Our Friday began with a to-do list. A collection of things that had somehow slipped through our hands over the summer, despite us regularly saying, “We really must do that.” One of them now had a deadline.
Chillingham Castle was about to close for winter. Our attempt the previous week had been scuppered by a storm, so this was our chance. First, though, breakfast in Rothbury and a walk at Simonside. Tom had clearly decided that catching up required a full itinerary.
Fortunately, October had saved us a beautiful day.
A breakfast worth getting out for
We set off early through almost empty roads, the trees still holding the last of their autumn colour. Sunshine, a few light clouds and a warmth that felt remarkably generous for the end of October.
Somewhere along the way, a farm collie passed us riding on the back of a quad bike. Meg watched with the particular indignation she reserves for another dog having a better job.
You could practically hear her. “Hmph. I could do that.”
We reached Townfoot Café & Bar just after opening and had our pick of tables. We’d been hearing good things for months, and the familiar Old Motor House had been on our list ever since it opened earlier in the year. Many people will remember the building from its days selling household decorations and ornaments at this end of Rothbury.
Inside, it’s comfortable and welcoming, although I felt one or two fewer tables might give everyone a little more breathing room. Initially, we had the place to ourselves, but other visitors soon began arriving. Always an encouraging sign.
We ordered two Big Breakfasts.
There is no case to be made against the description. These were big. Farm-worker big. Two of everything, with enough rounds of toast to make the smaller breakfast look like a very sensible decision in hindsight.
Nevertheless, we cleared our plates. We had a hill to climb, after all.
At £30 for both breakfasts and a pot of tea for two, we thought it was great value. From what we gathered, the place has found an evening following too, with drinks and live music giving us another reason to return. Preferably once breakfast has settled.
A tower in the sunshine
From Rothbury, we headed towards Great Tosson and the Forestry England car park at Simonside. On the way, Tosson Tower stood beside the road, caught in a shaft of sunlight.
The ruined medieval tower, associated with the Ogle family, still has walls around two metres thick. Even roofless, it has a stubborn presence above the valley. Looking at it, you understand why people once wanted somewhere substantial to shut the door.
The sun had picked it out so perfectly that it almost seemed to have read our recent piece about the Border Reivers and decided to help with the illustrations.
A little farther uphill, we found the car park on the right. Watch for the information board; it would be easy enough to drive past while admiring everything else.
We weren’t the only ones making the most of the weather. Families enjoying the last of half-term, couples, groups of friends: there was a cheerful bustle of boots, bags and dogs being persuaded that the walk would begin shortly.
The unofficial Simonside hill race
The paths led us through changing woodland and out towards those wonderful views across the Coquet Valley to the Cheviots. Blue sky, small white clouds and just enough warmth once we were moving. Meg found something interesting in approximately every square foot.
Tom kept calling her back whenever she went too far ahead. He hasn’t forgotten the day she mistook a large adder for a wet stick and tried to pick it up. According to his retelling, all four paws left the ground together as the supposed stick slithered into the undergrowth.
It gets a little higher each time he tells it.
I was enjoying myself, although the steeper stretches had me out of puff. Tom’s instinctive response to seeing people ahead is to catch them. Meg shares this ambition. I would occasionally like to look at the view.
On one particular climb, an older couple were gaining on us from behind while a family with children approached the rocky outcrop ahead. Apparently, we were now competing on two fronts.
“You go ahead,” I said.
Tom stood above me and announced, “We’re only as fast as our slowest team member.”
I could have planted him.
I’d been looking uphill into the sun while following him, and now had a black spot across my vision and felt horribly dizzy. Standing there on the rocks, I needed a moment, rather than further team encouragement.
Fortunately, Tom recognised the situation. Possibly he also recognised what would happen once I was safely on level ground. He came back to help and became exceptionally kind, guiding me up the remaining stretch while gently defusing his girl.
Then we reached the top.
For a while, there was very little to say. Northumberland opened out around us, and we could see for miles. The climb, the breakfast and my brief thoughts about disposing of Tom all faded into that enormous view.
We had picked the perfect day.
“Good news, Lucy. It’s all downhill from here.”
A pause.
“Mostly.”
One of those days
The descent on the other side was gentler, and we settled into a much more agreeable pace. Everyone we passed seemed cheerful. It would have been difficult to be otherwise in that light.
There was a soft, hazy gold across the landscape, with fresh blue above it and shadows gathering beneath the trees. Tom had plenty to point his camera at. I had recovered enough to agree that stopping was an excellent idea.
Sometimes you recognise a lovely day only when you look back at the photographs. This was one we knew about while we were still in it.
Back at the car, we had refreshments, discovered we were still remarkably full of breakfast and set off towards the A697. There was one more thing to cross off our list.
A castle with a long memory
Chillingham had been waiting for us all summer. By the time we arrived, the afternoon light was beginning to sharpen the shadows around its entrance. After the open air of Simonside, the building felt imposing before we had even stepped inside.
It has the history to match. In 1344, Sir Thomas de Heton received royal permission to fortify Chillingham with battlements. It later passed to the Grey family and played its part in the long, unsettled history of the Borders. This was a place built for a landscape where trouble could arrive at the door.
Royal visitors came too, including Edward I and James I. Centuries later, after wartime requisition and a long period standing empty, the castle and gardens were restored by Sir Humphry Wakefield. Knowing something of that survival helps explain the extraordinary place you find today.
Our welcome came from a small, jet-black cat, appearing so neatly on cue that I wondered whether someone had briefed him. He was very friendly. Presumably head of rodent reduction, with occasional front-of-house duties.
We paid £15 each for admission on our visit and went through the shop, where the gothic souvenirs made it quite clear that Chillingham is comfortable with its spooky reputation.
Gardens to the right. Dungeon to the left.
We went left. Of course we did.
Darker corners
The change was immediate. A dark, damp heaviness, low light and displays of torture instruments that I found genuinely unsettling.
I didn’t like it. Had Flynn been with us, I wouldn’t have taken him into that space.
There were gruesome figures and remains arranged for effect, but my imagination required very little assistance. I couldn’t tell you where the historical interpretation ended and the theatrical touches began. I only knew how uncomfortable I felt.
A few weeks earlier at Bamburgh, Tom and I had enjoyed trying to spook each other with the thought of being locked inside overnight. At Chillingham, neither of us needed to suggest it.
I expected the feeling to lift as we went upstairs into the Great Hall. It didn’t quite happen. The cool, dusty atmosphere stayed with me, and I felt increasingly tight across the chest as we wandered through rooms full of unexpected objects.
Some were fascinating. Some were decidedly odd. Together, they made the castle feel intensely personal, as though we had arrived halfway through several centuries of collecting and nobody had felt any great need to explain the arrangement.
For all its theatrical touches, Chillingham felt extraordinarily real to me. There was an intimacy to the clutter and the strangeness. You could almost imagine the ghosts of former occupants still living there, mildly irritated by visitors and entirely unconcerned about tidying their rooms.
Back into the light
For once, we passed up tea and cake.
I appreciate that this is a serious statement in a Heather & Sand journal, but I wanted to be outside.
The gardens brought us back into that beautiful October light. The beds were fading towards winter, the last growth dying back beneath the castle walls. After the rooms inside, the space and fresh air felt wonderful.
You could imagine how lovely it would be in summer, with the gardens in full colour. I was very happy admiring the castle from this side of its doors.
We passed a woman tending the rose beds who we thought might have been Lady Wakefield. We didn’t establish whether it was her, and afterwards wished we’d stopped for more of a conversation. There must be quite a few stories to tell about keeping a place like this going.
You can stay at Chillingham in one of its apartments, including outside the main visiting season. I can imagine a younger version of myself finding that a brilliant idea with a group of university friends.
The present version would like to be home before dark, thank you.
The way home
The feeling of the castle took a little while to leave us. We drove towards the coast through fallen leaves and that lingering golden light, gradually returning to the easy conversation of earlier in the day.
By the time Bamburgh Castle and the sea appeared on the horizon, we were talking about how strange Chillingham had been. How personal, how unexpected, and how thoroughly it had got under our skin.
We had started with a to-do list and ended with a day that felt much bigger than the sum of its stops. An enormous breakfast, a glorious hill, a narrowly avoided marital incident and a castle neither of us would forget in a hurry.
Would we go back?
Absolutely.
