Poems in the Air: Day 3

20km Ewartly Shank – Linhope – Hedgehope Hill – Middleton Old Town

The day started near the splendidly named farm of Ewartly Shank.  To get there we drove backroads to Alnham, then took off up a tiny, twisting, grass-centred road further out, passing loose cows and scattering sheep.  Spotting the Shepherds’ Cairn, which marked the first poem of the day, we pulled onto the verge.  Outside it was bright but a cold wind blew over the open hillside.  It was only a short stroll uphill to the cairn, erected in memory of two shepherds from Ewartly Shank who died one night in the 1960s while trying to get home through a snowstorm.  The poem talked of people carrying supplies up to the farm afterwards, ‘Condolences and sympathies offered like lamp oil and lint.’  It spoke of the transitory nature of things, including ‘this poem, like an invisible wreath hung in the air,’ which seemed an apt image for the fleetingness of the experience of listening to the poem.

Jill was going to wander round the area while I carried on into the Breamish Valley.  The paths were sketchy again, the fences broken, gates rusty, waymarkers blank.  At least the wind eased and the temperature climbed.  Past Alnhammoor Farm a car whizzed up the sheep-dropping-spattered tarmac to the road, where I was surprised to see a number of cars and a number of people.  On reaching this point I found signs for Linhope and Linhope Spout.  It seemed I had inadvertently happened upon some kind of tourist attraction.  I joined the sparse line on people wandering up the road.

Passing a family group, the father was scolding his dog after it sniffed around a dead rabbit.  ‘Don’t touch it, it’s got myxie.’  ‘What’s “myxie”,’ the little girl asked, without receiving a reply.

A good track led most of the way before a smaller path dropped into a valley between high bracken.  A short clamber down rocks brought me to the deserted pool by the bottom of the waterfall.  It was quite a pretty sight and made a lovely sound, though this was drowned out by the sudden roar of a jet directly overhead that left me twitching in blind panic.

People started arriving so I left and continued on the track.  To my surprise I came upon a sign for my next destination, Hedgehope Hill.  Not only this but the unpromising path on the map turned out to be a pretty good one on the ground.  It was only towards the top that it got first wet then rocky.  It was a steady pull without any difficulty, though my left foot was aching from the miles of pounding footpath, and it had great views behind.  I could see Simonside where I had been the day before – and the rain that was falling to the south.

Just as I approached the boulder-strewn top, a man came marching up from the other direction, spoiling my quiet moment alone with the trig point.  We chatted for a while though I could hardly get through his north-eastern accent.  He seemed fixated on walking to/from Ingham and seemed unable to accept that I was neither going there nor on to the Cheviot, which was basically the next hill along.

He trotted off while I ate a sandwich (no pease pudding today), and put on a coat to keep out the increasingly strong wind.  I felt somehow disappointed that there wasn’t a poem to listen to.  Perhaps the point is to create your own.

Pushing on, the next section was a long, steep, horrible descent, as the bottom of which it started to rain.  A grandfather, father and girl were coming the other way.  In a Scottish accent, the grandfather said, ‘I think we may have mistimed it,’ nodding his head towards the dark clouds.  They didn’t appear to have any waterproofs.

Shortly after this the path, as shown on the map, vanished, and I stumbled my way as best I could along its course over horrendous tussocks of grass and bilberry.  It was slow and exhausting.  The views to the rocky outcrops and the big hills behind made up for it to a degree.  When I made it back onto an estate track I found myself on a wide, green motorway.  It was bliss and I zoomed along.

It lasted a good way before I dropped down towards some farmers rounding up and penning sheep, chasing recalcitrant ones through immobile, passive cows.  A series of fields took me to Old Middleton, a ruined, abandoned settlement, where Jill was sitting patiently on the verge.  This was the site of the last poem in the series.  Again it spoke of transitoriness and provisionality, linking it to the ephemerality of a poem that can only been listened to at that specific location and then lost to the hearer.  ‘Like writing it in air with a fallen crow’s feather dipped in rainwater.’

The rain started falling as we walked back down to the car, pausing only to chat to the foreman of a stonewalling team.

See http://www.poemsintheair.co.uk/

Poems in the Air: Day 2

22km Lordenshaws – Simonside – Hepple Whitefield – Hepple – Holystone – Dove Crag

Today was to be the longest day and I discussed the plan with Jill.  We decided that, given the toughness of the walk on the previous day and the extra length of time it took me, cutting a bit off the beginning would be a good plan.  So instead of starting from Rothbury, we drove up to Lordenshaws for a common start point.  It was also going to be Jill’s toughest day, so I set off up the path to let her make her way in her own time.

There was a little drizzle falling as I started up the well-constructed stone path up the steep hillside. It led through the heather and a number of wind-carved sandstone outcrops up to a point called Old Stell Crag.  This point unlocked the first poem of the day, The Proposal Stone.  I put my hood up, turned my back to the wind and listened.  It began, ‘The south-west wind scours the ridge,’ and immediately I smiled.  Again it described the position, high on the hill with the plains spread out below, finishing with, ‘All England on its bended knee, hoping you’ll say “yes”.’  I listened again, standing by the Proposal Stone itself, a flat-topped rock amongst the bilberry and heather, carved with the message, ‘K, Will you marry me, J.’

I carried on over the top of Simonside, to be greeted with even better views, out to the coast and up to the Cheviots.  The path wound narrowly through more heather and I startled numbers of grouse.  The odd pair of sheep hopped and skipped across the moor.  On top of Tosson Hill (bagging the trig point), I stopped for a banana and was joined by an inquisitive bee.  I wondered if it was interested in the fruit, so I sat still, holding the empty peel in my hand.  The bee buzzed around then settled on my palm.  It took a couple of cautious steps before performing a little dance with its backside before taking off again.  This was the first time I can remember having seen a bee do a ‘waggledance’ and felt rather privileged.

As I reached some grassland soon after, inevitably the path vanished in a bog, but I picked it up again by an unlocked shooting cabin.  Inside, out of the wind, it was very warm.  Storm lamps hung on the wall and a large, Gothic candle dangled in the middle of the room.  The path led gently down to farmland and the climate changed.  The clouds had gone, the wind had dropped and I could get rid of the coat at last.

Entering the farmyard at Hepple Whitefield, a dog trotted across from the barn.  After my surprise the previous day I was a little wary, but this one was quiet and friendly, happily accepting a pat on the head.  As I continued it jogged along in front of me.  Perhaps it’s escorting me off the premises, I thought, as it waited by the gate.  But no, when I turned down the road it came along with me.  ‘Go home,’ I told it.  Then tried in north-eastern, ‘Gan yem.’  Neither worked.

Somewhat further along I climbed over a stile to cut across a field.  The dog, having been occupied by sniffing in the verge, came over to the stile and looked plaintively through the fence at my retreating figure.  Nice try, but I was glad not to have it following me.  Not for long.  As I regained the road, there it was running round the corner having worked out my shortcut.  Now we were on a busier road and the animal insisted on wandering blithely up the middle.  Cars kept having to slow down while it got out of the way, no doubt cursing the idiot who couldn’t keep his dog on a lead.

It followed me all the way up to the village of Hepple and up the track north.  At a farm gate I tossed a stone to distract it before sneaking through.  The dog paused a moment then skipped through the bars.  On we went.  After another gate I sat on big rock to have my lunch (a delicious ham and pease pudding sandwich from the Greenwell Bakery in Rothbury).  Doggy danced around a bit then sat behind me, its head almost on my shoulder, as a somewhat elderly couple approached from the other direction.  It jumped down to meet them and they patted and fussed around it.  Quickly I had to explain that it wasn’t mine and that it wouldn’t stop following me.  They said they were from the next village, Thropton, and didn’t recognise the animal.  To my relief and to their surprise, when they moved off towards Hepple, the dog went after them, clearly deciding that they were a better option for pats and possibly food.  It was a good 2.5km from where it had joined me.  I wonder whether it ever found its way home.

After Low Farnham, I turned towards the footpath sign but found the gate tied up with string.  Heedless of the ‘Beware of the bull’ sign, I climbed over.  The field was actually full of bullocks.  They were curious, nervous creatures, flitting up to me then backing off as I growled warnings.  After a couple of advances, they finally decided I was of no interest, and dashed off to the far side of the field.

Across the Coquet again and into Holystone, I had a long trek along roads, slowly climbing up to Harbottle Common.  A bloke coming the other way had a wreath of bracken wrapped around his head.  On greeting him, he lifted his eyes up to his improvised headgear and just said, ‘Flies.’  He was right, they were back again and buzzing around annoyingly.

My car was in the car park as hoped and I turned into the plantation.  A male family group were wandering down, half of them wearing camouflage gear.  We weren’t very far from a huge MoD artillery range and the sound of distant ordnance could be heard from the path.

At exactly the point I needed to turn further into the wood, there was a sign saying the path was closed for ‘Forestry Operations’.  I tried further up and found the same sign, then further again to be told there was no way through.  That was it for my possible alternatives, so I turned back, ignored the sign and took the original route.  I was later than planned, thanks to the futile diversion, but I found Jill still there, sitting on a tree stump.  She had ignored the sign too.

Having been there a while, Jill had scouted out where we needed to be, which was off the path we were on.  Instead it took some scrambling up and down muddy banks, tripping over roots and ducking under branches to find ourselves suddenly in a clearing with a big sandstone cliff and a small waterfall in front of us.  The poem captured the tricky journey precisely and began, ‘Step out of the known world.’  It spoke about the ‘tropical ferns’, the moss, the crags, the trees and the lanky grass.  Of the waterfall, it described the pool as an ‘illicit still’ where ‘thoughts drip into the mind’s cask’.

Walking back, it made sense for me to stay with Jill and return to the car.  We still continued to the Rose and Thistle at Alwinton, as had been my original plan, before heading back to Rothbury.  In the evening we went up to the Old Turk’s Head, which was very busy, before ending the night in the Narrow Nick micropub.

See http://www.poemsintheair.co.uk/

Poems in the Air: Day 1

21km Stonehaugh – Watergate – Whitchester – Snabdaugh – Greenhaugh

We had been planning on visiting the Poems in the Air ever since hearing about the project.  It involved walking to specific places within the Northumberland National Park following a route on a phone app.  On arriving at the end point, the app would unlock a poem, written and read out by Simon Armitage, about the particular location.  It was an area I was unfamiliar with, which made it an interesting proposition.  There are six sites and at first I tried to plan a route that would link all locations in a continuous walk.  However, the distances between them made this impractical so I settled for three one-day walks, each one linking two poems.  Jill would come along to visit the poems too, using the short walks described by the app, and driving between them.  She would also act as my lift from my walk’s end to the place we were staying that night.

The first stop was a long drive to the back of beyond, a village (of sorts) called Stonehaugh, which mostly seemed to consist of campsites and groups of holiday chalets.  The proximity of the Pennine Way perhaps explains this.  The car park, with its handy composting toilet, was empty when we arrived, though another car soon turned up.  Other people visiting the poem, I wondered, but no, they went a different way.

It didn’t take long for us to lose the way, being a bit casual about the directions.  We ended up at an apparent dead-end in a wood.  It was here I finally checked where we were to discover we had gone astray.  Luckily there was a way of sorts, though hardly a path, stumbling over a cleared line through the plantation.  It was drizzling intermittently which meant the long undergrowth soon soaked our legs and went through our boots.  After dodging brambles and nettles, and clambering round a fallen tree, we made it back to the official route.  This didn’t get any better as it twisted and turned through more overgrown vegetation, over muddy, narrow paths.  It was slow going, which meant the clouds of flies danced around our heads and crawled over any exposed skin.  Thankfully they weren’t the biting kind.

After a slippery descent and a climb over a stile, we suddenly came to the first poem location, the Weaver’s Cottage.  It was a very dilapidated ruin, slowly turning back into woodland, perched a little above a churning, dark pool in the river of Warks Burn.  As advertised, the phone app burst into life and started playing Armitage’s soothing tones.  The poem talked about the line of families who had lived in the valley, stretching along the river to pool at this point.  Somewhere downstream were ‘stags and hens’, hinting at future populations.  The poem also described the setting, with a mossed-over hearth, a holly tree bearing down on the gable wall and three tall spruces between the cottage and the river.

Jill turned back after this, using the proper route this time but finding it little better.  I climbed up and along to join the Pennine Way north for a stretch.  The paths were decent but I was surprised by a loose dog at Linacres that crept right up behind me before unleashing its bark.  Just beyond this I regretted my decision to keep on to Hunt Hill before turning to Watergate.  The ‘path’ was just an area of cleared forest.  Like earlier, I had to trip over stumps and fallen timber, along boggy, wet grass.  The flies, without a breath of wind, clustered around my head again and I flapped vainly at them, waving my hands around like Mad Jack McMad.  When I finally reached the far side and a proper path I was wet and exasperated.  A sign on the gate hilariously suggested the swamp I had just navigated was a bridleway.

After this I hit a road, which was some relief, though the shelter of trees meant I hung onto my gang of flies until the gentle climb took me onto open ground.  I popped up to Watch Crag to bag the trig point before continuing over Whitchester Moor.  The path disappeared again into a huge zone of tall grass and tussocks.  Again it was slow going and hard to see where the path, if it existed, lay.  After much grumbling I made it to the track up to Whitchester farm.  It felt like a strange, isolated place, given the arduous approach I had made.  A Wild West farmstead, up on the plains, a long way from civilisation.  It was deserted as I crossed the yard, not even a dog barking.  Mud and detritus was scattered everywhere, as if it had been ransacked by an invading army.  I passed through quickly, keeping my head down.

I lost the path again getting to Snabdaugh and was thankful again to find a road.  House martins perched on the phone line by Cliftonburn Bridge until a Royal Mail van scattered them.  I was getting near the next poem, a little way beyond the River Tyne.  A variety of pleasant paths took me to the edge of some woodland by Tarset Burn.  Checking the app I found the poem was unlocked.  It was called ‘Hey Presto’ and was a series of similes for the sight of a kingfisher flashing along the river.  Each line took the form, ‘I give you the X of the kingfisher.’  From ‘the azure streak’ through ‘the ambulance light reflected in the blank windows of the charity shops on the esplanade’ to a final admission that there is nothing to compare it to, ‘I give you the kingfisher-like kingfisher of the kingfisher.’

With a grin, and a raised eyebrow at not finding Jill, I made my weary way uphill to Greenhaugh.  It’s a very pretty village, built of low, cream-coloured stone buildings.  The pub we were meeting in, the Holly Bush, was just another building in a terrace.  Inside the small, dark bar I found Jill and a couple of local blokes.  It was a relief to sit down and drink a very good pint of Nel’s Best (famously pulled by Prince Charles, by the looks of a photo above the fireplace).  Time was getting on, so we sadly left it at that and headed to Rothbury.

In Rothbury we had pleasant rooms in the Springfield guesthouse.  We didn’t hang around there long before following the landlady’s recommendation of going for dinner at the Queen’s Head Hotel next door.  The specials were fishy – whitebait then hake for me, squid then salmon for Jill – and were very good indeed.  The kitchen seemed a bit chaotic.  Jill asked for a sparing amount of butter on her salmon, but it came swimming.  A girl at the table next to us asked for lasagne with vegetables on the side, and got vegetable lasagne.  An Italian family got beans with the kids’ meals when they asked not to have them.  The barman was apologetic and accommodating.

Tired from a long day, we were in bed early.

See http://www.poemsintheair.co.uk/