) counting down the miles, 5,4,3, we stopped at the crossroads 2 miles from Berwick. We were at 300 ft above sea level, I’d been to Berwick many times before and last time I checked it was a port, so came to the conclusion that over the brow of the hill, it would be down hill to the the finish!
5 minutes later it was done! Taking a selfie of both of us at the Berwick-Upon-Tweed sign the relief from Frankie was palpable! I’d say it was never in doubt, but the way he was feeling this morning I think he thought it was. I didn’t. It didn’t even cross my mind he wouldn’t get it done. I’ve put on here numerous times about his dogged determination, quiet stoicism, and unshowy way he goes about things. I’ve added a video of how he gets on and off a bike just to show what he has to do, to go cycling. With apposite timing, he’d received the call from the hospital just as he was pulling up to the hotel in Newcastle on Friday to say that his date for his other hip replacement was confirmed for 10th October, less than 2 weeks from now. As I told him today when things were looking bleak, I’d imagine if he spoke to his consultant and asked him how many of his patients had cycled 120 miles in 2 days less than 2 weeks before their operation it would be a very small spreadsheet…add in the hacking cough, streaming nose and the fact he was on the wrong kind of bike for most of it, chapeau my friend, chapeau!
Dropping down from the sign we were across the old packhorse bridge and pulling up outside the YHA in the old converted grain store just after 5pm, which is when check in opened. For the first time ever, we’d kind of arrived on time! Obviously Frankie didn’t have any ID on him as you have to have some to stay in a YHA (who knew?) so we couldn’t check in until he phoned Nicky and got her to send him a photo of his driving licence (for once it was nice that it wasn’t Andrea having to bail me out on one of these trips!) the receptionist telling us not to worry that we had 3 sets of bunk beds in our room, they had to move us rooms and no-one would be joining us! Anyway for £15 each it was perfect, shower was hot and powerful, and we were downstairs enjoying a very rock and roll toasted tea cake and cuppa before heading out for tea.
It’s now very late, I’ve had 4 pints of righteous beer at a fantastic pub (The barrels, if you’re ever in Berwick it’s a must!) an average tea at an Italian restaurant with guys doing coke in the toilets and back to the barrels for a nightcap with live bagpipe music to accompany me and Frankie putting the world to rights! I’ve now got to link up the rest of the coast and castles route with the John Muir way I did earlier in the year and return to do Berwick to Dunbar, then Edinburgh to Aberdeen. You can then get an overnight ferry from Aberdeen to Orkney and then onto Shetland…
Oh, nearly forgot. Dec, when I mentioned your admirable mates from the Norway trip yesterday, I obviously meant them not you, and I’m looking forward to handing you your arse on a climb next year, bionic new hip or not…🤣 (sorry it’s contractual that I pile into Dec in these blogs, and I nearly forgot…)
As Frankie found out today, it ends, it always ends…
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