Half Term 2025 | FindPenguins

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Trip start
October 27, 2025
Half Term 2025 Traveler
Granny's
Oct 27–28, 2025 in England ⋅ ⛅ 12 °C
Just the 2 of us for this mini half term trip, first stop Sheffield to stay with Granny & Grandad. Setting off mid-morning for a lunchtime arrival Jonah spent the afternoon at 'The House', an indoor skateboarding park and I popped over to Granny's Craft Group.

I had been asked if I would unveil the amazing poppy cascade that the craft group had made, it was an honour and a privilege to represent the military community. After lots of cake I headed back to collect Jonah, who had been Ollie-ing, Pop Shoving and dropping in off the waterfalls 🛹
(your guess is as good as mine)

https://www.thehouseskatepark.co.uk/Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
Old fashioned map reading!
October 28, 2025 in England ⋅ 🌬 12 °C
We went 'old school' with no phones unless on WiFi. So that means no Google Maps and Jonah had to navigate using a road atlas. Thankfully Grandad appears to buy a new one every year. We took the 2022 edition because it was a smaller version so easier to manage. A Starbucks coffee for the road and we headed off.

Jonah embraced the challenge, 1st stop a Camel farm and farm shop for lunch, somewhere near to Scotch Corner. Granny's friend, Rita, gave us some vague directions of taking the left fork and it's not far - you'll see it. We stayed true to the no phones and not surprisingly we didn't find it 🤣

Instead we kept going and ended up at a garden centre for lunch instead - which had WiFi. A quick search for the Camel Farm Shop told us it was much further along the A66 than we imagined, but it looked quite good. So we put it on the list for the return journey.Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
Hadrian's Wall & the Sycamore Gap
October 28, 2025 in England ⋅ 🌬 10 °C
We arrived at our first night stop with sufficient light left for a walk up to Hadrian's Wall and along to the Sycamore Gap. It's amazing how much history is part of our landscape, how our children climb on 2000 year old Roman artifacts and we can appreciate the beauty of where we live.

The tree stump of the old Sycamore Tree was quite poignant. Why would someone cut it down? It's beyond comprehension. But the shoots of life give hope and can be a metaphor for life itself.

We were out and back within the hour and The Sill was still open. A fabulous free discovery centre, where a beautiful sculpture has been created out of the Sycamore Tree and there was so, so much available to discover about the local landscape. Very highly recommend but you'll need a good few hours to do if justice. They have a co-located Youth Hostel, rooftop walk, café and shop as well as all of the exhibitions:

https://www.thesill.org.uk/Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
Stargazing
Oct 28–29, 2025 in England ⋅ 🌬 9 °C
Our first overnight stop was deep inside one of Europe's dark sky locations. We stayed at the Twice Brewed Inn:

https://twicebrewedinn.co.uk

We were booked onto a stargazing experience, that included a 2 course evening meal and 2 hours of activity delivered by 2 members of the Kielder Observatory. They had telescopes, meteors and a planetarium. The clouds were coming and going but we did see the Milky Way, Saturn's rings and learnt how to identify various constellations including the Andromeda galaxy. No photos of the stars but the food was amazing! I had mushroom & Venison Pie and Jonah had Cumberland sausage and mash. We shared the baked camembert starter and chocolate brownie desert . Oh, and I almost forgot to mention it was also a Brewery with a fine selection of Brewed on-site ales 🍺Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
The Romans
October 29, 2025 in England ⋅ 🌬 9 °C
After a hearty full English breakfast we headed a mile or so down the road to Vindolanda Roman Fort:

https://www.vindolanda.com/

An archaeological site that has been continuously excavated for over 50 years, and they estimate it will be at least another 100 before they're done 😲

Besides the size of the site (tours leave reception every 30 minutes, no need to book just join in) it is renowned for a number of significant historical treasures. One is a set of writing tablets, including an invite to a birthday party! The other is the shoe collection. I will admit to chuckling about a shoe collection, however, the examples on display are simply breathtaking. There are sandals in better shape than some if mine!

When we finally left, we drove down the Military Road. As you would expect of a Roman Road it is incredibly straight. Apparently, in the 1700s the military updated the road, and finding a very straight pile of stones they used them. So, in some places you are literally driving on Hadrian's Wall.

We loved chasing the double rainbow and I'm convinced we saw the end 🌈Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
Mongolian Yurt
Oct 29–31, 2025 in England ⋅ ☀️ 10 °C
Glamping at it's best! It's hard to convey in words just how fabulous this place was. Found on AirBnB, an amazing Yurt in a wood. This was camping luxury. The kitchen was in the nearby horsebox and we had our own private bathroom (see videos).

What made it so special was all of the little touches, such as the collection of moss & nuts and a hot glue gun with instructions to make a woodland fairy.

Jonah cooked dinner (chicken pasta) and created a fire in our log burner each evening. Being an early riser, I got the fire going in the mornings. It didn't take long to be super snug.

On our first night, the sky was clear and we could put our new found knowledge of the stars to the test. Although there was limited WiFi in the kitchen there was none in the Yurt, so we played Uno and Cards, in between throwing another log in the burner and me topping up my glass of red wine. Bliss 😊

We did challenge ourselfs to move around in the woods to the bathroom without using torches now we have a new respect for retaining dark night skies.

https://www.airbnb.co.uk/rooms/1420424514135201…Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
The Holy Island of Lindisfarne
October 30, 2025 in England ⋅ ☁️ 8 °C
We had originally planned to walk across the causeway from the mainland to Holy Island and planned to spend the whole day there, taking in the serenity, lunch and a coffee at a quaint coffee shop. I was genuinely excited as this had been on my bucket list for a while. All I can say is, manage your expectations. Jonah's description: "overhyped". We spent about 2 hours there!

Firstly, the car park before the causeway has now been blocked with large concrete blocks which means the only place to walk from is back at the A1 - sod that! But I'm glad we did drive or it would have been a bloody miserable long day. Car parking was £7 for 3 hours 😲 there are buses bringing tourists in so the place is swarming with Dry Robes and designer dogs, not the quiet serenity we had imagined. The castle and priory both cost money to go into and there is no quaint coffee shop. We managed to get some photos without people in them (not easy) and did see a few birds. Had s short walk around and then left.

https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/curlew

I did chuckle at the church ruins and their sign. After Vindolanda, any ancient artifacts will be hard to beat.Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
The Poison Garden
October 30, 2025 in England ⋅ ☁️ 10 °C
We had brought a packed lunch so munched it as we headed South to Alnwick, continuing to use the road atlas and road signs. We parked at Alnwick Castle, which isn't open in the winter but the gardens are, including the Poison Garden where the guides described various plants that can harm or kill. A great experience but I'll try to come back when there are more species in full flower.

However, good to learn about Laurel hedge cuttings that can kill by releasing Cyanide and other popular plants such a Laburnum, Helibore, foxglove and Ivy which all have different potencies and are all in our garden!

We spent a while appreciating the water sculptures before a game of crazy golf that was very evenly matched, thst I won by the slimmest if margins.

https://www.alnwickgarden.com/Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
Barter Books
October 30, 2025 in England ⋅ ☁️ 9 °C
If you love books or trains this is a must to visit, especially because of the model trains that rattle all around the front of the shop. If you love both then it's a good job it's also a café and there are plenty of reading nooks, tables and comfy chairs, it would be easy to spend all day here.

https://www.barterbooks.co.uk/

One of Britain's largest 2nd hand book shops, inside the old Alnwick train station, we arrived around 1630, noted how big it was and that it was open until 1900, so went into town for fish & chips at Carlos, where you can eat in or takeaway. The small portions was enormous and came with a slice of buttered bread and a pot of tea, very pleasing 😊

Once we returned we could leisurely browse the aisles. You know it's big when it comes with a map and key for where everything is. There is something for everyone here. I was interested in a very niche book on Fungi that I needed to return to the library but fancied getting my own copy. The guy behind the desk saw I had a picture on my phone and promptly told me "we don't have any copies of that, they fly out the minute we get a copy, we last had one about a month ago". Well, who knew s book on Fungi would be so popular! Equally impressive was that he knew instantly by looking at the photo that they didn't have a copy!Read more
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Half Term 2025 Traveler
The Angel of the North
October 31, 2025 in England ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C
A leisurely start and an affectionate goodbye to our Yurt we started to head home making a quick culture stop at Antony Gormley's Angel of the North statue:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_of_the_North

https://www.gateshead.gov.uk/article/3957/Angel…

We didn't make it to the Camel Farm in the end because of traffic and weather, we think there had been a few accidents on the A66 (we saw evidence of one), and knowing it was a long drive home we decided to press on. Maybe the Camel Farm Shop Café will appear in a different Find Penguins adventure.Read more
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Trip end
October 31, 2025