Wednesday 19th August - Housesteads Roman Fort

Today we walked the wall.
We set off from the B&B to drive to Hadrian's Wall at Housesteads, a distance of about 20 miles. We got there at 10.00am and had a coffee that I poured out of a machine and it wasn't too bad. We got in with our English Heritage passes so another savings. These passes have well been worth the purchase. There was a free guided tour starting at 10.30am so we decided to wait.

Paul started us off up the hill towards the wall and the fort. He stopped and pointed out all sorts of things both Roman times 68AD to Middle Ages and closer to our times. He was very good. We stopped several times by the time that we got to the fort. Paul explained all the details of the South Gate, theHospital, the Commanding Officers House, Granaries, Bathhouse, Latrines and lots more. He showed us Hadrian's Wall that disappeared into the distance. He also told us that his favourite part was the walk along the wall to Turret 37. This is the only part of Hadrian's Wall that can still be walked.

Paul finished his tour at the Latrines and Jannie and I took off to Walk The Wall to go to Turret 37. There was a track alongside the wall but we walked the wall. Off to the right side of part of the wall it was straight down for about 100 metres. We got to the Turret 37 and took our photos and headed back to the information centre. There was a film about the Roman Fort and a synopsis of how life must have been but nobody is really sure as there are few records.

We watched the film and then bought a sandwich and a bottle of ginger beer and we sat on the grass and had a picnic after which we walked all the way back to the car.
Brilliant morning. The tour that Paul did took 1.5 hours. But we were at Housesteads for 4 hours.