Route Description

The journey from Bellingham in the heart of the Northumbrian National Park to Holy Island takes less than six days. We start walking on Palm Sunday after a short service with the local parish and get to Lindisfarne in time for lunch on Good Friday. Despite being shorter, this Leg has been regarded by some to be the hardest physically as there are several long days and much tough off-road walking.

We traverse some beautiful countryside from flat farm land to rolling hills to open moorland taking in the magnificent views of much of Northumbria from Simonside. The route takes us along abandoned railway and forest paths and we even spend about half a day following the coast near Bamburgh.

The pilgrimage starts on Saturday evening when we meet up in Bellingham. We share a meal, the leg members introduce themselves and we distribute responsibilities for the week so we can live, walk and express ourselves spiritually in the small community that we form. As well as providing for our own needs we interact with the communities we meet with and stay with along the way. Songbooks, Leg guides and red crosses, our badges as pilgrims, are also given out. The wooden cross, which we will be carrying as we walk, is assembled. It is about eight feet high and is carried by either two or three people at a time with frequent changes.
  

On Sunday we walk to the small village of Kirkwhelpington which is twelve miles as the pilgrim walks. It is mostly small roads in the morning with some hill and dale walking in the afternoon. As with the days to follow we have a support vehicle driven by a fellow pilgrim to meet us for morning, lunch and afternoon stops.

Monday sees us heading for the small town of Rothbury, sixteen miles through field and woodland in the morning and over more woodland, hillside and farm track in the afternoon. From Rothbury we go fourteen miles to Alnwick on Tuesday. On Wednesday we head for the coast and along it, covering eighteen miles to get to Beadnell. With the onset of Maundy Thursday we go back inland and get to Fenwick after a sixteen and a half mile walk, visiting St Cuthbert's Cave on route. In the evening (providing kosher bacon is available at the supermarket in Belford at lunch time) we have a Passover meal and indulge in a spot of foot washing.

On Good Friday morning we have just three and a half miles before reaching the causeway where all the Legs of Northern Cross meet up and as one, traverse the sands to reach Holy Island and a well earned rest.