Amble
Bliss
Sun 24 Apr 2016 18:56
The plan was to catch a couple of buses to Craster, a village about 12 miles up the coast, and to walk 8 miles back to Alnmouth, a spectacular stretch of the Northumberland Coast Path, before returning by bus to Amble.
We left the boat at 10.15, in good time to find the bus stop for the 10.34, had a vague idea where it was but not exactly, so when we saw a policeman we asked, he pointed us in the right direction then said "tell-yers what, I'm going that way, hop in the back an I'll g'yers a lift."
It was a random act of kindness, bless him, unfortunately that's when our plan started to unravel!
I thought we needed to go to Alnmouth for our connection, when in fact we needed to go to Alnwick, so thanks to the young PC Craig, delivering us to our first destination ahead of time, we we're sitting happily supping an Americano, when our bus sailed past the window. Long story short and all that, we finally arrived at the start of our walk THREE AND A HALF hours after leaving the boat, Chris by this time had begun to flag. It was a lovely walk, a shame that when we stopped at a pub on route they had stopped serving food, had we been an hour or so earlier!!
We caught bus back from Alnmouth to Amble with no hitches, and discovered that the Working Men's Club of Amble is extremely friendly, sell very cheap beer, and show Sky Sports, so we ended our adventure watching the Leicester/Swansea match with a lovely pint of Theakston's.
Conditions seem calm here, the wind has subsided, it's hard to believe the forecasts of 50+mph winds tomorrow, but that's what they say. I think things are due to improve by about Weds or Thurs, so we might explore a bit more of the Northumberland Coast, up to Berwick upon Tweed, the Farne Islands, Lindisfarne, perhaps we might hire a car though.
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