I dropped down on to the beach at Druridge Bay and walked across to the sea defences that had now sunk into the sand. This was the turn around point when I walked Druridge Bay earlier this year (see Druridge Bay Day). I turned around again, walked back into Creswell and back along the road to the carpark. I could start the rest of my walk to Newbiggin-by-the-Sea now. 

Lynemouth Power Station

I spotted a pickup on the beach below the cliff. It was too far away to see what it was doing there and so I took a photo and expanded it on my camera. It looked like a fellow was filling plastic sacks with sand or rocks and putting them in to the back of the pickup. About 15 minutes later I spotted the pickup heading down the coastal road. It looked like its suspension had bottomed out. 

Looking out at sea I could see a huge tanker progressing southwards. Crikey, it was massive. I've seen a few ships making their way up and down this coast, but nothing quite as big as this. 'It's almost as big as an island' I thought. I reckoned it was at least as big as Coquet Island.  In fact, it was roughly around where Coquet Island should be too.

Lynemouth Power Station dominates the coastline. When I planned today's walk, I wondered if route finding might be difficult near the power station. I shouldn't have worried; the signage was good, probably because the company doesn't want you walking into areas that you shouldn't. It used to be a coal fired power station but now uses biomass as a fuel. There is much evidence of the bad old days though with huge areas around the plant covered in slag. On the southern side of the power station the area looked more like a rubbish dump with lots of plastic rubbish covering the area. It was all rather grim. Two elderly joggers plodded past. I wondered why they'd chosen to run through this rubbish dump, rather than better nearby coastal paths. At last I reached the end of the rubbish and into the realm of the Club Swingers. I sighed - out of the frying pan.... There's no way of escaping this particular group. The footpath went around the edge of the course and it turned out that it wasn't too much of an inconvenience. The route brought me to the clubhouse and then into Newbiggin-by-the-Sea. The first thing I saw in the town was the Cresswell Arms. A sign outside announced that it was the last bar before Norway. I was quite sure the Club Swinger's clubhouse had a bar and by my calculation, this would be the last bar before Norway. I thought about going into the Cresswell Arms and telling its landlord this fact, but at that moment, the pretty St Bartholomew's Church drew my attention.

Newbiggin-by-the-Sea

Newbiggin-by-the-Sea is an old mining town. I'd visited the place a few years before and quite liked it. It seems to have a nice atmosphere to it. I think this is probably due to there being no vehicular access along the bay front. Pedestrians rule the roost. There aren't any shops on the front either. A row of houses run along the top of the bay with their gardens running down towards the promenade. It all looks a bit... domestic. It has a fine beach. Well, it did come from Skegness, and so it should be. 500,000 tonnes of  Skegness sand  was dredged and then deposited on to the beach. A lot of it now seems to have permanent residence on the promenade.  Maybe that was the result of the recent storms.

A curious structure can be seen when you look out into the bay. It looks like a man and woman are standing on a metal frame and looking out to sea. It is in fact a sculpture by the artist Sean Henry, and is known as the Couple. There is a much smaller version of the statue on the promenade. Newbiggin actually has the longest promenade in Northumberland and I walked the length of it before climbing up to Spital Point at the end of the bay. In 1904, SS Anglia grounded on nearby rocks. The lifeboat and local fishing cobles sailed out to provide assistance. Unfortunately, one of the cobles overturned in the heavy sea and only one of the seven crew members survived. The SS Anglia's crew were all able to walk to safety at low tide. 

Return

It had turned out to be a lovely day with blue skies and white, cotton wool clouds. Spital Point was today's turnaround point and I started making my way back. Halfway across the promenade I saw an information board about Hunkleton stone. Apparently it was an erratic stone dumped here during the last ice age. I looked around but couldn't see anything. How odd. The tide was in and so maybe the water had covered it. Later research revealed that it keeps sinking beneath the sand, which then necessitates digging it up again. Due to either tide or sand, it certainly wasn't on show today.

I chatted to a couple of Club Swingers as they prepared to tee off at one of the holes. I didn't want to get hit if they sliced the ball and so thought it wise to wait. The fat fellow teed off first. He scuffed the shot and his ball went about a 100 yards. His mate then took a swing and it flew through the air like a missile and almost reached the green. 'Bloody hell. Well done' I said, and meant it. The fat fellow said that his mate played for the 'county.' I told him that for his sake, I hoped the loser didn't have to buy the drinks back at the clubhouse. 

I asked a couple of birders further along if they'd seen anything special. 'Aye we saw a Twite just a little further along the cliff'.' I nodded sagely. I wouldn't know a Twite if it flew on to my nose and pecked the word Twite on my forehead. 'We were wanting to see some Snow Buntings but we've not seen any yet.' Now, I would recognise a Snow Bunting. I once had an infamous encounter with a birder down at St Mary's Lighthouse near Whitley Bay. Unfortunately he'd had a broad Geordie accent and I couldn't understand a word that he muttered. All I could remember from the encounter was that he seemed to repeat the phrase 'Snoowar Boontn.' Later that day I got somebody to translatewhat he said into English for me. The chap had of course, been asking me if I'd seen any Snow Buntings. 

Back at the Lynemouth Power Station's rubbish dump I saw a Fish Botherer pitched on the discarded plastic next to the sea. Of all the spots along the coast, why on earth would you choose this one? Not only that, I saw another Fish Botherer heading off for the same section of beach! 

It only took me a couple of hours to get back to the carpark. That seemed a bit weird, since it took me 3 1/2 hours to get to the turnaround point at Newbiggin-by-the-Sea. I wondered if I'd gone through some sort of time warp at the power station on my way back. 

Despite the industrialisation around the power station, the walk had been very enjoyable. Newbiggin-by-the-Sea is a curiosly affable place with plenty to hold one's interest.