Warkworth

Today's weather was almost balmy by North East standards. After a morning spent digging borders in the garden like a coolie, I watched my sister's boyfriend squeeze tomato ketchup all over his gravy less Sunday dinner of roast potatoes, carrots, green beans, chicken, stuffing and yorkshire puddings like it was a plate of fish fingers and chips. I always wondered why he didn't speak much.
We drove up the coastal road to Amble in the afternoon, then walked along the river to Warkworth Castle. I hadn't been there since I was a kid, when we used to stay in a rusty caravan in a farmer's field nearby, but it was sort of how I remembered it - the castle on a hill at the top of the high street; grey stone houses; rowing boats on the river and the old hermitage right at the end of a shaded path.