The city of Durham

We got up to sunshine today also, although quite cold.  No problem when walking.  Breakfast was buffet style, with everything you could imagine on offer.  I had some fruit juice, then three different types of melon, then scrambled eggs with smoked salmon on sourdough bread..... I really enjoyed it.

Today we did something a little different for our walking club.  We had a city walk around Durham, a total of seven very interesting miles round the centre and outskirts of the city.  Durham is a university city, and the evidence is everywhere, especially in the numbers of young university students everywhere.  The Durham people are particularly friendly and we had many conversations with some.  One lady was telling us how the university tends to be taking over the city, and she was concerned that the old part of the city was losing out to more modern buildings.

We finished our walk at the cathedral, where we had arranged for a tour.    As we had tested out the tour on our recce in October, the six of us chose to have coffee in the excellent tea room instead. 

 The rest were broken into three groups, and all said the volunteer guides were excellent and very informative.   Lots of info about St. Cuthbert who's bones are contained in the cathedral.

 After the Battle of Dunbar in the fifteenth century,  2,000 of the defeated Scots prisoners were incarcerated in the cathedral.  Many died, and we saw a mass grave of some of them on our walk.

After the tour, we were all free to make our own way back to the hotel, and we chose to walk around the old part of the city for a bit, before wandering back along the river to the hotel.  And a nice rest (or a swim for the HG) before another very nice dinner.

Have added some extra pictures.