Length: 6.5 miles (and then 2.8miles back along road but you can get the bus back)
Duration: Best part of a day (including picnic and pub lunch)
Difficulty: Moderate
If you didn’t know, Sam is a huge history geek and he is slowly trying to educate the rest of the family! So when I suggested Northumberland, Sam immediately started planning a Hadrian's Wall adventure.
Now, our grand plan was to walk all the way from Housesteads Fort to Cawfields Quarry and then get the bus back…but the day before our walk we discovered that the buses were on strike the week we were visiting so we had to shorten our route so we made sure we were back at the car before it got dark.
We parked at Housesteads Fort Car park on the B6318. There is a fee to park here but you pay on return to your car, and for us all day it was £10. You can go into the small visitor centre and buy tickets if you wish to actually go into the fort, but if you’re happy to just walk along the wall you do not need to pay and can just follow the path that leaves from behind the visitor centre and takes you up the hill towards the wall. Please note, for the whole of this walk you are predominantly in active farmland with livestock, so dogs need to be on a lead for the duration.
Once we reached the wall, we headed West, and boy was it a special walk. Even for me…someone who has little interest in history, I had to admit how impressive the wall still is and the views as it follows the rugged landscape is truly stunning.
You will see on the map that we left the wall for a portion of our walk, this was due to there being footpath work on the wall path, so we were diverted further into the farm fields. There were styles, but also adjacent gates which made life easier with the dogs.
We visited Sycamore Gap, which was still beautiful, but I was disappointed that I hadn’t managed to visit before some plonker (being very polite there) decided to chop it down a couple of months before our visit. The day of our walk was freezing with an icy wind, so we headed to the ruins of the Milecastle just to the West of Sycamore Gap and hunkered down in a sheltered spot for a coffee for us, and biscuits for the dogs.
We then continued West along the wall towards Steel Rig. As you start to drop down towards where Peel Cottage is shown on our map, there is a steep, stepped section. The dogs were very good on this as we had to really take our time. There is also a narrow opening/gap in the wall where the path goes through. Freya struggled a little with this as it was a tight squeeze, so larger dogs may have to go over the wall.
Now, where you see the “6” marked on our map, if you wish to continue heading along the wall as we had originally planned, STAY ON THE NORTH SIDE OF THE WALL. We didn’t … we ended up in a walled field on the southside of the wall and couldn’t get out so had to do a lap round the field and then walk up the road towards the Steel Rig Car Park and rejoin the wall 😊
We continued along the wall to the West of the Steel Rig car park, but doubled back when we realised that we wouldn’t have time to make it all the way to Cawfield Quarry and back to the car before dark. We then followed the road from Steel Rig Car Park, back down onto the B6318 and headed West for around 500 yards to get to the Twice Brewed Pub – highly recommended…so much so we have a separate post about it! Excellent food, very dog friendly, lovely staff and they didn’t bat an eyelid at our muddy boots! As you’ll see from the photos Freya made herself right at home and, after a drink, some biscuits and a fuss from the staff, immediately fell asleep!
After our lunch, and Freya's snooze, we started heading back East towards Housesteads. Because of the bus situation and the fact it was November so there wasn’t a huge amount of time before the light would be going, we decided to walk back along the road. It isn’t a very busy road, but the traffic does go quite fast along it. But the road has long straight sections (good old Romans!) so you could see the traffic coming and get into the side in good time and we found pretty much all the drivers very good at slowing down and giving plenty of space. It took us 50 minutes to walk back to the car this way as you could stride out as it was easier going underfoot.
We were a little disappointed not to have been able to make it to Cawfields Quarry on foot, so decided to drive the 5-10 minutes along the road as it was such a beautiful evening. We got there just as the sun was setting and got some beautiful photos! It really was a special spot and I would highly recommend it.
If the buses had been running it would have definitely been doable, and we would have walked along the wall to Cawfields Quarry, got the bus back to Twice Brewed, had lunch then got the bus back to Housesteads, but the bus strikes had other ideas. We had a wonderful walk and thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Sam is planning for us to do it again (when the buses are running!) and also walk more of Hadrians Wall – As long as there is a good pub lunch in it I am game!
The whole walk took us around 4 hours walking time and was around 9.5miles, but as you know we had some detours and had to alter our route on the go.
Terrain
Some steep sections and muddy in places!
Wildlife
Not much wild life but plenty of livestock
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