by Today was a fun little jaunt along the “Castle Coastal Road” along the southeastern coast of Scotland, with a drop back down into England for a bit as well.
Seawall
The first stop was Tantallon Castle, a medieval castle right on the coast. It’s basically just a giant thick wall with defensive towers enclosing a portion of the coast, since they didn’t need much fortifications to defend from the sea, just from land.
Tantallon was the last truly great castle built in Scotland. William Douglas, a nobleman, built the mighty fortress in the mid-1300s, at the height of his power.
You walk across the fields out front where enemy trenches are still dug out of the landscape, across the moat bridge, through the relatively narrow but five-story-tall wall, and then into the inner courtyard where there used to be wooden buildings.
In the far distance is this white-speckled island with a lighthouse on it. Except, no, wait, zoom, those aren’t features of the rock, they’re seagulls. A thousand seagulls. Gross.
Okay, Yeah, This Is A Castle
Next up was Bamburgh Castle which is still inhabited by some rich family, though I don’t think they’re royal/royal-adjacent? But the castle and the site of the castle was the ancient seat of the Northumbrian kings a thousand years ago. You first see it from miles off, set on a hillside looming over the village. It’s another sea-side castle, though this time it includes a sea-facing wall where they have canons set up to defend it. Cool!
I took the self-guided tour of the old residences. The massive main hall has a really incredible ceiling, and the various sitting rooms had armor and tapestries and was generally interesting, but nothing really wow’d me *shrug*
States Of Disrepair
The next several castles were all really old ruins. Dunstanburgh Castle, Warkworth Castle, and Tynemouth Priory, they all wanted to charge admission to look at old stones. And, like, I’ve kinda seen it? They looked cool! And I read the Wikipedia about them. But the clouds were rolling in and I knew I wanted to get over to the Northumberland National Park before sunset. So I just sort of drove on.
Hidden Valley
Having crossed back into England for Tynemouth Priory in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, I swung northwest back towards Edinburgh via the Northumberland National Park. I can’t resist a spot of green on the map. And thank goodness I didn’t! I’m pretty sure I found the place where they took that classic Windows XP desktop wallpaper, or at least some gorgeous green hills that looked like it. Seriously. GORGEOUS.
Please Don’t Blow Me Up
Okay, so, hey Google Maps? Mayyyyyyyybe don’t send me into frickin MILITARY EXPLOSIVES TESTING RANGES?!?!
The route looks like a normal road on the map, and there are no signs that you can’t drive on it. And there are farms with sheep and whatnot all along the road? AND YET. Constant warning signs. And I was halfway across the park, so turning around would’ve added HOURS to my drive. And it was still a stunning afternoon with the sun glaring over the rain-damp roads and countryside. But come on.
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