Wallsend

Wallsend is ideal for the Hadrian's Wall experience. The fort at Segedunum was recently brought back to life at a cost of £9 million, and displays the only Roman bath-house in Britain. About four miles from the ferries, it is another possible start point.

A couple of miles down river on the opposite bank sits Jarrow, home of the Venerable Bede, and the Bede's World Museum. It was also the starting point for the Jarrow March. Two hundred hunger strikers descended upon London in 1936 and made one of the most striking political statements in British working class history.

As you approach the Royal Quays North Sea Ferry Terminus make sure you follow the signs (easily missed) and go to the LEFT of the Wet 'n' Wild water centre (you can't miss it - the giant flume tubes look like part of some space-age factory). Follow the path through landscaped public gardens in which an incongruous cluster of wooden sea groynes stand, as if awaiting tidal erosion. Turn left just beyond them, by a faded waysign - do not head back in the direction of the Amsterdam and Bergen ferry terminal - and go through the modern housing estate. To the right, pleasure craft and fishing boats should be bobbing around at their moorings.

Keep following the C2C, Route 72 and Route 10 signs (they are clustered together) and you will find yourself passing through another modern housing estate. You are now in North Shields, erstwhile home of comedian Stan Laurel.

Following the signs, descend a steep flight of stone steps to the fish quays. You will arrive outside a pub called the Chain Locker, opposite the ferry terminus to South Shields. The view across the Tyne on a good day is worth a pause. You can see, in the far distance, the elegant 19th century façade of the clock tower of South Shields town hall.

Cafés, stores and splendid fish & chip restaurants run the length of the North Shields Quays. This is where Danish and Polish sailors used to integrate vigorously with the local community at a den of iniquity called the Infamous Jungle, now known as the Collingwood Buildings.







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