Northumberland - Monday 14th July - Day 4

Totally different to yesterday, we woke to bright sunshine streaming through the cracks in the gaps in the shutters. There was a strong feeling amongst the Brewer clan that this could be the day to attempt the hike to Embleton beach again (we had to abandon the previous attempt due to a sea mist). So after breakfast, we packed our things and headed along the coast from Craster to Dunstanburgh Castle and then round the base of the castle to the almost deserted Embelton beach. It was a glorious site at low tide - miles of sand with rock pools and sand dunes.

We set up camp and Master B and I headed to the shoreline to build our first sand castle. It was a little wet down there, so the citadel we built was a little crumbling, but we had fun nonetheless. By the dunes, it was very sheltered and very warm, but there was a pleasant cooling breeze near the sea.

We then moved to the dunes, where we built another citadel in the drier sand in the middle of two streams that were coming from the dunes. By now a few more people were enjoying the beach and it was getting very warm in the shelter of the dunes. The sun was still blazing down, and it was more Ibiza then Embleton!

However, as I was taking the photo above the cloud cover had rolled in and there was a decided nip in the air. We'd had a good 2-3 hours of lovely weather at the beach so we decided to pack up and head home. As we were all a little tired, it seemed to take twice as long to get home as it had to get to the beach! Still we made it OK, and decided a treat was in order...

We headed the 20-30 paces to the pub next door, bagged a window table and ordered lunch. Mrs B and I had fishcakes and chips and Master B had a burger and chips. It was delicious. What more can I say? Possibly the nicest fish cakes I've had. Mrs B and I shared a Tiramisu for pudding, which was also lovely.

We spent  lazy couple of hours in the cottage. Mrs B and I sat out on the balcony looking over the beautiful vista whilst Master B pottered around the cottage playing with his toys and his iPod games. We put some bread out for the birds and were amazed at how tame they were - coming right up to the table where I was sitting to take the bread!

A trip to the shops for supplies in Alnwick and a trip to the pub for a snifter and we were pretty much done for the day... Save a glorious sunset: