The Notebook
The Notebook
Every article and note from The Bondgate Gazette in one index: stays, town history, castles, coast and walks in and around Alnwick.
The Notebook is the gazette's index: every article and note published so far, gathered in one place and kept at the address where this domain's former owners once kept their own occasional posts. It is the page to bookmark for returning readers.
The domain carried a small blog under the old guest house, mostly announcements and the start of a history of the building itself. The gazette keeps the same habit of writing things down, extended to the whole town and the county around it.
What is published so far
The gazette's coverage falls into three strands. The staying guides cover the practical culture of the guest house in a market town: how to read an old townhouse room, the Northumberland breakfast, how a tariff works and the choice between hosted and self-catering stays. The town guides cover Alnwick itself: the documented history of a Bondgate townhouse, the castle and the garden and the lanes, the bookshop and the museum. The county guides cover the days out: the castle circuit, the coast and islands and the walking country.
How the index is ordered
Entries are grouped by their strand rather than strictly by date, since a tide rule or a castle guide does not age the way a news piece does. New material is added as it is written, and older entries are revised when the record changes: a crossing time, a closed season, a corrected date in a house's history.
How articles are written
Each piece is written in the third person from published sources, local records and the documented history of the town, and is meant to be useful to someone planning a real visit rather than to fill space. Corrections and suggestions are welcome at the contact page; the editorial approach is set out in About The Bondgate Gazette.
Why a notebook?
The name is deliberate. A gazette reports; a notebook keeps what is worth keeping: the tide rule for Holy Island, the walk into Hulne Park, the plaque above a Bondgate doorway, the difference a good breakfast makes. Entries are added as the journal grows, and the index below always reflects the current state of the archive rather than a feed ordered only by date.
Where to start
New readers usually begin either with the practical question of the stay, answered in Staying in Alnwick, or with the town's story, starting at In the Town. The full index appears below.
The Notebook
What the Rooms of an Old Townhouse Tell You
Sash windows, chimney breasts, creaking stairs and rooms at the back: how to read the bedrooms of a Georgian guest house before you book a night.
Sash windows, chimney breasts, stairs: what the description really means.
The Notebook
The Northumberland Breakfast
Craster kippers, porridge, local bacon and the full cooked plate: what a bed and breakfast morning table looks like in north Northumberland.
Kippers, porridge and the full plate: the morning table decoded.
The Notebook
Reading a Guest House Tariff
Per person or per room, single supplements, seasonal bands and what is usually included: how to read the tariff of a small Alnwick guest house.
Seasonal bands, single supplements and what is actually included.
The Notebook
B&B Room or Self-Catering Cottage
Hosted mornings and a cooked breakfast against your own kitchen and your own hours: how to choose between a B&B room and a cottage in Alnwick.
Hosted mornings against your own kitchen and hours.
The Notebook
The History of Bondgate House
Three families in 150 years, a doctor's surgery, a fire insurance plaque and a street that changed its numbers: the documented story of an Alnwick townhouse.
Three families, a surgery, a plaque: one facade, 150 years.
The Notebook
Alnwick Castle and The Alnwick Garden
A Norman seat of the Percy family and a contemporary garden with a famous Poison Garden: how the two big sights of Alnwick fit a day in town.
A Norman seat and a contemporary garden, one town day.
The Notebook
Lanes, a Bookshop and a Museum
Pickwick Lane and Correction House Lane, a vast second-hand bookshop in the old railway station and a small town museum: the Alnwick between the big sights.
The Alnwick between the ticketed sights.
The Notebook
Castles Within a Day of Alnwick
Bamburgh on its rock, Dunstanburgh on its headland, Warkworth, Chillingham and Lindisfarne: the castle circuit of north Northumberland from Alnwick.
Bamburgh to Lindisfarne: the circuit ordered by day.
The Notebook
Beaches and Islands of the Coast
Long sand beaches, boat trips to the Farne Islands from Seahouses, the tide times of Holy Island and the villages between Alnmouth and Berwick.
Beaches, boats to the Farnes, and the Holy Island tide.
The Notebook
Walks Near Alnwick
Hulne Park behind the town, Iron Age hillforts in the Cheviots, the Northumberland Coast Path and St Oswald's Way: walking country within easy reach.
From the town gate to the Cheviot tops and the coast path.