St. Cuthbert's Way

Four friends took a wonderful seven-days walk in mid September.  It was 62 miles long, through the Scottish Borders.  The route was probably an old pilgrimage route from medieval days - - we passed several former monasteries or abbeys that had been ravaged by time after Henry VIII ordered them closed in the 1540s.  We walked from West to East, from Melrose to Holy Island - from Melrose Abbey to Lindesfarne Abbey.
The walk is named after a 7th century saint. Cuthbert was a native of the Borders who spent his life in the service of the church. He began his work at Melrose Abbey. He achieved the status of Bishop, and when he died he was buried on Holy Island. He was called a saint eleven years after his death, when his coffin was opened and his remains found to be perfectly preserved.
Here's a pictorial history of the walk, which  is called St. Cuthbert's Way [SCW]:

The "official" beginning of the SCW is the churchyard gate at Melrose Abbey



This is Melrose; we spent 2 mights here - most of the towns where we stayed looked like this: 2-3 story buildings, made of stone, several centuries old, ground floor shops, flats above, narrow streets. Melrose Abbey is a popular attraction, managed by Historic Scotland (I think) and so it's a bit more crowded and up-to-date than some others.





We walked and hiked and climbed up and up.   The Eildon Hills (rather steep) were the first obstacles, not very high, fortunately.   Barbara's looking down at how small the town appears.

Salmon fisherman in the Tweed River.  The SCW follows this for about 2.5 very large bends.  It had been suggested that permits to fish the Tweed for salmon are very expensive, which may explain why the river wasn't full of fishers.

The Roman helmet signifies that we are now on Dere Street, laid out by Roman army 2000 years ago.  On the map it is a straight line of a mile or two.  In reality it wiggles and twists and is overgrown with long wet and annoying grass.  That's Pat pointing out something.



These are outbuildings from a very large estate.  They've been converted into an arts center, children's enrichment center, tea room, art gallery, visitor center.  It's called Harestanes and we enjoyed the tea room while awaiting the taxi to carry us to our B & B.

Here is what sheep do.  They munch and munch, heads down on the grass.  When one sees me, it stares, motionless.  When I raise my camera, it hightails it away.   And all the rest follow suit.  Every one of them.  All running away.

This was a milestone not to be forgotten.  It always felt like bigger hills and that the end would never come.  The prior photograph shows us struggling to keep the constant wind from tearing off hats and chilling hands.  Blessedly, the wind was at our backs.

To American ears, these names seem (to be kind) odd.  Would I choose to live in a place called Sourhope?  too depressing.  And what would be the derivation of Cocklawfoot?  At least, Belford on Bowmont would be different from, say, Belford on Tyne or Belford on Thames.

Dogs in the pub were common.  This fellow sat or lay, bored, the entire time we were there.  Pub food seemed to be fairly uniform:  steak and ale pie, fish and chips, roast lamb shank. chicken curry.  Occasionally a treat:  seared salmon; lamb loin chops.  My personal favorite was also a one-off:  Trawler pie (like shepherd's pie but with salmon, prawn, scallops).

A border without border control.  As my son pointed out "You are on the right side of the border."  And I think this was my 72nd birthday but wasn't sure.  Time didn't seem the same without clocks everywhere.



The footpath led through many tree plantations.  This pine plantation surrounded St. Cuthbert's cave, a very minor but physically large attraction.

St. Cuthbert's cave is a large "room" on the hillside, beneath monstrously big limestone boulders.  Without a flashlight, I didn't explore.  We were greeted by the Ramblers who had passed us every day (being British, they don't poke along), and who were "killing time" until time to meet their van in the next town.

To get to this point - on a chilly and damp morning-  we crossed a highway, through fields and along farm roads, across a very busy train track, a stream and then a field, and eventually here.  The end is in sight.  The causeway is to the right of the signs.  My great fear was that we would miss low tide and have to wait six hours to cross.  We made it.

In earlier years (pre-causeway) pilgrims walked across the sands, like these two.  Poles mark the way.  Somewhere out there is a "refuge" - small room elevated about 12 feet above the sand.  We did NOT walk the sands.

The village of Holy Island and our hotel - large white bldg. behind the red roofed one - are just beyond the small harbor.  The castle of Lindesfarne stands on a very high rock (part of an extinct volcano?) behind the photographer.

Here's the same harbor from the hotel's lawn, and that's the Lindesfarne Castle high atop its dark rock.  Looks forbidding, doesn't it.

This bus runs once weekly in September and every 10 days in the next six.  The only time it runs daily is in Tourist Season.  It took us to Berwick where the next adventure began with buying a bus ticket in a train station.  It seems the train doesn't run on weekends because of track work (Oh, shades of Washington's Metro!) 

And that was the end of our too-fast visit to the Scottish Borders. I'd love to go back and revisit some of the towns, the moors and, yes, even the hills. It was very tiring but also very exhilarating and I have good feelings about having done this.