Cragside

Mr C set off for Thirsk as planned at 6.30 am. Once there he decided against getting an LPG container fitted under the van and instead got 2 canisters of Gaslow which were cheaper and he thinks better suited to our needs.

I took the car to the village to attend the U3A talk by Chris Mullen about his
books “A Very British Coup” and it’s follow-up. He was quite entertaining. He was questioned about his appearance tomorrow at the enquiry about him (in his journalist role) refusing to give the police the name of his informant regarding the 1974 Birmingham pub bombing. Anyone old enough will remember that he got the men, who’d been imprisoned for almost 20 years,
released - a miscarriage of justice. He had evidence that some other people were responsible but would not name the source. Now 30 years later the police have decided they want to find who really did it. Confessions at the time were made under duress.

This afternoon Mr C assured me the Alnwick road was still closed to traffic though I had seen an announcement on Facebook that it was opening for this week only, to facilitate an event in Longframlington. The idea was I would get a nice flat walk along the back lane, up the Alnwick road to Cragside to walk round the lake and come home the same way. Normally it is not possible to walk up the road as it is narrow, twisty and has nowhere for pedestrians to walk safely. Once there I found the road was indeed open and I had a horrible few hundred yards till I reached the safety of Cragside. No way could I return that way so the only alternative was to cross the road and go directly up the steep path through the woods to reach the carriage drive and get home that way. It was bad enough struggling up with my totally stiff calf, but when I got half way up I found the path blocked as a result of Storm Arwen. I had a real struggle to climb over fallen trees or crawl under big branches. I only did 2.5 miles and was not happy.

My friend has decided not to come to stay on Wednesday as she’s worried about Covid. She’s from Scotland where some of her friends have succumbed despite masks being still mandatory so she wasn’t up for England where few wear them. Numbers here are not as high as Scotland - yet. The good news is I dialled 119 this morning and booked booster jabs for Mr C and me in Morpeth on Wednesday.