Sampling Northumberland

Alison Prince

England’s most northern county is a surprisingly good place for a short break. From Ardrossan via Edinburgh, you can drive there in less than three hours, and the open, wonderfully empty landscape is a joy. As always when people are not overcrowded, everyone is relaxed and friendly, and the place is filled with a strong sense of history. Castles abound, and the sense of having one eye on marauders from the sea and the other on the wild men of Scotland is very strong.

Delights include the wondrous Barter Books, housed in the cavernous space of Alnwick’s now disused railway station. An extensive model railway track runs above the shelves, with little trains chugging busily round, and the ceilings are gloriously decorated with murals. Evocative scraps of poetry are lettered wherever the eye may rest, and the owner is a knowledgeable, well-organised enthusiast. Perfect for an all-day browse, and the café with its rooms sandwiched between ex-railway lines evokes all the atmosphere of Brief Encounter. A poem printed in its entirety on the wall under the little railway track moved me so much that I wrote it down and am now in close touch with its author, Katrina Porteous. She has kindly given permission for it to appear below.

Woodhorn colliery museum, near Ashington, is an evocative, almost heart-breaking experience. The winding gear stands motionless now, and in many ways, one could not wish to see men and boys working in such awful conditions – and yet the spirit of the place and the pride in facing daily danger held a quality that we have lost. Specially affecting is the exhibition of miners’ paintings, which became so famous that it went out to China. The men depict in touching detail small incidents that tell their own story – a family spring-cleaning their front room, a man watching an injured work-mate being treated by a doctor on a makeshift table, a dead pit-pony bundled into a coal ‘tram’ to be taken to the surface. When Thatcher demolished the mining industry, a new, rich seam had just been found in Ashington. It lies there to this day, untouched. With carbon capture and better machinery, we might still be using coal, rather than destabilising the country’s geology in search of shale gas. Ah, the pity of it all.