Thursday 3rd July 2023.
Let’s go North Tour.
Our first attempted stop today was at Bernard’s Castle, it was thriving and busy but unfortunately that meant we couldn’t find a safe place to park Homer, so after driving around town twice we continued north stopping in a lay-by on a country road for lunch.
We then headed to Stanhope this was uphill and across high moorland, virtually no traffic but there were a few challenging S bends and steep ups and downs.
We parked on the above car park which was for an open air swimming pool, closed until high summer, it was acceptable to stay the night free.
We walked along the road past a few pubs and shops and arrived at a modern set of buildings that amongst other things hosted craft shops.
A peculiar feature we came across was on the edge of the graveyard.
We left Stanhope via a steep hill which took us along yet another B road up and onto the moors, the open moorland was populated by hundreds of sheep who all have a death wish deciding at the last minute to dash across the road or wander halfway across to inspect the road surface. Eventually we began to descend and turned into the opening of tonight’s stop at Derwent Visitors Centre.
This is well laid out with toilets (closed over night) a small shop and cafe, a children’s play area and a huge dog walking field. You are encouraged to stay over night in a motorhome for the sum of £10.
After a short break we walked up the private tarmac road to the reservoir which like many we have seen lately is low on water.
Sadly it wasn’t possible to get down to the waters edge unless you were fishing with a licence and so Layla had to forgo her swim.
We walked across the dam where at times we were buffeted with strong winds but the views were worth it.
taraabit 