Friday is traditionally a day for eating fish, well it was/is in my house. On a VERY slow afternoon, I thought I'd do some research to find out why, while waiting for the clock to tick down and signal "Happy Hour"; the end of another working week.
Fish on Friday
The long-standing Roman Catholic tradition of not eating meat other than fish on Fridays (and of substituting fish for other types of meat on that day) continues to influence habits even in semi-secular and secular societies. Friday night remains a traditional occasion for patronising fish-and-chip shops and many cafeterias and similar establishments, while varying their menus on other days of the week, habitually offer fish and chips every Friday.[11]
Chips may have become associated with meals of fried fish because the fat used for frying the fish often became too hot for good frying. To return the fat to an optimal temperature, chefs dropped cut-up potatoes into the fat. Legend has it that shops initially gave the resultant 'chips' away free with the fish.[source: Wiki - Fish & Chips]
Fascinating to learn that potatoes were added to the menu by "accident". I think it was more likely that better transport made distribution of produce much easier and the two naturally got combined. Given a choice, I'd rather have curry & chips!
This weeks top travel destination article goes to Doug's information about Seahorses in Northumberland which is a good place (sic0) to get a bag of fish & chips on any night of the week.
Fish and Chips in Seahouses
One of many small towns and villages on this under populated stretch of the Northumberland coast is now a resort with a fishing harbour.
Situated on the North Northumberland coast and designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, since 1958 in recognition of the quality of the landscape. Seahouses is the ideal base from which to explore the Scottish Borders and the hills and coastline of this magnificent part of England. The area is best known for its sweeping sandy beaches and open views, rolling dunes and rocky cliffs, isolated islands, dramatic castles, ancient relics and rich wildlife.
You will find everything you need to know about Seahouses and our surrounding area, including the famous Farne Islands and the Longstone Lighthouse. We are a short ride away from most of the major tourist attractions in this part of Northumbria including Alnwick, home of Harry Potter and the Alnwick Garden. A visit to the bird and seal colonies on the Farne Islands is a must during your stay and several boat trips can be taken from the harbour.
You will find listings for all kinds of tourist accommodation with prices to suit your budget. From the casual week end visitor to the summer holiday maker Seahouses can offer accommodation and facilities second to none. There are a wide range of hotels, guesthouses, caravan and campsites in the area.
Dont leave before sampling the delicious fish and chips, watch out for the seagulls. Market day is Friday.
For nearly 180 years the lifeboat station has operated an all weather lifeboat and its crews have been presented with five awards for gallantry. Today the station operates both an all weather lifeboat and an inshore lifeboat it can be found in Seahouses.
The Marine Life Centre is set out on 4 spacious levels. Including a large trout pond where you can feed the fish, a tides out touch pool where you can get hands on with the crabs. The other levels comprise of exhibitions with audio visual conversations between fishing families. A must for all the family.
The Development Trust benefits both tourists and residents with listings of local amenities, businesses and services. The fascinating history of our village has been brought to life with our Heritage Walks around Seahouses. The Guide takes you around three heritage walks which inlcude the coastline, the countryside and the old towns. The walks are entitled The Harbour and Old Seahouses Time Trail. There are nine information panels along the routes a wildlife panel on the sea front. A childrens quiz to accompany the walks will be available from the Tourist Information.
Article Republished From: Liberated Press Releases a web site that DOESN'T use Google Adsense text links in or around articles.Author Resource:- Douglas Scott works for
The Rental Car Hire Specialist. and is a free lance writer for
The Seahouses SiteMore About NorthumberlandThe low-lying Northumberland coast , stretching 64 miles north from Newcastle to the Scottish border, boasts many of the region's principal attractions, but first you have to clear the disfigured landscape of the old Northumbrian coalfield. Beyond Amble you emerge into a pastoral landscape that spreads over the thirty-odd miles to Berwick-upon-Tweed. On the way there's a succession of mighty fortresses, beginning with Warkworth Castle and Alnwick Castle , former and present strongholds of the Percys, the county's biggest landowners. Further along, there's the formidable fastness of Bamburgh and then, last of all, the magnificent Elizabethan ramparts surrounding Berwick-upon-Tweed . In between you'll find splendid sandy beaches - notably at Warkworth, Bamburgh and the small resort of Alnmouth - as well as Lindisfarne monastery on Holy Island and the sea-bird and nature reserve of the Farne Islands.
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SeahousesAlnmouthIt's just three miles north from Warkworth to the seaside resort of ALNMOUTH , whose narrow, mostly nineteenth-century centre is strikingly situated on a steep spur of land between the wide sandy beach and the estuary of the Aln. Alnmouth was a busy and prosperous port up until 1806, when the sea, driven by a freakish gale, broke through to the river and changed its course, moving the estuary from the south to the north side of Church Hill and rendering the original harbour useless. Alnmouth never really recovered, though it has been a low-key holiday spot since Victorian times, as attested by the elegant seaside villas.
AlnwickThe unassuming town of ALNWICK (pronounced "Annick"), thirty miles north of Newcastle and four miles inland from Alnmouth, is renowned for its castle - seat of the dukes of Northumberland - which overlooks the River Aln immediately to the north of the town centre. Alnwick itself is an appealing market town of cobbled streets and Georgian houses, centred on the old cross in Market Place, site of a weekly market (Saturdays) since the thirteenth century.
BamburghFlanking a triangular green in the lee of its castle, three miles north of Seahouses, the tiny village of BAMBURGH is only a five-minute walk from two splendid sandy beaches, backed by rolling, tufted dunes. From the sands Bamburgh Castle (April-Oct daily 11am-5pm) is a spectacular sight, its elongated battlements crowning a formidable basalt crag high above the beach.
This beautiful spot was first fortified by the Celts, but its heyday was as an Anglo-Saxon stronghold, one-time capital of Northumbria and the protector of the preserved head and hand of St Oswald, the seventh-century king who invited St Aidan over from Iona to convert his subjects. Rotted by centuries of seaspray and buffeted by winter storms, Bamburgh Castle struggled on until 1894, when its new owner, Lord Armstrong, demolished most of the structure to replace it with a cumbersome castle-mansion.
The focal point of the new building was the King's Hall, a soulless teak-ceilinged affair of colossal dimensions, whose main redeeming feature is an exquisite collection of Fabergé stone animal carvings. In the ground floor of the keep, the stone-vaulted ceiling maintains its Norman appearance, making a suitable arena for a display of fetters and man-traps.
Berwick-upon-TweedBefore the union of the English and Scottish crowns in 1603, BERWICK-UPON-TWEED , some twelve miles north of Holy Island, was the quintessential frontier town, changing hands no fewer than fourteen times between 1174 and 1482, when the Scots finally ceded the stronghold to the English. Interminable cross-border warfare ruined Berwick's economy, turning the prosperous Scottish port of the thirteenth century into an impoverished garrison town, which the English forcibly cut off from its natural trading hinterland up the River Tweed. By the late sixteenth century, Berwick's fortifications were in a dreadful state of repair and Elizabeth I, apprehensive of the resurgent alliance between France and Scotland, had the place rebuilt in line with the latest principles of military architecture.
Today, the easy stroll along the top of the ramparts offers a succession of fine views out to sea, across the Tweed and over the orange-tiled rooftops of a town that's distinguished by its elegant Georgian mansions.
Craster and BeadnellHeading northeast out of Alnwick along the B1340, it's a six-mile hop to the region's kipper capital, the tiny fishing village of CRASTER , perched above its minuscule harbour. There's not a great deal to make you stop long, but you can buy kippers here at Robson's factory and have a pot of tea in the Bark Pots . Even better is the Jolly Fisherman , the pub above the harbour, with sea views from its back window and famously good crab sandwiches. Most spectacularly, however, the village provides access to Dunstanburgh Castle (April-Sept daily 10am-6pm; Oct daily 10am-5pm; Nov-March Wed-Sun 10am-4pm), whose shattered medieval ruins occupy a magnificent promontory about thirty minutes' windy walk up the coast.
Holy IslandThere's something rather menacing about the approach to Holy Island , past the barnacle-encrusted marker poles that line the causeway. The danger of drowning is real enough if you ignore the safe crossing times posted at the start of the three-mile trip across the tidal flats. (The island is cut off for about five hours every day, so to avoid a tedious delay consult the tide timetables at one of the region's tourist offices or in the local newspapers.) Once here, it's easy to picture the furious Viking hordes sweeping across Holy Island, giving no quarter to the monks at this quiet outpost of early Christianity.
Today's sole village is plain in the extreme, which doesn't deter summer day-trippers from clogging the car parks as soon as the causeway is open. But Holy Island has a distinctive and isolated atmosphere, especially out of season.
Once known as Lindisfarne , Holy Island has an illustrious history. It was here that St Aidan of Iona founded a monastery at the invitation of King Oswald of Northumbria in 634. The monks quickly evangelized the northeast and established a reputation for scholarship and artistry, the latter exemplified by the Lindisfarne Gospels , the apotheosis of Celtic religious art, now kept in the British Museum. The monastery had sixteen bishops in all, the most celebrated being St Cuthbert , who only accepted the job after Ecgfrith, another Northumbrian king, pleaded with him. But Cuthbert never settled here and, within two years, he was back in his hermit's cell on the Farne Islands, where he died in 687. His colleagues rowed the body back to Lindisfarne, which became a place of pilgrimage until 875, when the monks abandoned the island in fear of marauding Vikings, taking Cuthbert's remains with them - the first part of the saint's long posthumous journey to Durham. In 1082 Lindisfarne, renamed Holy Island, was colonized by Benedictines from Durham, but the monastery was a shadow of its former self, a minor religious house with only a handful of attendant monks, the last of whom was evicted at the Dissolution.
WarkworthWARKWORTH , a coastal hamlet set in a loop of the River Coquet a couple of miles from Amble, is best seen from the north, from where the grey-stone terraces of the long main street slope up towards the commanding remains of Warkworth Castle (daily: April-Sept 10am-6pm; Oct 10am-5pm; Nov-March 10am-1pm & 2-4pm). Enough remains of the outer wall to give a clear impression of the layout of the medieval bailey, but - apart from the well-preserved gatehouse through which the site is entered - nothing catches your attention as much as the keep . Mostly built in the fourteenth century, this three-storeyed structure, with its polygonal turrets and high central tower, has a honeycomb-like interior, a fine example of the designs developed by the castle-builders of Plantagenet England.
