Cawfields, Fort 42 on Hadrian's Wall

For the Veterans' Day Weekend (November 11-13, 2011), we went on a trip to Edinburgh. We left Thursday night and stayed in Haltwhistle at the Burnhead Bed and Breakfast. It was very comfortable and they gave us a nice tray of cookies and cake slices (along with tea) when we checked in around 8 p.m. We had a little trouble finding it, mostly because Google maps steered us wrong about a street name. We wandered through quite a bit of Haltwhistle before we made it out of town, past the Milecastle Inn and within a very short walk of Hadrian's Wall.

The next morning we enjoyed the breakfast part of our B&B and then drove 5 minutes to Cawfields, a park on Hadrian's Wall with a quarry that has fallen out of use and the remains for Fort XLII on the wall.

We parked and didn't do the "pay and display" sticker because it's off season and no one does (as our innkeeper told us). It was a little bit lazy of us to drive, but it saved the children some steps and when we left something in the car, we were glad not to have to go all the way back to the bed and breakfast.

The quarry, now filled with water, was right in front of the car and had a small path leading off to the fort.

Jacob and Lucy are ready to go!

Family on the path to the fort, photographer in the lead!

A quick hike brought us to the fort on the wind-swept hills of the national park. Lucy and Jacob enjoyed scrambling around on remains of the fort and the wall.

Jacob and Mommy had to catch up on the fun!

Wind-swept happiness

Jacob enjoys the rocky walls, too

Auntie Rosemary on Hadrian's Wall

We walked down the wall (or on the wall for Jacob and Lucy) quite a way until we decided to turn back to the car.

The car looks very far away

Back at the parking lot, Jacob and Lucy took advantage of their stompy boots (called Wellies or Wellingtons here in the UK) to jump in the puddles just like Grandpa taught them.

Lucy found a big puddle

Puddling their way to the car!

Then we drove off to Vindolanda to see another larger fort with a museum and replicas of the wooden and the stone walls. More on that in the next post!