Can you think of anything more British than a bank holiday rubber duck race down a river in a rural Northumberland town? Visitors and residents all chasing (rather slowly) hundreds of ducks downstream, men with nets waiting for the winner at the stepping stones, locals in waders with rubber ducks stuck to their hats fishing escapees out of the grassy riverbanks. Another reason to love the North.
We somehow managed to have a bit of luck and happened to book ourselves a few nights in a cottage on the weekend with the hottest, sunniest weather ever. This never happens to us. We are literally followed by rain and clouds everywhere we go. Evenings in the cottage, spent watching the chickens in the front, and days spent in the grounds of Cragside or by the river in Rothbury.
We'd arranged the weekend to work around the bank holiday, and the food festival on in Rothbury. We left with some amazing Sourdough bread and sausages. And a mild case of sunstroke for me. After our eventful Holland road trip, being back in Northumberland with quiet nights and slow days was exactly what we needed.
