Once Brewed to Gilsland, 9.3 miles

Our morning began at Vallum Lodge with a wonderfully sociable breakfast. We found ourselves sharing the dining room with a lively Dutch walking group, swapping stories about routes, weather and aching legs over coffee and toast. One of the lovely things about long-distance walking is how complete strangers quickly become friends through stories of shared endeavours. 

Rather than setting straight off along the trail, we took a slight detour. Our kind friend, Jack, gave us a lift over to Vindolanda, although our B&B host had also generously offered to take us there if needed (thank you for the offer, Sam). It’s only a short distance from the Wall, but a bit too far to walk (and it was in the wrong direction). 

You could quite happily spend an entire day exploring Vindolanda. We only had an hour, but it was just enough to get a feel for the place. This must have been a bustling village two thousand years ago, well, almost that long ago – building started here in AD 85. The site is impressively large and as you walk through from the west entrance you can see the excavated walls and buildings stretching out in front of you. 

Vindolanda was part of the first frontier in the North, the Stanegate frontier, and only later was it incorporated into the new Hadrian’s Wall, so there would have been people living here before the building of the Wall about one mile to the North. The museum is packed with remarkable artefacts recovered from the site, from shoes and jewellery to a whole library of writing tablets that somehow survived nearly two thousand years beneath the soil. 

Walking around the excavations, it is impossible not to marvel at how much has been uncovered, and equally how much still lies waiting beneath the ground. There is still an active archaeological dig ongoing at the site, how on earth there are still remains to be discovered is quite bewildering. We barely scratched the surface during our visit, but it was enough to leave us wanting to return one day with far more time.

After another lift back to the Wall at Steel Rigg, the walking began in earnest, starting off at the point we had descended from the day before. This is Hadrian’s Wall at its most dramatic. The path climbs and falls over rugged crags, with sweeping views stretching across Northumberland in every direction. 

It wasn’t long before we’d ascended to Winshields where an interpretative board informed us that we were officially at the highest point on the Wall, and also at the half-way point. 

From here, the Wall follows every rise and dip of the landscape, snaking its way along the crags, descending steep gullies, and rising up the other side. We were following the wall, so we had quite an undulating morning. The section down to Caw Gap from Shield on The Wall was particularly steep, a real test for those aching knees! 

We stopped for a cup of tea from our flasks at Cawfields where Milecastle 42 offered a comforting seat before we descended to the pretty flooded quarry by what is now a car park. There are public toilets here but sadly no café. 

The weather has continued to grace us with clear skies, light winds, and sunshine on our backs. Today, though, was a bit too hot and we found it sapping, especially with the miles in our legs from the last few days. Regular water breaks and shady pauses kept us going. 

As the miles passed, the landscape gradually softened. After Cawfields, the rocky escarpments gave way to open moorland, before fields began to appear and we entered farming landscape. Soon enough we were back among livestock once again. Regular readers will know by now that cows and I have reached an understanding: they stay over there, and I walk through as briskly as dignity allows. We were coming up to a farm just after Milecastle Inn when a friendly walker coming in the opposite direction warned us of a frisky heifer occupying the path in the next field. As we mounted the stile, I could see that she had two calves with her – yikes. There wasn’t much option than to carry on, so we gave her a wide berth. The two youngsters obviously found us fascinating and turned to follow us for a while, but soon gave up and seemed far less interested in me than I was in them.

Another craggy section with steep ascents and descents followed leading us to the whinstone crags above Walltown where we met up with Jack again. Then it was down to Walltown Country Park for a well-deserved ice cream and bottle of cold water in the hot sun at the visitor centre. From here we only had a few miles to go to our destination – Gilsland. 

Beyond the grazing fields, the scenery changed once more into gently rolling arable farmland. It’s remarkable how many different landscapes Hadrian’s Wall manages to thread together in a single day, each one with its own character. As we came down to Gilsland Farm, we walked through the wildflowers in the Vallum, with fields of hay bales either side. 

The last couple of miles after Walltown Country Park were marked by road crossings and even a train track crossing and it was obvious that we’d emerged into more of an urban landscape after the wilderness of the earlier part of the day. 

At Gilsland we had to walk through the village and up a hill to Brookside Villa, our home for the night. We’d been booked into the Samson Inn, a community run pub, by the B&B host so just had to wander down there for our supper.

Five days in and we’ve settled into our rhythm. Up early for a good breakfast, chat to other guests then set off on our day, chatting and walking, taking the time to discover the history of this fascinating area, then mid afternoon arriving at our next stop to check in, shower and change then out for dinner at a local hostelry. Rinse and repeat. That’s what I love about multi-day hikes, it’s just a simple existence with nothing else to worry about. Up here on the Wall, every day brings another chapter of Roman history, another changing landscape and another reminder that this famous trail is about far more than simply following an ancient wall from coast to coast.