Hilary's St Oswald's Way Walk & Wollaton Park Wander

I am once again walking to raise money, this time for Nottinghamshire Hospice. I'll be taking two weeks to walk some of the 97 mile St Oswald's Way in Northumberland, then coming home to round it off with a Wollaton Park Wander on Saturday 16th July, when I hope lots of you can join me.




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Day 5. Lindisfarne

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   And so I come to Lindisfarne, the official start of St Oswald's Way, which ends at Heavenfield, but I think this is the wrong way round and has more to do with offering a coherent system of Pilgrimage trails, rather than accurately depicting the life of St Oswald. Heavenfield was the site of Oswald's first great battle, where with inferior forces he defeated the Welsh invader, Cadwalla, and took back the throne of Nothumberland, whilst Lindisfarne represents the fulfilment of Oswald's ambition for Nothumbria to become a Christian kingdom.  Having regained the throne, Oswald sent word to Iona, where he had lived, in exile with the Irish monks and priests, after his father was killed in battle. Oswald asked the holy men of Iona to send a priest to help him fulfill his mission to lead the people of Northumbria back to Christianity. The original candidate, a rather pious man, found the Northumbrians abit too rough and ready and returned to Iona, suggesting it was a lost ca...
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Day 8. Beauty and Burials - Budle to Bamburgh

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An incredibly bright, sparkling day and I decide to walk part of St Oswald's Way from Budle Bay to Bamburgh Castle whilst I wait for Rachel to arrive. The official route goes inland from Lindisfarne before joining the coast at the golf course above Bamburgh; but I walk from our hideaway cottage on Budle Bay, walking out to Budle Point then along the beach, instead of the cliff path. I check the map, its probably about 2 miles each way. I can do that.... The wind is almost constant along Budle Bay, but I love its wildness, and the sun is warm. The sea sparkles, the beaches are vast and open. It's an Armani colour palette of soft browns and beiges and that signature blue-grey or blue-green.   I walked with this wind in the winter, hunkered down into the hooded warmth of my padded coat but today the wind, though wild and blustery, is milder, my blue cardigan, that blends with sea and sky, is warm enough.  At Budle Point the wind lifts the soft white sand from the dune edges ...
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