The Long Walk to Lindisfarne
By: Richard J. Goodrich
Tags: Travel, Hiking, Pilgrimage, Outdoors, History

The first leg of the trail, rather predictably, runs up a long hill out of Wooler. As noted above, our guidebook had asserted that our altitude gain would be smaller than any other day on the trail. If this is true, it would appear that the trail planners were intent on packing the height into the earliest miles. Up we go, threading a narrow track cut through the bracken. Near the peak, we begin to see clumps of heather, a sure and certain sign that we were moving into the higher altitudes. We hike across the top of the hill, and then plunge down the other side, toward the Weetwood Bridge. Built in the sixteenth century, this stone bridge crosses the River Till, and played a minor part in the Battle of Flodden, one of the bloodiest encounters between the English and the Scots.

Weetwood Bridge, England. Author Photograph.

It is an elegant bridge, bent over a lovely arch. It clearly wasn’t designed to support the heavier vehicle loads of the modern world; barriers deny crossing to all vehicles save bicycles and the narrowest of cars. Pedestrians are fine, and we saunter across in style. We follow a paved road from Weetwood Bridge for a few miles, winding up another hill to West Horton, a cattle ranch. Pavement gives way to gravel, and then to a dirt path that will lead us to St Cuthbert’s Cave.

St Cuthbert’s Cave, England. Author Photograph.

When St Cuthbert died in 687, his body was interred in a stone coffin in the Church of St Peter on Lindisfarne, next to the high altar. Nine years later, the brothers opened the coffin to move the body. According to Bede, they had expected to find only Cuthbert’s dried bones, but to their astonishment, his body was incorrupt, clothed with flesh, and his joints still supple. He appeared to be having a long nap.

News of this miraculous preservation spread, pilgrimage traffic increased, and Lindisfarne became one of Britain’s most sacred sites. Visitors would come to pray near Cuthbert’s remains, and Bede recorded a number of miracles performed at the tomb of the saint. In 875, with the Vikings attacking vulnerable monasteries on the English coast, the monks of Lindisfarne decided to move Cuthbert’s body for safekeeping. For the next century the saint lived an itinerant existence, moving from hiding place to hiding place, until he finally reached Durham Cathedral, where he remains to this day. St Cuthbert’s Cave, which we are approaching, is said to have been one of the sites that sheltered Cuthbert’s remains during his exodus.

A narrow trail runs through a grove of pine trees, like the central aisle in a great cathedral, dividing the marble columns on either side. We turn left at the end of the trail, and the land falls away in a great stone bowl. At the upper end of the bowl is the cave. Element-carved out of native sandstone, the dark recesses surely could have been used to conceal Cuthbert’s remains. Generations of tourists have visited since Cuthbert’s time: graffiti has been scratched into the stone, and a charred circle at the mouth of the cave marks a late night campfire. Crosses, fabricated from limbs stripped from the surrounding pine trees, stand in every spare niche and hollow.

Wooden Crosses, St Cuthbert’s Cave, England. Author Photograph.

We sit beneath the overhanging cave ceiling as rain begins to fall and the freshening breeze whips around the empty spaces. Outside the pine trees sigh, needle-clad limbs resisting the growing gale. Rain spatters on the rocks. The cave is a lonely place today, devoid of visitors, a fine place to hide a body or, as becomes clear when David begins unpacking his backpack, to have a cup of tea.

The Final Leg

We haven’t encountered many other hikers on the trail. Perhaps it is the time of the year: late September with the grim winter beginning to close in. As we are packing up the remains of our lunch, four hikers who have been shadowing us on the trail arrive. We passed them yesterday morning, climbing Green Humbleton. We’d stopped to share trail stories for a few minutes, and then walked ahead of them. We saw them again this morning leaving Wooler, but had left them behind us on the first hill. This was our last meeting.

The weather deteriorates rapidly. The wind is backing into the North and picking up a wintry quality. Rain begins to fall. While David fusses over his portable stove, working far too hard to brew a cup of tea, I snap photos of St Cuthbert’s Cave.

Lunch over, we ascend the hill behind St Cuthbert’s Cave, and are rewarded with a first glimpse of our ultimate destination: Lindisfarne, the Holy Island, object of Cuthbert’s journey and the end of our walk. A stray sunbeam pierces the clouds, momentarily catching the island and fixing it like a green jewel in a dark grey sea. A heartening sight, to be sure. It looks close, and more importantly, downhill from where we stand.

A first glimpse of Lindisfarne, England. Author Photograph.

With lighter spirits, we set off down the hill, through Shiellow Wood and into Fenwick. A torrential cloudburst intercepts us on the outskirts of Fenwick, but we laugh it off. In a few minutes we will put our feet under the table of a cozy British pub for an afternoon break. Unfortunately, the laugh is on us. As we hike through Fenwick, rain soaking into our boots, it becomes evident that this lonely collection of houses lacks a pub, a store, post office, or even a public urinal. With tears in our eyes, bedraggled in both spirit and clothing, cheated of a few moments of warmth and an alcoholic pick-me-up, we totter on through the rain.

One last hill, and then we reach Beal Sands, the beginning of the great causeway that crosses the estuary to Lindisfarne. Intermittent rain squalls smite us from the Northwest, and a strengthening gale, no longer blocked by the undulating hills of the Borders, now batters us with its entire force.

Well, at least the path ahead is flat.

There are two routes to the Holy Island: a road with no shoulders, used by vehicular traffic; or the direct path, across the wet sands, the so-called Pilgrims’ Path. The Pilgrims’ Path is marked by a line of wooden stakes, pounded into the usually submerged plain. “Twice a day,” wrote Bede, “The tides rush in and the place is enclosed by the sea like an island; twice a day the shore dries and the island rejoins the land.” Twice a day it is safe to cross, and twice a day the tides rush in and submerge both road and Pilgrims’ Path. For those who have begun the walk too late in the tidal cycle, there are two elevated refuge stations, where one could huddle in the cold while water races with surprising velocity below.

Pilgrim’s Refuge Station, Lindisfarne, England. Author Photograph.

By my calculation, the Pilgrims’ Path is about 2.5 miles long. It is a direct route, as opposed to the road, which traces a long slow curve to the island. As we knocked off the final miles to Beal Sands, the Pilgrims’ Path appeared to be underwater, and David and I had agreed not to chance it. Better the hard pavement of the longer road. Unfortunately, that meant we would be sharing a narrow ribbon of tarmac with a steady stream of cars, trucks, and tour buses. Discouraged after a few minutes of being buffeted by passing trucks, we realize that the only true course for a pilgrim lay along the Pilgrims’ Path.

The path stretches across a sea mud and sand flat. With our first tentative steps, we sink up to our ankles. Obviously the boots must go before they are ruined by saltwater. In bare feet we slipped and slid on the mud and bits of seaweed like automobiles on an icy hill.

The gale strengthens. Rain and shotgun blasts of light sting exposed flesh. It is as if demonic minions are conspiring to keep us from the island. Struggling to keep my feet, I decide to put my boots back on: I need the traction. I wash my feet in a tide pool, and then drag reluctant, damp socks back over my clammy feet. Not a pleasant experience. It was a good decision, however. Their rough rubber tread offered a significant boost in traction, and I was able to make better time.

After about a week on the Pilgrims’ Path, a few minutes before the inrushing tide effaces it entirely, we reach the secure stone of the Holy Island. The foul wind, now at our back, drives us into the small fishing village, and we hurry through the tourist-deserted streets, making our way to our evening’s lodgings.

We have, like St Cuthbert, reached our destination.