Hadrian’s Wall – Following in the Footsteps the 14th Cohort of the Silesian Navigators

It’s probably just a piece of bad luck or mal-chance  that the only section of Hadrian’s Wall constructed by the 14th Cohort of the Silesian Navigators, overconfident, as they were in their ability to comprehend which direction they were pointing in, lies on a heading of 178 degrees – that is to say, almost North-South. Whereas the rest of the wall heads in a different direction. At it’s junction with Emperor Hadrian’s East-West directional concept, it forms an almost perfect T junction – a fact not lost on Lucky the dog who selected this very spot as an ideal place to enjoy a bonio or two whilst I scoffed my cornish pasty and a banana, sheltered as it was from the cutting breeze off the North Sea.


None of the twelve peeps who turned up for the Wednesday-Walkers-Except-It-Was-Saturday group believed me, in fact, when I revealed this newly discovered and , it must be admitted, fairly unlikely archaeological fact as we passed along Hadrian’s Wall between Steel Rigg and Sewingshields – a fine walk by the way, if a bit over-supplied with contours.



Me and Lucky did the reccy on the Thursday in perishing cold, grey conditions and these only got colder and greyer by Saturday. And in-between, Lucky grounded the knipemobile ooop in the Weardale alps and knocked off the drive shaft, so I was grateful for the lifts from Eric and Diane who went out of their way to collect and deliver me on Saturday. Note how I cleverly transferred all responsibility to the dog by the way and, as it’s an ill-wind etc I was happy to have a post-walk beer or two at Twice Brewed Inn afterwards. (There’s always an up-side). I don’t need the car for a while as I’m off to Wales for a trundle around very shortly..


As for the reccy and the walk – they all went shiveringly well. I used some unmapped boardwalks and permissive routes around Greenlee Lough to make the walk a little bit easier and to add a bit of interest to the relatively dull second half.

Lucky tidied up several lumps of fox-poo and interviewed a dead sheep whilst post snowstorm and thaw, the thirteen of us enjoyed specially slippery mud and extra damp boggy bits.
And there were signs of spring – mainly skylarks, curlew, lapwings and some frog spawn. Plus some trail hounds scaring the pregnant sheep and being watched for by fat blokes in cars from a hugely long distance away – in fact, many of them were looking in the wrong direction. Clearly the descendants of the 14th Cohort.
The walk is 11 miles.
Finally – thanks to The Bro for topping up the virgin money-giving page to a nice, round sum. We like nice, round sums. The only sums we don’t like involve lowest common denominators, fractions and algebra. And the sum of the angles of the two other sides being half of the square of the other thing.  Or whatever it was…


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