1230 Northern Rivera South Shields Riverside

The Open spaces

1 North Marine Park

Outside of central London where three parks interconnect, St James onto Green Park and Green Park onto Hyde Park, and where the great space of Regents Park is not too far away. I know of nowhere other than the coastal area between South Shields and north Sunderland where there is so much open space, and formal parkland, and here within moments from my front door there is the immeasurable bonus of the sea and a coastline of rocks, inlets and bays. Find me somewhere else in the United Kingdom which has so much to offer in such a compact area?

North Marine Park is a combination of three spaces on a Hill overlooking the mouth of the river Tyne. The middle space is open grass which runs from the top of the hill from where trees and shrubs obscure the river as it reaches the wide estuary of Little Haven Bay artificially created by the two long piers, one from the north bank headland of Tynemouth Priory and Castle and the other from the southern base of the south bank hill known as the Lawe Top, which as I discovered, some who live in South Shields do not know its name or ever have cause to visit, except perhaps once to the Arbeia Roman Fort.

There is a children's play area on the middle space, compensation for the lack of gardens in the former three storey terraced villas which were once the homes of the sea captains and their officers. The first space, is hidden space, a pathway surrounded by trees and shrubs from the top end of the hill to where the middle space sweeps down a steep bank to the car parks and promenade of Little Haven Bay. It is this area where consultants have suggested the local authority builds a visitor's centre and restaurant for Arbeia and construct a beacon observation tower to signal the existence of the former fort and supply depot. The edge of the bank is where a crowd sometimes assemble, a mixture of locals and visitors according to the sudden disappearance of car parking spaces, usually to watch fireworks on or around November 5th, or as part of the new Mouth of the Tyne Festival over a weekend in July, or on the two occasions when the Tall ships arrived on the river to visit Newcastle and then paraded as they left to race their next leg, or as in this year, to greet the arrival of the QE2 to the Tyne.

To mark the increasing significance of the Fort and occasions for visitors to assemble, there is now a splendid stairway down this part of the bank to the car parks and beach with the Yacht club and Little Haven Hotel at one end and the entrance to the pier at the other. At this lower level it is possible to also enter the third and main space of North Marine Park, a traditional but varied parkland which commences with trees and shrubbed walks down the hill to several bowling greens towards the sea shore, to pleasant walkways, some lined with rose bushes, other flowers and flowering shrubs, to secluded picnic areas which are given an oriental feel because of archways and a pagoda like building on a little hill. Within this area there is what appears to be the basics of the hull of a ship, a pirates' ship perhaps, and when weather permits, a putting course.

The park ends at Ocean Road, which was once a tributary of the Tyne thus the Lawe Top was an island and from here you can cross the road into South Marine Park, or walk into or from the town centre enjoying a meal at the best fish and chippy in the North East, or at one of the score of oriental and Mediterranean restaurants and take ways, having had an enjoyable bed and breakfast in the score of little hotels and guest houses, or after a good night at the Custom's House which can be reached at the far end of this road through the pedestrianised shopping area, passing the linked metro and bus station and crossing Market Square and the road to Mill Dam, perhaps then going to one of the late opening bars or night clubs which are now concentrated half way between the river and the beach.

The road between the North and South Marine Parks is always a busy one as visitors by car and motorbike make their way to the beachside car parks, the amusement park, and the sea front restaurants. It is a popular area for young people to congregate regardless of the weather, or time of year.

2 North Marine Park
Bents Park
Bents Recreation Ground

Across Ocean Road is South Marine Park, which is undergoing a multi million make over, recreating its former Victorian originality, but with the latest features. This is also a park on a hill, with a wide walkway with flower beds on either side, commencing from the lower entrance gate climbing to its southern point, from where one can look down over the park and the coast. At the upper level there are statues which once adorned the front of the Town Hall, a water feature an a series of grassy steps and this is one of the areas of the park where improvements and changes are already underway.

At the lower level there is also an area of walks among flower beds and a small wood before the main area which is more popular with local families than the beach. There is a boating lake full of swans, about eighty at the last count, and a little train with circumnavigates. There is a small open air café where I have enjoyed an early morning bacon butty and coffee, but from midday on good weather days, it is rare to find a spare seat, especially since the government introduced the welcome smoking ban in all cafés, restaurants and bars.

A new feature of the park to south west of the lake is two large children's play areas to the latest standards of safety, one for the younger children and infants, and one for the older and more adventuresome. From here, sweeping up the slope to the top is a picnic area with suitable spaced picnic tables with integral seats. During what is becoming the annual Mouth of the Tyne Festival the park is given over to entertainments on stages and walkabouts.

Across the road is the third separate Bents parkland consisting of a large open space which in July is used for what has become a major regional event with four free concerts on Sunday afternoons, but with two stages, on both the Saturday and the Sunday of the Mouth of the Tyne festival. For this event the park, together with the area of Tynemouth Prior and Castle, is covered with large flags. While the Sunday afternoon concerts attract artists of the calibre of Cliff Richard, sixties bands such as the Animals and the latest X Factor idol such as Ben Mills, the Festival includes performers from around the world which this year included Maori group Te Masterae Kapa Haka, and from India, the Jaipur Kawa Contemporary Brass band, traditional jazz from Norway, from France the Les Snob Glissssendo and Les Osieaux de Lux, from Brazil Alumino Rootsa Reggae and from Holland or was it Germany the Jo Bithune Fanfare, a kind of thirties Oomph band with dancing and from Spain, La Tal. There was New Yorker singer songwriter, Dean Friedman and regarded as a leading contemporary jazz artist Courtney Pine although the local interest was with the legendry Lindisfarne hero Billy Mitchell and there was strong support for the Blockheads which were once fronted by Ian Dury. The space is sometimes used for exhibitions but for most of the year it is a public recreation area across from the main beach.

Screened by trees and shrubs there is fixed mobile home/ caravan site, with space for touring caravans, motor homes and tents. On the other side of this official site there is the Bents recreation space, an enormous flat open area used for a dozen football games on Saturday and Sunday mornings, with on its beachside space for over flow car parking which is taken up during the summer, particular when there are special events. Across the road at the far end of the Bents Recreation space there is the Gypsies Green Stadium and the beginning of the Leas.

The Gypsies Green stadium is where there is to be a new hotel and conference centre and where Her Majesty the Queen was guest of honour at an event to mark her 25th anniversary of succession.

1230 Northern Rivera South Shields Riverside

My main occupation overnight was review existing information and undertake further research for Rivera the South Shields riverside section. This was a frustrating as I could not find two pieces of information, he number of merchant seamen from the town killed during World War Two together with the percentage of these who were Muslims. The other was the number of vehicles which used to be transported across the Tyne by the ferries compared with those now using the road Tunnel, given that preliminary work for the second Tunnel has commenced. Deciding on the photographs was enjoyable and the selection governed the structure of the writing which spilled on to four pages which affected the subsequent layout. I will do those on rocks and inlets next.

South Shields Riverside

Although there has been a port on the river Tyne for 2000 years it was not until 1850 that Newcastle's monopoly was shared with Gateshead. Tynemouth, South Shields and the Admiralty. The main use of the Port during the industrial revolution was coal with 23 millions tons transported when production of the Northumbria and Durham mines was at their peak and the joke about taking coals to Newcastle has been turned around with coal being imported..
My focus for 2007 has been on the mouth of the river where I live at South Shields, although a visit was made by ferry to the other side to listen to jazz on a Sunday afternoon, and where by coincidence the stage was set to one side of the Rock of Gibraltar, a few metres away from the ruins of Tynemouth Priory and Castle, and which is the first photograph taken from an open part of North Bents Park on the Lawe Top, and can also be seen in the third photo at the Eastern end of the Hill, featuring the Beacon erected as a navigation aid in 1832.

One of the first tasks of the Port of Tyne Commissioners was to commence the creation of the two long masonry piers which enabled shipping to avoid the notorious Black Middens Rocks and Herd Sand. The second photo on this page shows the South Shields Pier and every year there is a run between this pier and that at Sunderland, arranged by the Sunderland and the South Shields Running clubs, a distance of about seven and a half miles. The fourth photo on the page shows the new mouth of the river hotel overlooked by a long block of flats on the opposite bank. The length of the piers at South Shields and Tynemouth, together with storm damage, meant that it was fifty years before the piers were completed.

The second set of photographs includes the new Ferry Landing at South Shields, with one of the three ferries also shown on this page and in addition to the all year crossings, the ferries are also used for Summer trip 1s to Newcastle and for private functions. Before the opening of the first Tyne Tunnel, the ferries were the main way to cross the river by car without having to travel the dozen miles to Gateshead There are known to have been crossings from the fourteenth century and in Victorian times paddle steamers made twenty one stops between Newcastle and South Shields. In 2001 there was a proposal to create a new river bus service with seventeen landing stages but it can be assumed that lack of public support led the idea to being dropped. Preliminary work on a second Tyne Tunnel has commenced. There is also a cycle and pedestrian tunnel crossing at Jarrow.

This set of photographs shows the important sea rescue and safety training station, and the Marine Training courses at South Tyneside College are moving from their present location to become part of the imaginative and comprehensive development of major stretches of the South Tyneside river bank, from South Shields, Jarrow and Hebburn to Gateshead.

It was not until 1859 that docks were created in South Shields and these stretched along the whole of the river in three areas. Below the Lawe Top where fuel storage tanks dominated the skyline there is now a little village of terraced housing and flats and just before the ferry landing there is a second new development around former docks which includes a set of beautiful model sailing ships built from steel, and other public artworks have been placed on little piers and boardwalks. Opposite the ferry landing stage on a post war building at one end of Market Square a mural fills the entire wall space.

The land from the roadway to the ferry landing stage and along Harton Low Staiths to the former Customs House has been cleared and this provides spectacular views across and up the river, so much so that during lunch times local workers and families sit on the grassy banks and picnic while river watching or waiting for the next ferry. The transfer of a major supermarket within the town to a nearby site together with proposals for other cultural developments should further improve the use of this space.

It was not until 1828 that the Tyne Commission Quay was built on the opposite bank of the river and Bergen and Olsen Lines commenced passenger trips to Scandinavia. DFDS Seaways now operate a daily passenger, vehicle and goods service, from the impressive new terminal which includes automated baggage handling, six check in desks and covered walkways. 2000 passengers are catered for in a turn around service with over three quarters of a million passengers a year. The daily services are presently to Amsterdam and two or three times a weeks there are services to Bergen, Stevanger and Huaghesend, according to weather. The highlight of 2007 was the arrival of Queen Elizabeth 2 to the new Quay, and a second visit is planned on her farewell tour before becoming a Hotel in Dubai.

In some respects the heyday of the Rivermouth as a port was after the Great War. In 1936, at Jarrow, a shipping staith for timber was created and the timber yards remain a prominent and thriving enterprises to this day. In the 1950's the decision was taken to concentrate shipping to the river mouth and away from Newcastle, and Gateshead and where in the latter part of the century the Quayside has developed into an area for culture, recreation, residential accommodation and the new Law Courts and legal services, and more recently for the new Gateshead College.

In 1953 an iron ore import handling terminal was created at South Shields, and even as late as 1985 the Queen mother opened a new Coal Terminal. Both have vanished along with the railway network to and from the pits. The adaptation to changing economic circumstances has continued with the Port of Tyne and Middlesbrough mow used for the transport of completed cars from the Nissan plant at Washington, Sunderland. The photograph of the Heogh Autoliner shows the size of vessels which still use this part of the Tyne river. Other photographs show a drilling rig being repaired at the McNulty yard at Tyne Dock.

The social life of the port used be located at Milldam with the former Customs House now an important cultural centre providing a 440 seat multi media use theatre with the most comfortable seating ever encountered. There is a separate 145 seat cinema studio, three art Gallery areas, and in the adjacent building, in the process of being physically linked. there is a rehearsal/dance studio/meeting area with a lighting rig and wall to wall mirrors, and a separate new community use area. There is a large restaurant and bar, the Green room, which can also provide entertainments.

Approaching Mill Dam from the town centre one crosses onto an amusing area of public artwork consisting of bar/nightclub stands on a site where once a lively night club existed before such facilities were centralized in another part of the town. On the road to the Customs House there are three public houses which now offer TV sports and live music to attract customers. Other buildings including a church have been turned into private flats and dwellings, although the Mission to Seamen also retains a facility.

A reminder of the extent to which this was a seafaring town is the statue unveiled by Lady Mountbatten in 1990 adjacent to the Customs House. The number of merchant men who lost their lives was considerable, including many from North Africa as seamen and their families from the Yemen, Aden, and Somalia, as well as African, India and Asia made their home in the town in early part of the twentieth century and just before the outbreak of World War II there were 2000 of them living and working from South Shields. The strength of the Muslim Community has been such that in the same week that Her Majesty, the Queen, celebrated her 25th anniversary to the throne, Mohamed Ali, the World Heavyweight Champion Boxer participated in marriage at the Mosque, attracting vast crowds and was guest of honour at a lunch at the Town Hall which I attended and witnessed the impact of his charisma on the ladies of all ages present.

The rear Customs House car park is the best place to view the line of white silhouette artworks with a marine theme which have been attached to a wall out of reach of the graffiti artists

In between Mill Dam and Middle Dock and between Middle Dock and Tyne Dock (the modern Port of Tyne docks and Port Authority) the local authority has published a comprehensive strategy and plan for the development of these riverside districts with housing of various kinds, commercial enterprises, and recreational and cultural facilities which will complement those in and around the Ocean Road area. There has been a series of public consultations and presentations. The transformation is underway with the announcement of a new call centre providing 1000 badly needed new jobs.

1228 Wearmouth and Wartime

This has been a good Sunday with Saturday becoming better as the day progressed. I became excited about work after selecting 36 photographs in pages of 4 to communicate the changing nature of Sunderland riverside from its mouth to the Wear side Bridge. I was less satisfied with the accompanying words

River Wearmouth
"For two decades I walked the beaches of Seaburn and Roker, Sunderland, but infrequently, and even less to the mouth of the river Wear, and never the embankments from the estuary to the Wearmouth Bridge. Since the Millennium I have explored the new marina and village created around the inner harbour which looks across to the gates which guard the entrance to Port of Sunderland on the south bank(13). Only in the summer of 2007, I explored all the new developments.

As with the Tyne, the Wear, or Vedra, its classical name, is said to have been used by the Romans to transport supplies to its army, encamped at Chester Le Street. In the sixteenth century coal was transported from the port but was affected by the competition from Newcastle. However because Newcastle had to remain Royalist in the Civil War, because of its garrison, Sunderland through choice as well as expediency, was strongly Parliamentarian, and was consequently rewarded with a monopoly of coal shipping. The life of the port boomed and with the formation of a Commission for the river Wear in 1717, the development continued until its further expansion during the industrial revolution, which included shipbuilding which is known to have started in the 14th century, and which in turn led to the growth and prosperity of the town, which became a city in 1992, after winning a competition to mark the 40th anniversary of Elizabeth becoming the Queen. The town continues to have no Cathedral.

In 1972 the local authority took over responsibility for the port which along with the rest of town was suffering from the decline in ship building, the decline in coal output and shipment, and from the revolution in merchant shipping. It is to the credit of the local council, that the port is playing a key role in the regeneration of the district and the city, and which will continue as the vast areas of derelict and underused land are brought into economic effectiveness. The new port authority building, the restoration of Old Sunderland High Street, the new fish quay and public sales building, the University complex, the National Glass centre and new residential complexes, particularly the iconic new apartment block at the Wearmouth Bridge are no more than the beginning of development which I hope to witness during the rest of my lifetime."

Although I have planned the structure of this project I had hoped its size would be governed by the 40 pocket albums (80 page) on hand but I begin to think sixty 120 pages will be required as I am yet to tackle the Tyne River Mouth, the coast with the seashore and the rocky bays, or the six parks and the four other major open spaces

I write this, stopping from time to time to listen to the Manchester born singer song writer David Gray performing at St Luke's. It was a similar session two years ago that I first heard Damian Rice, also then unfamiliar to me, but with whom it is said by Wikipedia David has appeared on stage. His most popular songs reaching the top ten were Babylon and The One I love.

On Saturday I wrote Wartimes for the Rivera 2007 album of photographs and words with six photos on three pages as the last section on the historical aspects of the walks.

"As I walked close to the river mouths of the Tyne and the river Wear and along to coastal areas in between, there were few reminders of what is was like to live in this area during the Great War of 1914-1918 and the second World War which I remember so vividly; my mother and her sisters praying in the air raid shelter, near London's main airport, Croydon. I can still feel their fear, and mine, but also the fascination of watching a V1 flying overhead as we made our way to the shelter in daylight, and then the engine cutting out, and a few days later going to look at the crater where housing had been. I remember a telegram arriving about one cousin who was not to return from a Japanese POW camp, and one who did from Germany, liberated by the Russians. As a schoolboy I read the official reports of the Nuremburg War Crimes Trials of Bergen-Belsen and Auschwitz, and in my first work at the age of sixteen I was attached to a section of six men, one navy and two airmen and three army, one of whom had lost part of his leg in the Great War.

There are the War memorials, and the buildings around the market Square South Shields have that look of post Second World War functionalism, reminders that in the war of my generation destruction and death marked the cities and town of Europe, especially in the industrial centres and the sea ports and shipbuilding towns. This is an area where the young men, and now young women, answer our continuous call for the sacrifice of their blood. There are often recruiting caravans in the South Shields shopping centre and the annual Sunderland Airshow, provides the opportunity for all the branches of the services to make appeal. Recently experiencing the 26 episodes of the BBC series of films about the Great War one memorable moment was the sight of Durham miners en masse walking out of their pits to enlist. As the war progressed it became necessary to halt this movement and mining work and shipbuilding became protected occupations, as in both wars we struggled to match the preparations and the might of the German war machine.

There is a gun on the cliff overlooking the bay of South Shields and cannons on Lawe Top, a notice explains that Cleadon Mill was used as target practice, while another tells of the bomber that ditched in the sea at Whitburn close to present day firing ranges."

The writing made me think more of my experiences and approach to the concept of war as a solution and the difference between a personal viewpoint and being in government. Of course if one became Prime Minister it would be difficult to separate the two and this clearly was an issue for Tony Blair, as further revealed in the second of three riveting programmes about his Premiership. There are two distinct types of Prime Minister. The first tries to satisfy the role of Primus inter Pares, the First among Cabinet Equals. He listen to everyone. His Cabinet colleagues in the government, his back benchers, his political party, the political opposition, the media and in relation to international affairs, the views of the interested nations, and attempts to achieve a consensus and balance this with what he believes to be best. If there is doubt he hesitates and if necessary postpones or abandons and leaves it to others to work out how to present the change or failure to progress to the best party political advantage. The problem with this style is that there is tendency to play safe, not take risks and maintain the status quo. This is appropriate in a time of stability and where there are no major threats. It was for this reason that with the ending of the cold war between the Soviets, and the rest of Europe and the USA, that a Conservative government commenced to accept Britain reducing influence in the world and saw the British forces as a small specialist force which could be a part of Nato and world policing activities and also provide training and set standards for others within the umbrella of a nuclear, technological and mechanised defence system. Forces were not expected to engage in personal combat on the kind of scale which reached its zenith in the Great War with over ten million dead, but which also was a major part of the Second World War along with direct attacks on the civilian population which Britain and America had not experienced in the Great War but which had remained a feature of all other wars with blockades, raping and pillaging of opponents, their families and their children.

The other kind of Premier is the shaper leader who has a clear view of how the world and life should be. Stalin, Hitler, and Churchill were similar men of my childhood who possessed single minded visions, albeit diametrically opposed positions within very different political systems. Since then in the UK with have had two examples of cometh the hour cometh the man, or woman, with first Margaret Thatcher and then Tony Blair. It can be argued that both came and held onto power because of the failure of the main opposition but the fact remains that a majority of the voting British people supported them not once but twice after they had found out what they were really like and stood for. They were individuals with personal charisma who people loved as well as hated

In the instance of Tony Blair the accusation during his first period of office was that he was not a man of substance but bent according to opinion pools and focus groups together with the shameless use of presentation and spin.

Then there was Kosovo, where he achieved what Margaret Thatcher did in relation to the Falklands but which was not about British self interest and which saved the lives of millions as mass killing, rape and the uprooting of lives began to engulf the middle of Europe. That Tony remains a hero in that land to this day indicates the magnitude of what was accomplished, although as he admits what turned a stand into victory was the willingness of America to put his forces on the ground, although this did not prove necessary, just its threat to do so. What Kosovo also established was the ability of Tony Blair to go out an convince others, as he was able to do in relation to Northern Ireland and to a great extent in Afghanistan meeting with President Putin and also having effective communication with Iran. However what appears to have changed his position and moving from personal leadership in a democratic context to proceeding because of personal conviction regardless of the opposition was 9/11 and the awareness that this kind of terrorism was just the tip of the iceberg of a fundamentalism which if left to develop would engulf the world as had Communism and Fascism but with the added and more serious threat of a belief system in which life was willingly sacrificed for the greater good of others and the belief in a self aware further existence.

In this respect I am probably closer to President Bush than Tony Blair if the decision to intervene in Iraq was layered in a hierarchical structure. The regime was a dictatorship and not a democracy. The regime was ruthless towards opposition using torture and extermination. The regime posed a threat to the rest of the Middle East and the wider world because it had developed and used weapons of mass destruction and attempted to go nuclear and the means of universal delivery and was known to be a safe heaven training for terrorism, although in fairness the regime was not religious fundamentalist If a stand about religious fundament then Iraq was a good place to make that stand. I a not sure if President Bush would go as far a sharing my view that religious or political fundamentalism which argues that it is the only truth and life system including political and social life, and justifies the extermination of anyone who disagrees or refuses to follow cannot be compromised with, you have to stop it, and in my case, I could not accept such fundamentalism even if it was agreed by a democratic majority. However I do not accept that the way to stop such a development is to the unscrupulous methods and tactics, but this is a personal position as a citizen and which would be different if I was in government, or the government as a President or Prime Minister can be said to be.

It is at this point that what happened in Iraq was complex. On one hand President Bush admitted in the programme, as did others, that having decided to take action, they did not believe or want to delay action to achieve a second UN resolution, or to make a commitment to a resolution of the Israel Palestinian Question a pre condition. They believed they were right and the record of the UN was such that achieving agreement was unlikely. President Bush was also a realist he did not want regime change in he UK and told Tony that if that was a likely possibility, which it was, then he would prefer to go it alone. This is where I believe Tony made his mistake, he should have accepted that he had failed to convince his political party and the country at large. If there was million on the streets of London then this was likely to represent ten, twenty and even thirty times that number in the UK and at that point, even if they were wrong, and the issue of fundamentalism would have to be confronted at some point, at home as well as abroad, anything less that immediate and comprehensive vindication would end in disaster. He should have backed down when given the opportunity. I have never had the view that the government manufactured or lied about the evidence of weapons of mass destruction because with victory in Iraq the truth would be revealed, as it was, but I share the view that the form of words used when making the case to the Commons in the crucial debate was wrong and did mislead whatever the personal intention and he should have known they would come to haunt him whatever the outcome as the sinking of the Belgrano by Margaret Thatcher. One can be forgiven for making the wrong decision for the right reasons but one is never for the right decision taken for the wrong reasons. Admittedly it is always easier to criticise with hindsight than ensure that a decision is the right one for the right reasons at the time

At this point I stop and erase the rest of my notes for rewriting and do not go back and confirm my thinking or correct the writing because the allocated time has run out and I am significantly behind in my plan for the rest of Monday and week ahead. If it does not make sense, is inconsistent, it has to be and hopefully there will be opportunity to revisit the subject and what I have written sometime soon.

1227 Industrial Heritage

Wintry weather was not ideal to go out to take some pictures required for the industrial section of the chapter on past times of the Northern Rivera and the feeling of negative omens about the day continued as I listened to the pre-match building of Newcastle playing Liverpool at home, waking that the game being shown live on Sky but having the feeling that all was not going to go well. The 50000 crowd could be heard to boo Stephen Gerrard the disgraced English team, a response of away fans to any English team players wherever they were playing. For decades I have berated fellow home fans for booing away players because it only winds them up and true to experience Gerrard unleashed an unstoppable free kick.

I switched on the TV back home but felt in the need for warm comfort food and made an omelette with prawns and olives and then settled to enjoy the rest of the game and I have not seen Newcastle play as woefully as this since the dark days of last year. Worse was to come and although the loss was 3.0 it should have been five or six. Well Sunderland would cheer me up, wouldn't they but this proved just as bad, perhaps more so giving away sloppy goals and showing no indication of changing the 3.0 disaster by half time, and then wow we score so it is 3.1

Yesterday was not a good working day, in part because I was affected by reviewing previous research about the number of those who had lost their lives in four of the five mines on or close to the coast between the rivers Tyne and the Wear, where information has been collated, over 100, of the 600 recorded deaths, about one fifth, were aged sixteen years or younger as low as 9, 10, 11 and 12. We are losing 6.1 at this point and the game is not over. My reaction yesterday was to watch films. I saw Dreamgirls in theatre and enjoyed the performance of Jennifer Hudson of American Idol, so added it to my mail order Internet list and although the musical has serious themes it brightened the evening. I also enjoyed the quirkiness of Alice Through the looking glass, a Daily Mail provided DVD which has an excellent cast going through the four main sequences of Jabberwocky. Tweedledum and Tweedledee, The Walrus and the Carpenter, and Humpty Dumpty. Before this I watched a made for TV movie with a title something like Solomon’s choice about an adolescent who needed bone marrow transplant which could be provided by her younger brother who has just recovered from life threatening illness himself and where his mother does not want to risk his life bring about marital disharmony and separation. Both children survive and there is the suggestion that the relationship of their parents revives, making a good example of well motivated risk taking producing a good outcome, so why did I forget to buy my Euro Lottery ticket, and I have yet checked to find out if I would have won or saved a couple of pounds.

Industrial Realities
I have spoken with coal miners, about their lives, since being a young man, and in 1961 I visited the headquarters of the Scottish Miner's Union to replay the fines, met from union funds, because Direct Action Committee Marchers from London to Holy Loch had insisted on walking along Princess Street in Edinburgh (8). I have never met a miner who wanted his children to have to go down a pit. I lived and studied alongside former miners during my two years at Ruskin College and worked for a year in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and leant something of the mining communities within the local authority areas responsible for Doncaster, Barnsley and Rotherham, so I had some preparation for coming to the North East in 1974 and where coal mining and shipbuilding were still the core industries which formed community and civic culture. One of my earliest long play folk records, the Industrial Muse, has one side of songs about Miners, including the Durham Lockout

In 1984 I attended an international residential four week senior management course during the Miner's strike and in the concluding exercise, the teams in which we had separately worked, were asked to represent the fuel interests, electricity, gas, oil, nuclear, coal, and alternative sources, in determining a national policy, and I was a member of the group allocated coal. For the first part of the week we researched the industry, the demand, manpower, output and costs and we could not avoid the reality that because a number of countries were able to supply the majority of domestic requirements at significantly less cost, the contraction of the industry was inevitable, although not as drastic as subsequently happened in practice. This is where my experience of working in a political environment came to the fore and I arranged with the college for a special delivery letter to be delivered to the chairman of the advisory group, formed to present an agreed energy strategy to the responsible Minister. The communication explained that it the national interest to limit and avoid further industrial conflict and bring to an end social hardship, the output from coal had to be kept at a level significantly higher than commercial considerations indicated. It was the style of the college that the letter was delivered by a special messenger on motorcycle and this persuaded the advisory chairman that it was official, in the sense, an intervention by the college, rather than a self interest manoeuvre by coal and the miners. Alas while this could have happened in reality and the demise of the British Industry taken place at a slower rate, there was the clash of incompatible ideologies between Margaret Thatcher and Arthur Scargill. The consequence for South Tyneside and Sunderland is clear to see two decades later at the sites of Whitburn, Westoe and Wearmouth collieries.

At Whitburn, located between Westoe and Wearmouth, the end came in 1968 after 111 years with 3000 men working under the North Sea in 1914 2000 in 1950 and 1000 at closure. 139 men and boys died in the mine (138 before the creation of the National Coal Board) of which nineteen were aged sixteen years or younger (twelve)(10). As the photographs reveal, with the closure of the Northern offices of the coalboard, the site was cleared to create a coastal park to one side of the Souter Point Lighthouse. On the other side there is now no trace of Marsden Village built to house the miners, 135 houses population 700, Church, Methodist Chapel, Coop store, post office, school and Miners Recreational Institute (11).

At Westoe, overlooking one of three parks and an a large area of playing fields, before the beaches of South Shields, the end did not come until 1993, and in 1914 only 108 men were employed rising to 1000 in 1940 and 2500 in the 1980's, doubling in manpower following the closure of Whitburn. Two men were killed after 1948, in 1966 and 1983. Today there is a development of contemporary terraced housing with the last phase underway.

The most impressive new development is at the former Wearmouth Colliery. The pit opened in 1824 and reached its peak in manpower in 1914 with over 2500, and there were still over 2000 employed at closure in 1991. Considerable local controversy surrounded the future use of the site with understandably many residents seeking low cost housing and job creation projects. However the majority are more than content with one of the great football stadiums of Europe with a capacity of 49000, and adjacent, an Olympic size swimming pool, is now in the last stages of construction. The Stadium of Light(12) is marked by a large Miner's lamp which is kept lit. 281 men and boys are known to have died in this mine with some forty aged sixteen and younger, including a ten year old and several aged twelve. One man died in 1947 and none after.

Not far inland from the coast at South Shields was the Harton Colliery which employed over 3400 men in 1921 and closed in 1960 with 1400. 92 men and boys are known to have died here of which 20 were boys sixteen and younger (91 before creation of NCB), and the St Hilda's Colliery 2000 men in 1914 and 1000 when it closed in 1930 with 116 dead of which over a quarter were aged sixteen and younger including two aged nine years. I will leave information on other pits close to the rivers of the Tyne and the Wear for future walks.

Although the ship yards at South Shields, Hebburn and Wallsend on the Tyne and Monkwearmouth Sunderland continued to build and repair ships throughout the twentieth century, it was the closure of Palmers at Jarrow in the 1930's which had become part of industrial and Labour heritage and folklore. This was because Jarrow was created as a shipbuilding town and when the yard failed as did many others throughout Europe, the people were promised a steel making plant which was then denied despite available funding, and in desperation the men decided on a peaceful protest Crusade for work. As has been chronicled by Matt Perry, The Jarrow Crusade Protest and Legend, University of Sunderland Press, the march ended in failure as it was World War II which brought and end to a decade of mass unemployment. Nor did the Trade Union Congress and the British Labour Party support the primary objective. As the marchers and media record reveals the reception given to them varied, with sometimes more help provided by middle class interests. Nor was support from religious interests wholehearted. The Jarrow Crusade was of great interest to me because together with the salt marches of Gandhi it was the inspiration for a protest idea taken up by the Direct Action Committee Against Nuclear War, a march which commenced at the end of an Aldermaston March in Trafalgar Square in 1961 to Holy Loch on the Clyde where the Polaris Submarine was being based. As chief Marshall at the beginning of the March I met with Home Office and Scotland Yard officials and later received a warning letter from the Commander, Flag Ship Scotland, following discussions with various local police chiefs along both banks of the Clyde and at Dunoon, about our intentions for non violent protest. The march received a mixed reception from political, trade union and religious interests. In the later 1960's I was introduced to a former Jarrow Crusade marcher and his wife who were honoured members of a local Labour Party in outer West London where they had settled and made good lives for themselves and family.

Final Score Everton 7 Sunderland 1
Newcastle 0 Liverpool 3
Middlesbrough 0 Aston Villa 3
North East 1 others 13.

1225 St Peters and St Paul Wearmouth and Jarrow

I did not have a good night with several interruptions. My fault because I gone to sleep for only a few minutes while watching the opening of England's important game against Croatia, which at the time was considered a good thing because I missed Croatia's first goal and was barely awake when they scored a second. Everything was wrong torrential rain and pitch looked horrible, the outcome of playing an American league Football match. I then stayed up too long playing quick chess level two against the computer and should have stopped when I reached 300 recorded games 19 drawn 1 defeat but only 46 winning streak, with 56 reached before the decision to record everything so that in fact some 470 games have been played at this level, and of course I lost attention and allowed a draw. I then started to think about matters put off during the day and hey presto I did not sleep immediately on going to the loo or felt inclined to get up again and work. I even remember the dream on waking early this morning.

Because tonight I am out for a Judy Collins Concerts I decided on a cooked lunch, a beef spaghetti stir fry and a glass of wine knowing I would want to then sleep, which I did but only to be woken by the two deliveries within half an hour of each other. There was nothing for it but to return to work but first I checked emails to find a reminder from Travel Lodge that their over Christmas and New year into January accommodation sale was still available and decided to book another trip to Croydon making use of a free First Class Travel which had arrived a couple of days before, as a consequence of using the new GNER online booking system for the December trip. I had checked the cost of accommodation but decided to wait to see if I needed to use the voucher for a visit concerning the inquiries about the premature and preventable death of my aunt, but then received a letter which suggested it could be two to three months before progress although the reasons for the delay appeared to be good ones. I first checked the availability of accommodation and found that a saving could be made of £41 was possible instead of £31 if I adjusted travel dates and then contacted the GNER promotions line to check on the availability of seats and because it was first class was allocated individual airline forward facing type seats. Because the seats reservations are sent by post I provided my address to then learn that the assistant was born in the next street and attended the school opposite the Arbeia Roman fort which was the subject of yesterday's writing. The omens were propitious. It had become a good day.

St Peter's Wearmouth, Sunderland

St Paul's Jarrow

For thirty years I regularly travelled along the A183 from Seaburn into Sunderland City Centre, passing the church of St Peter's(5)' at the centre of its grassed over burial ground. However my interest was first aroused when as a consequence of an arson attack in 1984, the chancel roof was destroyed with much other damage and for a time the church appeared no more than a shell. Since then it had been restored into the active community church of today which because the historical significance of its history, hopes to become part of a World Heritage site in 2010, along with St Paul's Jarrow and the adjacent exhibition of Bede World in the grounds of Jarrow Hall.

In the seventh century, the King of Northumbria generously gave a site at Wearmouth, large enough to support seventy families, to one of his noblemen, Benedict Biscop, who after visiting Rome decided to renounce his role in society and create

a monastery and a church in the Roman manner. St Benet had a bold vision going to France of find masons and glaziers to train local people to create coloured glass into windows, lamps and vessels for the first time in Great Britain, thus commencing an art which remains in the city to this day. In Victorian England, Sunderland along with Newcastle became major centres for the industrial production of bottles and plate glass, and during the twentieth century all Pyrex ovenware was produced in the city, although during the period of my walks production was moved to France. However skilled glass blowing into objects of beauty continues at the National Glass centre today(6), a few yards away, and the craft is being promoted by Sunderland University(7) whose new complex of buildings is overlooked by the Church.

Our knowledge of the development of Christian worship and learning in Northumbria is due to the St Bede AD673-735AD, usually referred to as the Venerable Bede, through his major work on the Ecclesiastical History of the British People, and his Lives of the Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow. It was a year after his birth that work on the Monastery commenced and at the age of seven he was entrusted to the care and teaching of the monastery in which he was to spend the rest of his life, although the greater part is believed to be at the Jarrow extension whose ruins can be viewed.

St Benet continued to work on his vision travelling across the channel; to bring back paintings and at one point the chief Cantor was offered by the Pope to promote the chanting and singing of psalms as choir master to the Monastery. Such was the reputation quickly established by St Peter's that eight years later St Benet commenced to develop a Monastery on two sites, also with the separate church of St Paul, at Jarrow.

As you drive along the A185 from South Shields to Jarrow, past the Port of Tyne Authority and south bank dockland and turn into Church Road there is no hint of the historical treasure a short distance away. The Jarrow location is on the banks of the river Don which runs into the Tyne and provided a river and sea route for the monks to maintain contact between the two sites. Today it is possible to also follow a clearly marked land journey of some thirteen miles between to the Churches, travelled on foot once year as a pilgrimage, or can be followed in one of six stages, or cycled (5)

My visits to the two churches and the monastery ruins at St Paul's were important experiences in my life as one obtained a sense of serious Christian belief and worship far stronger that at St Peter's and the Vatican at Rome when visiting again after the Millennium, I thought Christ would have attacked with as much vigour as he is reported to have the done the money lenders within the confines of the Jewish Temple. I would be surprised if any modern day Benedict Biscop would be inspired to try and recreate the circus which the Vatican has become, I have a similar reaction to the films of the hordes of pilgrims visiting Mecca, given my understanding that both men preached religions which were about the values and standards of every aspect of individual life, spirit within rather than the ostentation, exhibitionism and ritualistic worship which many religions have become and is why I was drawn to the Society of Friends in the 1960's after losing my Catholic faith. Over time I came to appreciate work of architecture and other forms of art which express the wonders of nature and the human experience and I can understand the emotional excitement and joy believers of individual faiths experience on visiting shrines and other holy places, and how such visits can affect the way lives are then led. I found St Peter's and St Paul to be good places where to sit and reflect and most will find the fellowship of others offered by their communities of great value.

1224 Abeia and Rivera project

This brings me to yesterdays completed work on the Arbeia Roman Fort.

Times Past

In the whole of the North East of England, the vast geographical area of Northumberland, Durham and 'Cleveland' there are estimated to have been about a quarter of a million people in 1800(2).

One hundred and seventy fives years later the population had reached two and three quarters of a million, eleven fold.

This growth, with large numbers migrating from Scotland and Ireland, was created by the need for fuel, transport and manufacturing machines for the Empire: Coal, Steel and Ships. Over half the population was concentrated, as it is now, within the comparatively small area around the river Wear and the City of Sunderland and between the towns on the banks of the Tyne, Tynemouth and North Shields, South Shields, Jarrow and Hebburn, Wallsend, Gateshead and the accepted regional capital city of Newcastle. For the past two decades a half marathon has been run from the centre of Newcastle to the Coastal Park at South Shields(3).

Excluding the Industrial Revolution, the region is known for the Roman Wall, the chronicling of early Christianity, the City of Durham and its many and magnificent Castles. By one of those quirks of circumstance, value for money opportunities and sudden availability, I bought a house within a couple of streets of the visible remains of the Roman fort and main supply depot for the troops which guarded the wall built by the Roman Emperor Hadrian. I was about to purchase a house a mile away when the estate agent rang to say that the individual who had made an offer had dropped out.

The fort is now known by its earliest recorded name Arbeia (4) in a 4^th/5^th century work, Notitia Dignitatum, and is thought to be Latinised Aramaic, the known language of the last attested unit stationed at the fort. It has also been known as Caer Urfa with Caer a Welsh word meaning fortified place and then in the Middle Ages as Scheles which is a middle English term for a groups of shelters.

The fort was built during the reign of Hadrian about AD 125 to guard what was then a small sea port below the hill, which was once an island created by a tributary of the Tyne which ran down what is now the main shopping area, a night life district and street of small hotels and restaurants onto the coast, called Ocean Road. At this time it was an Auxiliary Calvary Fort with units of 500 men. "In AD 208 the Emperor Septimus Severus launched a series of campaigns against the troublesome Caledonian Tribes". The function of the fort was then changed first into an auxiliary infantry cohort and then extensively rebuilt with additional barrack blocks. It is said to have fallen into disuse for a time and then developed as a store to supply the troops of the seventeen forts guarding the wall, using the Tyne river to transport. It contained the only stone made granary found in Great Britain and as attested by the stone built structure of the West Gate, its building would have required specialist engineers.

The fort was abandoned about AD 400 when Emperor Honorius advised the British people that we had to look to our own defences. Research has shown that cavalry units stationed at the fort came for Hungry and Spain and then by infantry troops from Gaul, although perhaps only half the 1000 strength were stationed because only accommodation blocks for 500 have been identified. The last known Roman unit was of Syrian bargemen from the River Tigris in the Middle East. Of contemporary interest among the Gods worshipped at the fort were the Spirits of Conservation.

The spirits of conservation were dormant for much of the Industrial Revolution and it is only during the last quarter of a decade that attention was given to the site, first with building the extraordinarily authentic reconstruction of the West Gatehouse, and only this year the more recent recreation of the centurion's house was completed as a contrast with the accommodation available for his eighty men.

The following two photographs do not do justice to the potential of this important site which is tucked away on the brow of the hill surrounded by large three storey Victorian terracing. The proposal to build a visitor's centre and observation tower on the adjacent hillside park overlooking the mouth of the river towards the beacon remains of Tynemouth Priory and Castle has met with understandable self interested opposition by some local residents, and admittedly my preference, if there is to be some skyline structure, is for a giant sculpture of a miner and a shipyard worker to rival that of the Angel of the North, perhaps together with a Centurion they could be made to support the tower!

1223 Northern Rivera

This is been an interesting 24 hours in which I completed the introduction to Northern Rivera, (se below) just three pages of words and ten pages with 20 photos. There are just five copies being printed and I made a mistake with two pages of the photographs forgetting that I had previously decided on the inclusion of different photos. I have also drafted the first two pages of the first chapter which is called times past and will features words and pictures commencing with the Arbeia Roman Fort, the Latinised Aramaic as the last recorded Roman Troops, to be stationed were boatmen from Syria and the River Tigris in particular, as by then the fort had a supply depot for the 17 forts guarding Hadrian's wall, with good arriving at the port of South Shields, store at the fort on the hill and then shipped by boats along the river Tyne to various distribution points to the Wall. The chapter will then cover the work of St Bede at the monasteries of St Peter and Paul, smuggling into inlets and caves the creation of Jarrow as a ship building town, growth of the ports of the mouth of the Tyne and Sunderland, the coastal Coalfields at South Shields and Whitburn, the Jarrow Crusade, former mining village by Souter Lighthouse, using Cleadon Mill for target Practice in World War One and the day a German Bomber fell into the sea near to where Lewis Carroll worked on his stories.

It is also 24 hours when I watched an American made film in Japanese with English Subtitles directed by Clint Eastward and then a Russian counter terrorism adventure, also with English subtitles, and received my voucher for a free first class return travel on GNER anywhere on its line during January. Another trip to Croydon and London me thinks. It has been 24 hours of almost solid rain with a day long gloom which discouraged venturing far, although I did take a trip to Sunderland to a bank try and resolve issues regarding the small estate of my mother. I stopped first at the supermarket for some bread, prawns in shell, salted peanuts and fresh fruit, and the latest DVD from the Daily Mail. On my way to the car a man in front about my age paused, and I had to slow to get by as had another man before me, at which a woman behind commented jokingly about needing to slim, I think aimed at the man who paused although I am larger and the man in front even bigger. He turned round had asked me if I had heard the one about the man who could not fit inside a hula hoop. I mentioned my efforts to reduce weight whereupon he said he now owned a car for the first time in his life and had put on two stones since giving up the bicycle on which he had done100 miles each week. It was raining with a cold wind but this was the true spirit of the Tyne. Talking of spirits I learnt that one of the inscriptions found at the site of Arbeia for the God of the Spirits of Conservation.

On my way to Sunderland I heard that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had to admit to Parliament that a junior at the Child Benefit HQ had sent by a private firm of carriers two computer disks on which all the names and addresses, socials security and bank information for every child in the UK had been compressed and appears not to have immediately disclosed that the information went astray, sending two more disks to the National Audit Office in the same way and who had requested the information. The information covers half the families in the British Islands. There can be no bigger scandal in the history of bureaucracy, moreover the implication of the statement suggests there was an attempt to cover up within the organisation, but the Government appears to have learnt from the blunder of the Home Secretary regarding the number of illegal immigrant employed by the government in its security services. Well Gordon, this is the job you wanted so much, now prove you are up to it. An independent inquiry has been established but will not report until next year. What I want to know is why the National Audit office wanted such detailed information?

Introduction to Rivera. The photos will be added to my photos in due course.

"For over thirty years, half my lifetime, I have lived and worked, close to the Rivers Tyne and Wear, travelling by road, almost daily, along part of the coastline, which is approximately seven miles between the points when the rivers reach the North Sea. It has taken all this time to fully appreciate the spectacular shore of former smuggler's coves and inlets, the bird covered stacks of rocks, the glorious spectacle of the sweeping sandy bays, on a bright winter's, spring or autumn day, the six magnificent parks, and the other stretches of public and agricultural land, the two ancient sites of British Christianity, of St Peter's and St Paul, and the way in which public and private interests are working together to complete the transplant of the former industrial landscape of shipbuilding and coal mining into an organic mixture of global enterprise, varied new residential communities, focussed adult education developments, together with vibrant recreational and imaginative cultural experiences.

There is still much to accomplish and there is sometimes vigorous debate about overall priorities and individual projects, in an area, and a region which in the twentieth century experienced great loss from two World Wars, and still mourns its courageous young men and women as they continue to form the backbone of the British army, navy, and merchant force, and time and time again, had to recover from the devastation of a community, such as the people of Jarrow, brought together to build 1000 ships, and then faced a decade of dole because of economic change and political intrigue which denied them a steel plant (1).

As I walked along the manicured green by the Souter Point Light House, it is easy to forget the tiny houses which once formed a mining village around me, or as I eat lunch among flowering shrubs and sheltering trees of the Whitburn Coastal park, that men and boys toiled under the sea and that before the nationalization of the coal, over one hundred lost their lives in preventable accidents, or as I stood among the attractive business like buildings of the new Sunderland University complex on the bank of the river Wear, close to the National Glass centre, to remember that once there where giant factories producing glassware for the world, and then learnt that the last factory, where every piece of Pyrex ovenware was once produced, had closed its gates, because the company was moving production to France.

I believe I can demonstrate through pictures and simple words, commencing with the ancient Cathedral and University city of Durham, to the industrial port of Sunderland beside the banks and mouth of the river Wear, and then along a coast with features rivalling that of Devon and Cornwall, and then inland once more with the twin beacons of the ruins of Tynemouth Castle and Priory on the north bank. and the now hidden ruins of the what was once the biggest Roman supply fort in Europe on the other, in South Shields, and onto what has already become the great tourist city centres outside of London in the United Kingdom, Newcastle with its twin local authority Gateshead, that this area can now claim to have become again the Northern Rivera, a new era for the North East riversides, and which also includes those at Middlesbrough, Stockton on theTees.

The towns and cities of Durham, Sunderland, South Shields, Tynemouth, North Shields, and Whitley Bay, Newcastle and Gateshead, are excellent places from which to explore the region with to the North, the deserted coast of Northumberland and the film set Castle at Bamburgh, overlooking the dawn of British Christianity at Lindisfarne and the other Farne Islands, and inland the vast forests and sheep lands, and the grand reservoir lake of Keilder, merging into lowlands of Scotland, with its capital city, an hour away by train, and to the immediate west the Pennines and northern Cumbrian Lakes, with in the south west the country towns and wild open hill lands of Durham on over the mountains to southern Lakeland, while in the South there are pretty villages of the North Yorkshire Moors, the land of Heartbeat and All Creatures Great and Small, leading to the picturesque Robin Hood's Bay and Whitby, with the once grand seaside splendour of Scarborough, and the extraordinary city of York Minister, also an hour away by train.

I first settled here in 1974, a stranger without having had any meaningful sense of a home land before, and quickly came to love and hate which is the stuff of all great passions, and where now as I reach my three score years and ten, I marvel at where I am and able to enjoy in a comfort what many others do not. For 2007 I have concentrated on the embankments of the river Tyne to the River Wear between Jarrow, South Shields and Sunderland.

I hope the photographs convey something of the variety of flavours of a day's walking, or a week's leisurely experience, covered in the following work.

In future years I hope to travel and part walk the length of the Tyne, stopping to cover the amazing developments in Newcastle and Gateshead, all the way to Keilder, and then concentrate on the City of Sunderland to Durham
.
These walks and travels are part of a contemporary art installation project 101.75 in which I am reflecting on my lifelong experience in the form of A 4 size cards, one for each hour until the age of 65, over 600000 cards in over 20000 sets representing each day, with between a quarter and a third of the work completed, divided between material which will be accessible and that which is confidential and will remain private, plus photographs over which of 250000 have made been made, and some unedited audio and digital film.

Everything I do is designed to be shared and enjoyed by anyone and everyone."

1181 The Great North Run before a funeral

For the first time in over a week I want and feel able to write again, and although the air has been a cool, the sun has been shining brightly for several days, and for several hours from dawn when I awoke and rose, the sky has been cloudless.

I went out to place a notice of thanks in the local evening paper, to purchase books of first class stamps and to obtain some cash and bank statements. From the post office, en route to the offices of the newspaper I passed the attempt to improve the attractiveness of local shopping through the development of a BHS, Desire at Debenhams, River, and Next, and decided to see the what was offer for men, having unexpectedly found a quality but inexpensive off the peg suit at the Newcastle store last Thursday evening, and discovered that the Sunderland store was closed until January because of a fire. Alas I was disappointed because while the Shields store has two floors and caters for boys, it does not for adult males. A similar situation to that at the Marks & Spencer's which reflects the population structure of the town. However the visit was not a total waste because I enjoyed an excellent cup of coffee and a Danish type slice, and a chat with assistants over the comparative rarity of a male being in store.

This comfort break was needed to prepare myself for the cost of saying a public thank you to the staff at the District General Hospital, the Residential Care Home, the community Medical and Nursing staff, the Priest and his parishioners, and the Funeral Directors who between them had made the last three years of my mother's long life the happiest for both of us and her last physical days joyous.

It was only when making way to Funeral Firm a week ago, and saw the road closure signs and diversions for Sunday's Great North Run that I realised the difficulty there would be finding accommodation and getting out and about on the day. The present population of the town is 90000 and the advance publicity for the Run mentioned that close on 50000 participation forms had been distributed which meant that with everyone having an average of one supporter and the number of volunteer helpers and organisers there could be more of them than us. Much like what happens at Seaburn Sunderland when a population of thousands become swamped by at least a quarter of a million people on each of two days, the approach of the locals is to go away for the day, or stay home or take a peak at the crowds, although as the air show took place a few years from my former home, and the road outside was filled with three lanes of buses in one direction, windows shaking as jet fighters zoomed away, and long lines of visitors clutching giant toys won in raffles, it was impossible to pretend nothing was going on.

The problem which the run created is that main dual carriage way route to Newcastle, and the two main routes to Sunderland are closed and with only one way to get from north to south and vice versa between coast and river Tyne along its banks to Jarrow where the road Tunnel takes you the North Bank and across to Newcastle if you wish, or South on the A19 dual carriage to Sunderland, over-passing the runners. My problem was how to get from my home to where my mother was in Chapel during the afternoon, and I quickly abandoned my car in a town centre car park when it was evident I would have to spend valued time in an increasing traffic jam as vehicles commenced to make their way to the only exist route. The war was not only good for me but provided opportunity to encounters several hundred happy but tired faces as they made their way to join the amazing queue I could see of those waiting to for the shuttling ferries and then the even more extraordinary spectacle of thousands orderly queuing at the two Metro train entrances entertained by a live band. I had great sympathy as one, I assume partner, consoled one exhausted participants as they unknowing headed for the station, just think how all this exercise is good for you.

It had been a warm day and my first task on reaching the Chapel of rest was to remove my soaking shirt and button up my out jacket. Later my concern was how to get to the bus station to meet the London coach as a preliminary check confirmed that all the outward traffic was now blocking all exits for my almost hill home with the coast and river on three sides. Fortunately within 30 mins of the arrival time the police diverted the traffic to a different route and I had I now difficulty in getting to the arrival point, and knew the only way to reach the hotel without meeting the escaping vehicles on their redirected homeward journey's.

I have to admit I watched the BBC showing of the event in the morning while I made last minute preparations, interspersed with a re run of the Japanese Grand Prix which he won and barring a disaster in the final two races secured him, and GB, the World Championships Driver's title. The retirement of Lady Tanni Grey took away something from the wheel chair race although she was on the course handing out bottles of water. It was good to see Paula Radcliffe back although she was soundly beaten by rising star Kara Goucher from the USA who broke her national record for the distance.

The main run was started by Sir Bobby Robson who had to give up shaking hands of those who passed closest to him after the first ten thousand or so, although the number who started and completed the full distance was about 25% less than those who were registered.

The most sad and moving of the personality stories was the reason why Sir Christopher Chataway was making a special effort this year. In 1954 while I was still at school I went to the White City athletics stadium and watched Christopher Chataway break the world 5000metres world record although I was about as far away from the finishing line as anyone could be. He then became the first BBC sporting personality of the year. His son was engaged to a young woman who worked on the promotional side of Chelsea Football club and worked in a water aid project in Africa when at Newcastle University. She was knocked down one day or her way to work and died. Father, son and some 190 friends and supporters were competing in order to raise sufficient to complete a new water project.

Bubbly three times married Carole Vorderman told the story of her welsh mother and family background at Prestatyn in the latest Who are you? programme and then moved on to travelling to Holland to find out if the father, she had first agreed to meet in 2002 when she was forty, he having left the family within weeks of her birth, had worked as in the resistance as a very young man. She discovered that he had risked his life listening to the radio on the progress of the allies and helping to print and distribute leaflets which passed on the information. He died before she could report on her discoveries about him.

For me the most interesting aspect of the programme was the recently walked coastline filmed from a helicopter. I am not yet ready to write an account of this year's walk to accompany the photos, but nearly. I repeated some of the walk in the sunshine on Monday afternoon; it was an affirmation of life and death.