Northumbria has a rich heritage of early Christian sites, dating from the late-seventh-century crypt in Hexham Abbey (right), Lindisfarne Priory on Holy Island, and the two monasteries of Saint Bede at Jarrow and Monkwearmouth to the fine tenth-century Saxon parish churches along the Tyne Valley. There is the beautiful and majestic World Heritage Site of Durham Cathedral, together with Durham Castle built in the late eleventh century: they should not be missed, and are often included in their visits by our clients.

There is a range of other castles in this once troubled Border area, ranging from the small early Norman motte and bailey at Elsdon and the bijou Lindisfarne Castle to the grandeur of Alnwick Castle, where the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland still live in what has been called the Windsor of the North. Fine country houses with their expansive gardens replaced them in later, more settled days and can be visited in this quiet, uncommercialised countryside.

There are many incunabula of the Industrial Revolution, the Railway Age, coal mining, and ship building in this cradle of the world's heavy industries: Beamish Museum alone can occupy a whole day. In the south of County Durham are the Maritime Centre at Hartlepool with the newly restored early nineteenth-century frigate HMS Trincomalee, the Bowes Museum and the medieval castle at Barnard Castle, and the tiny Saxon church at Escomb. A little further south are the medieval riches of York and northern Yorkshire - Ripon, Fountains Abbey, Rievaulx, Kirkdale, Middleham - and the beautiful scenery of the Yorkshire Dales, immortalised in the James Herriott books and television series. And above all there is spectacular scenery in the sparsely populated and largely unspoilt countryside, hills, and coast of Northumbria and the Lake District.

We can arrange tours to these further heritage sites and provide expert guides where required in addition to your tour of Hadrian's Wall.