The Historic Houses, Art and Heritage of Northumbria
Please remember to send your final payment to Tailored Travel by 31st JULY.
Tailored Travel will send you full details of the holiday before we travel. There will also be a short meeting for all participants following the September lecture. Any concerns you may have can be discussed then and we will confirm details for our departure - which will be from The Community Hall Car Park.
Anne Fuller will be on holiday during July and the beginning of August, should you need to make contact please send an e-mail but communication may be slow!
Day 1 We depart by private executive coach from The Community Hall, Park Road, Banstead. En route to our hotel we visit the National Trust's Nostell Priory in Yorkshire, home to England's best collection of documented Chippendale furniture, an outstanding art collection, a longcase clock by John 'Longitude' Harrison and a remarkable 18th cen1ury dolls house complete with its original fittings and Chippendale style furniture. We continue to the 3* Gibside Hotel at Whickham for a four night stay on a half board basis. Day 2 We enjoy a guided walking tour of Durham with our Blue Badge guide this morning, taking in sights such as the exterior of the Cathedral, once described as 'one of the great architectural experiences of Europe' and a renowned masterpiece of Norman architecture. We then spend some time at leisure in Durham, and on an individual basis you may choose to go inside the Cathedral. This afternoon we visit The Bowes Museum for I guided tour. This purpose built public art gallery was created by John and Josephine Bowes between 1862 and 1875 and is home to a large collection of fine and decorative paintings from around Europe. Day 3 Our Blue Badge guide meets us at our hotel this morning and accompanies us throughout the day. This morning we visit Alnwick Castle, the second largest inhabited castle in England, the first being Windsor Castle, and home of the Percys, Earls and Dukes of Northumberland since 1309. This afternoon we visit the National Trust's Cragside House and Gardens, a wonderful Victorian mansion dating from the 19th century and described as 'the palace of a modern magician'. Its interior features state of the art hydraulics powering a revolutionary lift system and internal telephones which mesmerised visitors in its time. Day 4 We visit the remains of English Heritage's Lindisfarne Priory on Holy Island with our Blue Badge guide this morning. It was built nearly 1,400 years ago. This is the site where St Aidan and St Cuthbert founded Christianity in Anglo-Saxon Northumbria, and where the Lindisfarne Gospels were created in the early 700s. The Priory's museum focuses on a grisly Viking raid, the cult of St Cuthbert and the beautiful Lindisfarne manuscript. We spend some time at leisure in Bamburgh this afternoon, or alternatively you may wish to join our optional boat trip to Farne Island, one of Britain's most important bird sanctuaries (weather dependent). Day 5 After checking out of our hotel we visit the Spanish Gallery at Bishop Auckland. The gallery depicts a story of Golden Age Spanish art during the 16th and 17th centuries, exploring how its artists expressed the tension between man's yearning for eternity and the transience of life. We then visit the Mining Art Gallery at Bishop Auckland. Home to three permanent rooms and one temporary exhibition space, the gallery explores working life in the coal mines through original artefacts and artworks by prominent mining artists such as Tom McGuinness and Norman Cornish. During our visit we see the renowned Gemini Collection of mining art that includes over 400 works by acclaimed mining artists. Taking carefully selected comfort stops en route, we return back to our original pick up point. |