We’ve been to Northumberland so much that we’ve completed nearly all the walks in our Cicerone and Pocket Mountains guides. Both of which are excellent, by the way. We’d happily repeat many of the walks in these guides, but it’s always lovely to find new favourites too. Hence, a perusal of the Northumberland National Park website which led us to discover the Kirknewton Hillfort Trail.
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Walk Summary: Kirknewton Hillfort Trail
- Distance: 3.2 miles
- Route type: Hill
- Time: 1.5 hours
- Parking: Kirknewton Village Hall, ///bluffing.branded.hazelnuts
- Dog friendly: 3/5
- Difficulty: Easy to moderate
A Kirknewton Hillfort Fail
We rolled up into the car park nice and early, arriving at 9am so that we could get around the walk before it got too warm for the dogs. As we cruised down the road to the car park I spotted the path we’d return on… And I also spotted the extremely large herd of cows lying on both sides of it. Cue an immediate sulk and refusal to do the walk from me. No one’s perfect and yes, sometimes I let my intrusive cow thoughts get the better of me!
Sam managed to coax me out of the car with promises to turn around if a close en-cow-nter was unavoidable. As we set off down the lane I perked up a bit, happy to wave at the cows in the fields safely on the other side of the fence (where I like them best). I had a fiddle with the OS and saw that we could amend the route to cut out Cowmaggedon entirely. Problem solved – even if we were now doing a somewhat different walk.
As with other hillfort trails we’ve done in the national park (Breamish and Humbleton), there are way marker posts pointing you in the right direction throughout. Although, sometimes this isn’t too helpful as there will be three arrows in one place, all pointing in different directions! Fortunately we had our map and managed to get on our way without any navigational errors. At least, for now…
Objective: avoid the cows
The route follows a quiet lane to cross onto the Access Land where West Hill, the first hillfort on the trail, is located. Also, the only hillfort we’d be summiting, having agreed to abandon St Gregory’s Hill in the negotiations to get me out of the car. I’m not sure I can still technically call this post ‘the Kirknewton Hillfort Trail’, given that we only completed about 50% of it, but let’s not nit-pick.
It starts out with a very gentle incline, circling the base of the hill. At the back of the hill, we amended the route (again). The national park’s route crosses into the field beyond, cutting diagonally across, before returning to the slopes of West Hill. Being able to see over the wall into the field, we could also see another herd of cows happily minding their own business along the path. As it would have been rude to disturb them, we cut this corner off, picking up a path heading up the hill a little earlier than we would have otherwise. A path is a path! I was so glad I’d checked the access maps for dog restrictions before we came – I knew that we were all clear to leave the public right of way with no issues.
Up to the top
It’s actually a pretty easy climb to the top, even without a path on the final stretch. No tussock clutching here! The view was… a bit underwhelming? I’m probably comparing to Humbleton Hillfort, which we did on a much brighter day. Sunshine always makes everything look prettier. We did however get some nice views of the surrounding countryside – although I think the generally lovely surroundings on the way up and down were better. Sam suggested that we tag on a loop along the St Cuthbert’s Way, which we could see running up towards The Bell (another hill), but we decided not to. It was warm and muggy and we still had to drive home – it’ll be there another day. In fact, it got us talking about maybe walking the whole St Cuthbert’s Way one day…
Objective: failed
One thing the summit was, was windy. It’s the first time I’ve ever see Merry’s chops blowing in the wind as well as his ears! Luckily, it was a warm wind, and I didn’t even need to put my jacket on. Starting our descent off the top to pick up our alternative path home, we spotted the gate we’d have crossed to exit the cow field. It was open – so technically we’d been in a cow field almost from the start. Oh well – if I can’t see them, they can’t see me…
At this point, I spotted one of the handy hillfort trail way markers pointing us along our way. Sam, however, saw a gate with a stile next to it about thirty metres away, and insisted that this would join up with our route and save lifting the dogs over a stile later. Spoiler: it didn’t.
One twenty minute detour later, we were back at the hillfort trail way marker. In fact, if we hadn’t taken the detour, by that point we’d had been back at the car! It’s an easy, steady walk back down to the lane from the start, which you follow back to the car park. Cow drama aside, this was a lovely walk. Although I can’t promise I’d have enjoyed it as much if the cows hadn’t been so far away!
Dog friendly rating: Kirknewton Hillfort Trail
Dog friendly rating: 3/5. 3/5 feels a bit harsh – but there is a strong possibility of cows being present for the majority of this walk, especially if you do it in summer. I think we were just lucky that they weren’t anywhere close to where we were walking – there was definitely ‘evidence’ that they’ve been all over the path before. You will likely come across sheep all year round. There’s no water along the way for dogs, but the route we did was stile free. Make sure you’re familiar with Access Land rules for dog walkers, which include keeping your dog on a short, fixed lead from 1 March to 31 July.
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