Alnwick Castle

The plan was to pay a brief visit to "Holy Island" on the northeast coast of England on our way south. Legend has it that 7th century monk, Saint Aidan, founded a monastery here, Lindisfarne Priory, which was a pretty important place in the history of British Christianity. It was later associated with St. Cuthbert, who is buried behind the high altar at Durham Cathedral -- but that's a long story.

Blocked traffic

The place is a peninsula at low tide and an island at high tide. So one has to consult the tide tables to know when to visit and when to leave. We had done so. Unfortunately, the driver of a new Audi had not, so when we tried to drive over we found the way blocked by a freshly washed Audi with its transmission seized in salt water. So much for visiting Lindisfarne!

Not every day do college kids from Iowa play on a beach
near a Medieval castle

As a "Plan B," our coach driver took us a few miles farther down the coast to the site of Bamburgh Castle, an excellently preserved seaside fortress. Unfortunately, the castle was already closed for the day, but our students very much enjoyed some time on the beach and in the (cold!) water of the North Sea.

Cold!

We then drove on to Alnwick (pronounced ANN-ick), ancestral and one of the (several) current homes of the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland. The Duke's ancestors have been involved in English history for roughly 700 years and were "upwardly mobile" -- meaning that he's inherited land and enterprises making him even more wealthy than Her Royal Highness, the Queen.

Alnwick Castle

One of his smaller side ventures is renting out part of the castle's former servants quarters and guard barracks to St. Cloud State University of Minnesota for a study abroad program. We, in turn, sub-let some rooms from them for one night, so that our students could sleep in a castle.

Fish & Chips

We dined on a fine fish & chips meal in one of the village's few establishments. No ghost sightings were reported during the night.

The tour

After breakfast, we had a minor difficulty locating our assigned classroom within the castle, but we soon met up with Dr. Christine Mitchell, a British historian who is on staff with St. Cloud State at Alnwick. She gave the group a quick history lesson about castles in general, Alnwick castle, and the Duke's family tree. She then took us on a tour of the castle grounds, and later, on a tour of the town and surrounding area.

It was an antique bus

Once again, for some of the students the history in which they were most interested was not ancient, but cinematic. Alnwick Castle was the place where the broom-riding lesson scenes from the first two Harry Potter movies were filmed. They insisted on a re-enactment with me as the broom instructor. Unfortunately, we had no brooms to use a props in the photo.

Broomstick lesson re-enacted [student photo]

After lunch, we loaded the coach and headed southwest toward Hexham to view the ruins of Hadrian's Wall and a Roman fort now known as Housesteads Fort. Emperor Hadrian (who ruled the Roman Empire from 117 to 138 A.D.) had this wall built across the full width of Britain as a barrier to raids by Scots tribesmen. It was one of the most fortified borders of the Roman Empire, and a cold, wet, god-forsaken (yet very scenic) posting for Roman legions.

Excitement for Hadrian's Wall (or just being silly for the camera)

We had a quick history lesson and some time to explore the ruins before heading home to Nottingham. It was important to get home early, as final exams would begin for some students the next day.