Wild camping in Northumberland: an off-road weekend adventure

All Land Rovers have their own character, according to David Cook, who rents these highly capable vehicles to campers who want to see the wilder side of north-east England. The one he had entrusted to me was mild-mannered and eager to explore, perhaps because it was named after Cuthbert, the patron saint of Northumberland – a conspicuously diligent seventh-century churchman.

He was an ascetic man too, which isn’t quite true of his four-wheeled namesake. Old-school Land Rovers are by no means luxurious, but this one came with a memory-foam mattress, gas stove and solar-heated shower. Unlike St Cuthbert, who sought religious enlightenment by sleeping neck-deep in the North Sea, I would remain warm and dry.

Even so, I would be enjoying another kind of splendid isolation, unfurling the rooftop tent each night in a field or forest clearing. Illicit as it seemed, it had all been arranged through Wild With Consent, a wholesome (if unholy-sounding) network of landowners willing to offer up a patch of land for the night.

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My first resting place was on the coast, a few miles north of Bamburgh Castle. As I followed the emailed directions, turning off the road and onto a gated track, I was relieved to see a man on a quad bike beckoning me in. The instructions were detailed and backed up by an app that pinned down my location to the nearest field, but as a first-time wild camper I appreciated human confirmation. The farmer pointed the way: through the gate ahead, onto a long grassy track through a wheat field and through the second gate on the right.

It was a fine place to spend a night, with a clear view out across the sea to Lindisfarne crouching on the horizon. St Cuthbert spent a decade in the island’s monastery and was buried there when he died in 687AD. I parked at the top of the field, nose towards the sea, so that one Cuthbert could pay respect to the other.

The tent was up in moments, so I set about creating shelter at ground level. Spooling out the built-in awning and pegging another behind it kept the wind at bay as the sun began its slow summer descent. The portable fire pit played its part too, first cooking dinner and then providing warmth.

I thought I would be woken up early by the sunrise, but the thick black canvas of the tent (and the memory-foam mattress) let me sleep until 9am. I dug out the moka pot and stove, brewed some coffee and then was back on the road, heading inland towards Kielder Forest and the western arc of the Northumberland 250. The scenic route was plotted out by Cook, the owner of Northumberland Defender Hire, to promote the county’s natural and historic attractions. Now it is something of a joint enterprise with Wild With Consent, which has several sites along the way.

For 50 miles, the route follows the coast, from Warkworth to Berwick-upon-Tweed, where it turns away from the sea and crosses the Scottish border (the ancient kingdom of Northumbria stretched north to Edinburgh and beyond, so the expansionist approach has historical precedent). Back in England, it turns south, taking in the Kielder Forest Drive and wending its way towards Hadrian’s Wall and my next wild camping site.

It was the most remote site I visited, up a long farm track and over grassland with no track to follow. When I reached the appointed field I headed for the crest of a ridge that ran through it, the highest point for many miles. It was an excellent viewpoint, but some vestigial caveman instinct made me uneasy about sleeping there. I retreated to a sheltered corner, with an outcrop of trees at my back, a dry stone wall on my left flank and sight lines down into the valley. I felt happy there, and prepared the evening ritual of fire and food.

Crackling logs provoke deep thoughts, and mine drifted off into the past, and who else might once have made their camp in this corner of an English field. It lay at the heart of an area fought over for centuries – by Romans and barbarians, Saxons and Danes, English and Scots – and some men from those armies, or others fleeing from them, had no doubt sought its shelter. St Cuthbert was a soldier too, before he was a monk. Could he have stopped here?

If he did, I think he would have liked it. He seemed to find peace in nature, at least according to the stories told about him. Like me, he would have enjoyed sharing this little patch of land with the grazing sheep and the pair of young pelicans that circled in the twilight. When the sky was finally dark, I climbed up to the tent and settled into another deep sleep.

Holden Frith was a guest of Wild With Consent. A three-night off-grid experience, including Land Rover Defender camper hire, is available from £575; wildwithconsent.com

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