Back to the wall

Solitary daily pacing of Hadrian's Wall, in the footsteps of Roman soldiers, brings back family memories

- Fiona Reynolds

YOU might think that visiting Hadrian's Wall in an English August would be a mild, balmy affair, but not this year. In the midst of heavy rain, mist and strong winds, we pity the farmers still desperately trying to get the hay and harvest in.

Nothing diminishes our visit to Northumberland, however, as we are taking my mother, in her 90th year, to see her 94-year-old brother (whom she hasn't seen since before covid) and revisit the places of her childhood. She grew up in Haydon Bridge and lived for some years in Alston, where I and two of my sisters were born. We're staying at a Landmark Trust cottage, Causeway House, just south of the wall. It's one of very few buildings still thatched with heather and its steep pitched roof is testament to the need for the rain to run off, fast.

New heather is piled up near the house ready for re-thatching and inside is arrayed a fascinating history-Landmark does this so wellincluding pictures taken during its restoration.