Hadrian’s Wall
It wasn’t meant as a route. But after a day trekking the best of Hadrian’s Wall, it’s hard not to believe that the Romans who built it were hillwalkers at heart.
All the best bits in one historic day
Apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us? Well, in a spot of neighbourly boundary reinforcement they built a ruddy great wall across northern England to keep the Ancient Britons out (although there’s no suggestion they made them pay for it).
When construction began in AD122, Emperor Hadrian’s wall marked the most northern extent of the Roman Empire. Nineteen hundred years later and such divisions are unnecessary – the whole of the UK gets along swimmingly, don’t we? But the route of the wall from the River Tyne in the east to the Solway Firth in the west has been immortalised as one of Britain’s best-loved long distance paths. The problem for the discerning hillwalker is that not all of it is particularly… interesting. The start through Newcastle is a pavement-based tour of riverside industry, and things don’t improve much beyond the city limits where the Hadrian’s Wall path slavishly follows the B6318. In the west, the Carlisle to Bowness-on-Solway section is alright in a desolate kind of way, but teeters on the brink of dull. However the central section that runs across Northumberland National Park from Chollerford to Greenhead is a bit special. It’s the most rugged, picturesque and, allegedly, toughest section of the entire National Trail. And at a little under 30km it can be walked in a day.
We begin our trek through two millennia of history at Chesters Fort. The early strides are along roadside pavement, but it’s only a few hundred metres until the trail takes to fields instead. The stone stuff isn’t long in coming. “I spy with my little eye, something beginning with ‘W’...” The first sight of the wall – a World Heritage Site, no less – is an exciting moment. What’s often not appreciated is that for the vast majority of the 135km Hadrian’s Wall path, there is no wall; it’s been destroyed, robbed for building materials (much of it by famous 18th century military road builder General Wade) and is notably absent. This is another advantage the central section has: it’s full of wall. And when it’s spotted, it’s impossible to refrain from reaching out, touching it and making a physical connection to history – and the wall is just the start of it. The route is punctuated by the remains of buildings. Constructed along the wall approximately one Roman mile apart, ‘milecastles’ housed a garrison of auxiliary soldiers and served as gateways across the north-south boundary. One-third of a Roman mile either side of each milecastle was a turret – a small watchtower built into the wall. The lower walls and foundations of these defences can be explored at regular intervals along the trail, acting as helpful indicators of progress. Incidentally, a Roman mile equates to roughly nine-tenths of a standard mile. And guess how many soldiers were in a Roman century? That’s right, 80.
“What are you doing?” Tom is swinging his right boot wildly into a small pile of earth. “Molehill kicking.” “Got something against moles?” “Not really, but they might have excavated bits of pottery.” Moles are archaeologists – who knew?
For walkers not wanting to get their hands (or boots) too dirty, there’s plenty of exposed archaeology to poke about in, such as the Brocolitia temple to the sun god Mithras. But if you’re here for the landscape, rather than the history, the sight of the ground climbing steeply ahead provides all the incentive you need. This is where the exciting stuff begins. The trail shifts from easy field edge terrain to the kind of gradients hillwalkers will be more familiar with. The climbs never come in the sustained volumes you get on a mountain, but they’re often and regular, with the descents between them seemingly undoing the hard work you’ve just put in. But this roller coaster landscape has its benefits. Even where the original wall (which would have been up to six metres wide when first built) is gone and only a narrow drystone wall remains, the sight of it threading over the writhing landscape is still impressive.
When walking the wall – either all or just a bit of it – you have a decision to make: do you walk with the sun from east to west, or with the prevailing winds from west to east? We’d gone with the former, hoping to walk into a glorious sunset at the end of the day. But it means we were head on into a wind, which began the day as blustery and has grown more thuggish as we gain height. And while the altitude never comes close to mountainous (the highest point along the whole wall is only 345m above sea-level), this linear landscape is exposed on all sides and shelter from the elements is sparse. Little wonder soldiers weren’t keen to be posted to the northern limits of the Empire; it’s probably fair to say that the weather here does not compare favourably with Rome. A brief respite is enjoyed through Sewing Shields woods, the swaying, creaking trees with their cawing rook residents taking the brunt of the breeze, but we are soon back out in it, seeking shelter in the corner of a milecastle ruin to break for lunch.
“So let me get this straight: they used a sponge, on a stick, which they shared? I think, on the whole, I prefer Andrex.” Housesteads Fort is one of the largest remains on the wall and the most complete example of a Roman fort in Britain. It’s also the perfect place to learn about the toilet hygiene habits of Romans. Arse-sponge, anyone? The woods above the fort contain a section of wall that, while visually identical to much of the rest, is unique in being the only stretch you are free to walk along. There’s no-one to physically restrain you from clambering onto the wall elsewhere, but there are polite signs at regular intervals requesting that you don’t. Given the age of the wall, and the fact that we’d like future generations to enjoy it, we’re happy to oblige. Further west the Hadrian’s Wall path is joined by the Pennine Way from the north. The two trails share the route, not going their separate ways until the other side of Greenhead where our journey ends.
There is a place on Hadrian’s Wall that nearly everybody, even those uninterested in history, geography or construction, will be aware of. In the movie Robin Hood:
Prince of Thieves (you remember the one, it spawned that number-one-spot-hogging power ballad from Bryan Adams – altogether now “Everything I dooo…”),
English folk hero Robin Hood (played with a very American accent by Kevin Costner) stops beneath a tree next to a stone wall to fight some baddies and rescue a child. On the basis that Robin was on his way from Eastbourne to Nottingham, it’s surprising to find this tree in Northumberland (great film, terrible geography). More specifically, it stands right next to Hadrian’s Wall in a U-shaped dip in the landscape known as Sycamore Gap, and can be fondly stroked as you wander past. Beyond Sycamore Gap the land climbs again, taking the path with it up onto Steel Rigg above Crag Lough.
“Why did they need a wall?” Tom asks. It’s a good question. Steel Rigg is a steep, cliff-faced outcrop – part of the elevated Whin Sill escarpment. The sheer nature of the crags to the north makes the wall on the top slightly redundant. “Perhaps it was to stop the soldiers wandering over the edge,” I suggest. The sight of the wall tracing the edge of the escarpment is a familiar one. This is the postcard scenery everyone will have seen. It’s certainly the most dramatic section and, truth is, once you descend from here the most exciting ground is behind you. But the wilderness continues. A long, drawn-out climb to a lonely trig point takes us up onto Whinshield Crags, the highest point on the wall. By now the repeated short descents and ascents niggle aching legs. And there’s no let-up. The peaks and troughs continue until the end. The wall also remains a near-continuous companion – with a few exceptions. The comprehensive footprint of milecastle 42 (they’re numbered east to west) is encountered just before Cawfields Quarry where, due to some overenthusiastic excavating in the early 20th century, the wall has been destroyed. Ancient archaeology was clearly insignificant when you have quarrying quotas to reach. Still, the deep, steepwalled water hole is impressive and vaguely picturesque it its own, brutal way.
The farm at Great Chesters has been far more responsible with the history entrusted to its care. Imagine having the remains of a Roman a fort in your back garden. That’s the case here; although the farm’s horses grazing around the ruins of Aescia Fort don’t seem that bothered by it. We can relate. The last 4km are, perhaps obviously, the toughest of the day. Tired limbs and thoughts of what might be on the menu for dinner mean we’re not as enthused by Hadrian’s brickwork as we were 24km ago. But then something happens. Above Walltown Crags, where some of the tallest remains of the wall are encountered, the flagging sun droops below a cloud and throws a cloak of gold across the world. The dimpled and textured ground is thrown into sharp relief, hinting at the secrets buried beneath. The wild lands to the north take on the same honey hue they would have thousands of years ago. And the wall. The wall continues as it always has. We make our final descent of the day, down to the road and out of the National Park. We’re lucky to have such landscape in this country. We’re lucky to have such history in our country. And to have them both in once place? That’s got to be worth this walk.