I’ve wanted to visit the Poison Garden at Alnwick (pronounced Al-nick for some reason) Gardens for a couple of years. I’m not sure where I read about it but it piqued my interest, even more when I discovered it was only an hour away from Durham. So, while visiting Glen’s sister and her family in Durham for the week, we snuck in a big road trip to visit Alnwick Gardens, Alnwick Castle and Lindisfarne.

Alnwick Gardens

Glen’s nephew Henry was “sick” from school on Thursday but couldn’t be left home alone so came with us, Miranda and baby Robin for a drive. We left at about 9:30am, loaded up with supplies and headed north to Alnwick.

I’ve got a thing about running out of time (along with a fear of death) so I was anxious about how much time we had to “see everything”. I really shouldn’t worry because, typically, Glen and I don’t spend long in places and we’re usually done in less than an hour.

The drive was fine, the sun had come out and it was glorious weather (which makes a change for the first four days of our visit being basically gross. We drove to Lincoln and back on Tuesday and it pissed it down with rain. This is summer in England!

Alnwick Gardens is located on the grounds of Alnwick Castle, the home seat of the Duchy of Northumberland. The gardens are impressive with a cherry orchard, big cascading fountain, ornamental gardens, bamboo labyrinth, rose gardens and the poison garden.

The Poison Garden can only be viewed via a 20-minute guided tour. It’s situated behind a locked gate and you must wait until 20 people congregate and you get taken through. The main reason for it being locked is that it contains some plants which are used to make controlled drugs such as chat and cannabis. It’s part of drug reduction education program but adds a bit of cache to the place.

We joined a group, went through, did the tour, saw some plants. Caster bean (which you get ricin from), wolfsbane, oleander and laurel some of the highlights. It also started off with a chat about rhubarb leaves and how poisonous they are – especially when you eat 5kg of them. Interesting was how the British Government encouraged people to eat them during World War I and World War II (even after knowing how badly it went down in World War I). 

I think I was expecting something a bit more…deadly for the poison garden. Or a bit bigger. Or a little…more. I’m just not sure but it didn’t quite meet expectations. It was a good tour though and now we’ve done it, plus it meant we visited the rest of the gardens and the castle.

Alnwick Castle

After a big walk for short legs (Henry’s, not Glen’s) through the garden, Miranda and Henry went to explore The Treehouse (which turned out to mostly be a restaurant) while Glen and I went to see Alnwick Castle.

It’s been used in a couple of Harry Potter movies (we think in the broomstick flying training scenes) as well as a bunch of other movies and tv shows (including Downton Abbey). The family still live at the castle for about five months in the year (over winter) when it’s closed to the public. 

Miranda and Henry joined us as we went into the main living quarters – there was a stuffed dog in nearly every room. Interesting for me were the carved walking stick handles made from ram’s horn and shaped into things like ducks, geese, snakes and a representation of coal mining.

We hit peak-museum at about 1pm so traipsed back to the car and drove towards Lindisfarne (another – more recent – addition on my to-do list).

Lindisfarne

(The Holy Island of) Lindisfarne is cut off from the mainland twice a day as the tide rushes in and covers the causeway. (Why not build a higher road? Glen asked.) Lindisfarne is an important place for early Christianity on the British Isles, sweeping out of Iona on the west coast across to Lindisfarne on the west, and insinuating itself with the kings to take up a prime spot from which to spread the Word.

The tide on Wednesday was high from 9:05am to 12:50pm which was the reason why we could fit in Alnwick first. We crossed the causeway while the tide was well out. Again, expectations are strange. I thought it would be much smaller than it is, basically a rock with abbey ruins and a castle on it, but there’s still a far whack of land. 

Still, the village is small and easily walkable (which you have to do anyway because they restrict the traffic). We parked, someone gave us their leftover parking ticket for an hour and a half and we set off towards Lindisfarne Castle.

The castle is best viewed from a distance so you can get good perspectival photos of it perched on top of the rock. We climbed up, looked around, but didn’t go inside, then went back down the hill and into the village. Next stop was the priory ruins which were pretty cool. We had a look around then were done in time to get back to our car without risking a ticket.

(Although I’d given Glen the bag so he and Henry could go back to the car while Miranda and I went to the bathroom. I thought the keys in the back. When Miranda and I got to the car, it was to see Glen frantically rifling through the bag for the keys which were in my pocket the whole time. Oops.)

Despite it being smaller than I expected, I enjoyed the visit to Lindisfarne. It was lovely to go for a walk beside the sea (something Miranda and Henry haven’t seen for a while) under the sun (even if we did get a bit sunburn) and to see something new (even if they’re really old buildings).

The drive back to Durham took two hours as we hit peak hour traffic. The kids were lucky and had a nap in the car. I was exhausted by the time we got home.