Outings

We had some family nights and outings in June and July to places not far from Durham.  Alex and I also had a lunch date at the Durham Botanic Gardens one sunny day.  

We went back to Hadrian's Wall, since it was covered in snow the first time we went.  We went to a different part of the wall, called the Sill, which is where the tree in Robin Hood is located. 

One of our more fun outings was the beach in Hartlepool.  I was just planning on hanging out for a bit, but we ended up playing soccer for quite a while.  I was surprised how fun it could be with just our family - the boys are getting pretty good at soccer, so we had a nice 3 v 3 going (Savannah didn't really play much). 

The same day that I took Jared and Savannah back to the Beamish Museum, I took the 3 youngest to Hall Hill Farm in the afternoon.  We had fun with all the animals, play areas, jumping pillows, mini golf, puppet show, snacks, and sheep race.  It was a great place for kids!   

The sheep each had a number, and we got to pick a number before the race and then see which one made it to the feed bucket first.  You won a small prize if your sheep won the race.  I think Savannah won a pencil for picking the winning sheep.  

They had some pretty creative names for the sheep:  Ewe-sain Bolt, Woolly Wanka, Jensen Mutton, Lewis Lambleton, and Ed Shear-am.  

We finally made it to Newcastle to sightsee, despite it being less than 30 minutes away.  We had been through Newcastle via train, but not walked around the city.  We loved all the bridges, particularly the Millenium Bridge and Tyne Bridge.  We went to the museum as well, which had some cool things.  

We took an evening outing to the Northumberland coast, near Alnmouth (where Alex was doing some work already).  The kids got to see some of the work Alex does.  We also went to a nearby castle, ate fish & chips, and played at a small beach.  The kids goal at that particular beach was to throw sticks and get them to stand up in the mud.  

The Bishop Auckland Castle wasn't open, so we couldn't go in, but we had visited a nearby art gallery and wanted to take a peek at the castle.  We wandered around the outside, which was pretty impressive in itself.  

We also went to see a Roman fort, which seemed exciting for Weston.  He was pretty disappointed when he got there and didn't find any Romans fighting... it wasn't what he expected, but he perked up at the armor and some of the more impressive areas of the fort.