Coast & Castles

Coast & Castles

I never thought I'd do a tour like this, don't really know why, this route never really appealed to me so why did I do it ? Because I was invited to, that's all. It's good enough reason.

I was contacted by an old school friend a few months ago, someone whom I'd not seen for about 25 years, we met up and had a short ride with two other people from our home town and they invited me to join them on the Coast and Castles route in August. The route goes from Edinburgh to Tynemouth mostly down the coast of Northumbria and passes many castles en route, we decided to extend it to ride all the way to Hartlepool, our home town.

So we made our plans, Moore booked the B&Bs, we booked our trains to Edinburgh and arranged to meet on the train at Newcastle Central Station. We rendezvoused again in the centre of Edinburgh because my ticket was to Haymarket and not Waverley because it was cheaper.

On the road and soon out of the city; it was busy with tourists and festival people, we got onto the bike track that took us far from the madding crowd in a non direct way, it was mostly downhill and smooth which was nice. It rained before we got to Dalkeith, heavily. I knew Dalkeith, my route would have taken us there more directly but with more traffic, this was better but it felt slow. More heavy rain in Dalkeith. The exit from the town was via a different road to what I am used to, it took us to the same long hill, one which on clear day affords nice views of the Firth of Forth, not today though, drizzly and misty. No traffic, not wind. We rode up steadily and summited more or less together, no one forced the pace, we had plenty of time for our planned distance. Pretty soon on the descent we rode away from the rain and into sunshine, the five mile descent pleased us, particularly the other three chaps who'd not been here before. We kept good pace to Innerleithen where we stopped for a late lunch at the cyclist friendly Whistle Stop cafe. Cyclist friendly ? They loaned us a bike lock to lock our bikes to the metal rings embedded in the wall.

Off again, bound for Kelso. Not difficult cycling, plenty of time to spend messing around on the bike tracks that are part of the route. Had I been alone I'd have probably used the roads but this wasn't my tour, I was just a passenger and it was after all old school touring, just cycling with friends. A bit more rain, heavy, the obligatory Sustrans get lost in an urban area but it's par for the course. The river side path was very nice, quiet, stress free riding, pretty good surface and fairly direct.

We arrived at Kelso around 17:30, fine. Found the B&B OK, The Abbeyside B&B I think it was called. Very nice, the proprietors stored our bikes in the garage and took our wet things to a place to dry them overnight. Rooms were nice, en suite, breakfast was great. We ate at a pub and had some pints. A good day.

No rain the next day, our destination was Seahouses on the East Coast of England. Not a particularly difficult days riding. Meandering along the Tweed towards Berwick we crossed the Scotland-England border three times on traffic light roads. I felt irritated in Berwick with the traffic and people. After lunch we headed down the coast. Now here is where my criticisim of Route 1 really starts, too much on off road paths on the edge of the beach. We all did OK, even me on 25mm road tyres but it was stressful at times. The seaviews were great, it was a bright sunny day and of course no traffic on the paths, except some walkers, cyclists and cows ! We didn't see any UXBs or quicksand despite the warnings. It was a hot day, we were all flagging a bit in the heat, we stopped near the A1, the noise of the traffic was deafening, we pushed on and stopped again in a hamlet on a hill. All downhill from here back to the coast. Budle Bay was nice, Bamburgh Castle was nice and finally we arrived at Seashouses for our overnight. The last mile seemed much longer, the headwind made it harder and our group broke apart. Not for long though. The B&B was very nice. Malabar House. Dinner was in a pub with some nice beer and we chatted mostly about people we knew from school.

A reasonably early start for our longest day, about 90 miles to our homelands, all down the coast with some tricky parts through coastal towns and river crossings to negotiate. We made a short detour to Craster to get some kippers. Pretty soon after Amble we split the group, slower and faster. I was a faster rider. So Moore, my old mate, and I pressed on into the headwind. Once again on the off road path around Duridge Bay. It's very very nice, well worth a visit. Some crappy industrial bits around Newbiggin and Blyth were not so nice though. It took us ages to get past Blyth, huge busy roads that we wanted to avoid meant we found ourselves doubling back and going through estates. Eventually we made it through and back to the coast, it seemed to take us ages though. I was getting a bit irritated by this, it was hot and we had a headwind too. Down the coast to Whitley Bay was more straightforward, it was busy there, as was Cullercoats so we stopped only for a sit down. Tynemouth was busy too but we did eat here. It was nice to sit in the shade and cool down and relax properly. Only about 30 miles to go from here.

We rolled along the north bank of the Tyne to the Sheilds Ferry where we had to wait for 10 minutes or so. Once on the otherside of the river we made pretty good progress on another Sustrans route as far as Sunderland. From here it was plain sailing to our hometown.

It was a good three day tour, relaxing and easy. Old skool touring.