Bamburgh, Holy Island and St Abbs, Our Motorhome Tour of Scotland Begins

Zagan the motorhome has started his Scotland tour in fine style. He is parked up right by the sea in St Abbs (N55.89965, W2.13104). It’s 4pm and starting to get dark, but then it’s been pretty grey and showery all day. We can’t blame the Scottish weather though, it was the same over the border when we woke up in Bamburgh.

We bid farewell to our friends Richard and Jenny after a couple of nights at Hadrian’s Wall Campsite. We had a great catch up and now they have another motorhome, I’m sure it won’t be long before we meet up again on another mini trip. We tracked East, following Hadrian’s Wall until we reached the A1, they went south heading home, and we turned north. Our plan was to head to St Abbs just over the border, but as always… plans change.

We’d spotted on our Park4Night app that there were dedicated spaces for motorhomes at Bamburgh Castle (N55.60714, W1.71011). As we were passing, and the castle is built next to a beach, we thought it would be rude not to stop off. At the ticket machine we were surprised to see that you could stay for up to 72 hours, so we bought a 24 hour ticket and ignored the small print about not being able to sleep or cook – if needs be we’d eat sarnies and binge watch Downtown Abbey all night!

You can see why councils have to do this merry dance. There are several campsites in the area who would want our business in the summer, but as it’s the end of October they were mainly closed. I’ll be honest, we didn’t try too hard to find an alternative once we’d bought our overnight ticket as everywhere was pretty quiet.

We were surprised to read that Bamburgh Castle featured in the film ‘El Cid’ as the city of Valencia. Earlier this year we spent a couple of weeks in Peniscola in Spain which provided a location for the outside distance shots for Valencia in the same film. Funny to think we’ve had to come all this way to see where they filmed the other Valencia scenes – the magic of the movies. Despite this, we decided not to look around the castle, instead opting for a stroll along the beach to the light house.

As we read some of the information boards dotted around the village I had a flashback to my school days. It must have been at junior school that we were taught about Grace Darling, the lighthouse keeper’s daughter who rowed out to rescue folks shipwrecked in a storm. I’d forgotten all about her for around 40 years, until her name appeared on one of those boards, and suddenly I was back in the classroom. The rescue took place on the Farne Islands which we could see from the beach, and Grace, who died just four years later in her 20s, is buried in the St Aiden’s church in the village.

Grace has a gravestone where she lies with her family and there is also a memorial, raised up so it can be seen from the sea. An effigy of her holding a coble oar lies on the top of the memorial with the original version housed in the church as it was eroding in the weather.

Jay went for a run up and down the beach in the evening and around 4pm the cars slowly left the car park, leaving just us and one other motorhome to stay awake in there all night! This morning we were up and at ’em on a mission to visit The Holy Island of Lindisfarne, and for that you need to conform with nature and plan your trip around the tide tables. The causeway onto the island opened at 9am today and closed around 3pm, if we didn’t get off by then we’d need to wait until 9pm before we could cross. On average one car a month gets caught out, which is why there are helpful signs all around the island, and a refuge box tower on the causeway for stranded folks to flee into.

With dark clouds and rain speckling our windscreen we made our way over the causeway just after 9am and parked up in the huge visitors car park on the edge of the village (N55.67507, W1.80052). The ticket machine offered 3 hours or 24 hours (overnight parking isn’t allowed but the ticket could be used at mainland car parks), we went for the first option, wrapped up and set off to explore in the rain.

We’d arrived so early that most of the village was closed when we walked through it, so we made our way to the small harbour via the highest point in the island which was called The Heugh (cue many jokes about being sick noises). On The Heugh an old lighthouse has been redeveloped into a lookout, so we took shelter from the rain and viewed most of the island in the warmth. We had a great view down into the, now ruined, priory and could also see colonies of seals gathered on the beaches across the bay.

Eventually we ventured back outside, and made our way past the harbour to the castle – probably the most photographed part of the island. At least it was today as a group were having a photography class on the stony beach in front of it.

Again we opted not to go into the castle – I’m sorry, but we’ve seen loads of them and aren’t always in the mood – and walked around the grounds. The area is known for its bird life, who were mainly using the greyness as a camouflage today. A quick look at the impressive lime kilns that were used for making building materials and we’d walked three miles and were now suitably cold enough to head back to the van with an hour to spare on our parking ticket.  

With the heating on we warmed up with a hot brew before setting off for Scotland. Yes our Scottish tour has finally begun! We pulled in as we crossed the border for an obligatory photo of the sign and jumping out I noticed that Zagan is now flithy all the way up each side, higher than I can reach. We can only think it was from the causeway as there was still quite a bit of seaweed on it. Thank goodness it’s raining as it will wash away the salt.

Parking up at St Abbs we were surprised to find it was still only 1pm. After a bit of jigging around to get as level as possible, we set off for a walk along the coastal path which took us to the beach at Coldingham Bay. Scattered with mauve rocks and orange sand, it wasn’t just the colourful beach huts that brightened up the place. Bright green seaweed gave the rock pools a psychedelic vibe as we peered into them, before spotting a seal bobbing around in the bay.

Walking back to Zagan we got chatting to a local chap out walking his dogs who told us there’s not much going on here in the – we don’t mind that at all. Tonight we’ll sleep to the sound of the waves and seagulls, I can think of no better welcome to Scotland.

Ju x