An attraction, town, or place of beauty or interest on or near to Britain’s coast.
We bowled up to Pevensey Castle on a blue-sky day in the company of Molly. Molly, I should say, is a small dog of exceptional poise and dignity, but has no relevance whatsoever to our story. She is mentioned merely in a cynical attempt to win the cute dog vote. Sorry, Molly. We have included
Molly visits Pevensey Castle, a Very Important Place Read More »
South East
To visit Lindisfarne, a tidal island at the tip of north-east England, is to enter a different world. It is a world of saltwater, seabirds and saints, a world of mudflats, mead and mystery that is still revealing its secrets. Our story begins in the shadow times before places like England, Scotland and Wales had
A pilgrimage to Lindisfarne, the Holy Island Read More »
North East England
A neighbour was taking a short break in Northumberland, and told me that one of the reasons she was excited about it was because, growing up, she had a picture of Grace Darling on her bedroom wall. She would not have been alone; Grace Darling was a perfect Victorian heroine who braved a violent North
The Grace Darling legend Read More »
North East England
It is said that Britain’s seaside towns are looking tired: unfortunately, in many cases, that’s true. But there doesn’t seem to be too much wrong with Suffolk’s Southwold. So we’re just going to show you a few photographs of this lovely little East Anglian resort, taken on an all-too brief visit on a warm, cloudless,
A short visit to Southwold Read More »
East of England
The Needles, enormous 100-feet (30-metre) high chalk and flint stacks off the most westerly point of the Isle of Wight, are part of the Island’s iconography, and one of Britain’s most recognisable coastal features. They are an exposed eroded section of a folded east-west band of chalk running through the Island, the remains of which
The Needles – a tale of shipwrecks, Victorian forts and Cold War Read More »
South East
The great tempest broke rapidly and without warning in the darkness. The sea around Whitby convulsed, waves rising in growing fury, over-topping one another, beating white-topped on the sands, rushing up the cliffs and breaking with great spumes over the piers of the harbour. Adding to the difficulties and dangers of the night, a huge
Dracula and Whitby Read More »
Yorkshire and the Humber
There are several reasons to go to the little Northumbrian coastal village of Craster. It is famous for its kippers, offers several pleasant eating options, an art gallery and is a popular base for bird watchers, fishers and walkers alike. Our excuse was to revisit Dunstanburgh Castle, surely one of the most dramatic set of
Craster to Dunstanburgh Read More »
North East England
This is the Bridge over the Atlantic, also known as the Atlantic Bridge; I daresay someone’s referred to it as Atlantic Crossing too. You’ll find it in Argyll, Scotland, about 10 miles south of Oban. Atlantic Bridge’s real name is Clachan Bridge and it joins the Hebridean island of Seil with the mainland, spanning a
Orford Ness, a ten-mile long shingle spit on the Suffolk coast, is one of the most extraordinary places in Britain. Its environment, part natural, part man-made, provides a perfect, and in places rare, habitat for an enormous variety of flora and fauna. But, more than that, for the greater part of the 20th century it
What really happened at Orford Ness? Read More »
East of England
This is HMS Queen Elizabeth. She and her sister ship HMS Prince of Wales are the largest warships the Royal Navy has ever had, and their home port is HM Naval Base Portsmouth, on England’s south coast. Portsmouth is well-known for its naval heritage: this is, after all, the home of Horatio Nelson’s flagship, HMS
A tour of Portsmouth Harbour Read More »
South East
We are in the east of England, on the Suffolk coast. The town of Aldeburgh was once a thriving Tudor port; that’s where we’ll find the fort. And Thorpeness, well – Thorpeness was purpose-built in the 20th century – and that’s where we’ll find our house in the clouds. Few people now will have heard
From a house in the clouds to a fort Read More »
East of England
The wind whips words away, yet the incessant piercing cries of thousands of seabirds all around Marsden Bay cut through every sound. To the best of my knowledge, England’s north east coast between South Shields and Sunderland features in few guide books to Britain, whose writers seem to skip from the North Yorkshire Moors to
Marsden Bay isn’t quite the Algarve Read More »
North East England