Harbottle Castle & The Drake Stone

Sunday 21st September 2025 | Today’s foray into the great outdoors was very much a last minute affair. Having been prompted to come up with a route during an early morning cuppa, I decided to dip into Ian Jackson’s book of North-East geological sites Northumberland Rocks for inspiration. At this rate the hike was likely to be a compact one because it wouldn’t get started much before lunch time as the drive itself would take over an hour.

I’d already picked out “The Drake Stone” as an early candidate from the book. The 30ft-high, sandstone boulder has long attracted visitors thanks to its distinctive position and proximity to the road. Being high on the steep scarp slope of the Harbottle Hills it nevertheless demands some effort to reach it. It overlooks the village of Harbottle and its ruined castle, right on the edge of the Northumberland National Park and the Otterburn military ranges.

The forecast was for possible showers later in the afternoon but was otherwise set to be perfect. Winds were relatively gentle, temperatures mild with plenty of sunshine. Thankfully, the drive, of which much was spent on the A1M, proved to be smooth and predictable. It’s a nice one generally but the views along the Coquet Valley after Rothbury are outstanding.

Stats at a Glance

Distance 10.7 km/6.6 miles | Elevation Gain  309 m/1013 ft | Maximum Elevation 296 m/971 ft (West Wood) | Going Generally firm with potentially (very) muddy/boggy sections; trail, road, track, moorland, farmland, woodland | Exposure Very exposed on the highest parts with some sheltered woodland and urban options | Navigation Partly way-marked on FPs/BWs (OS Explorer OL16; Landranger 80)| Hospitality & Supplies Harbottle (PH); Alwinton (PH) | Start & Finish Castle Car-Park, Harbottle, Northumberland NE65 7DH (what3words: ///staring.snacking.tube) | Grade Challenge | GPS File

More photographs are available in our Google Gallery

The Approach

As the crow flies, stone and castle are little more than a kilometre apart though separated by a significant amount of elevation. If you’re visiting both then the castle car-park offers an ideal location from which to start including a couple of interesting pieces of public art and an interpretation board for the castle — all of which I’d need to inspect before going further.

Though the features in the car-park sought to draw my attention to the castle, I was hard-pressed to ignore the monolithic profile of the Drake Stone high up on the ridge opposite. This would be our first objective. After that, we’d continue on the trail past Harbottle Lough before descending through West Wood, losing all of the height we’d just gained. We’d then head for the Rose & Thistle pub in Alwinton which I had the idea of approaching via an indirect route along the River Coquet. At that point, we’d see how the time was going.

The route from the car-park to the stone is, more or less, direct. After a short distance on the road there’s an uphill trail through a field before reaching a rugged path on the boundary of the military training area. Assuming you stay on it long enough it’ll take you directly to the stone. More parking is available, courtesy of the Forestry Commission, further along the road, even closer to the stone. A track leads directly uphill to the stone.

This was where we began to notice and ever-increasing volume of chatter which soon disclosed itself as possibly the noisiest family grouping I think I might ever have come across. I’m probably showing my age and grumpiness but it wasn’t so much the kids’ excited screams as the multiple adults’ disconnectedly loud droning that was so jarringly intrusive. While we quickly put some distance between us it was obvious where they were going. 

Thrown off somewhat, we left the trail earlier than we should have and paid the price for trying to ascend directly towards the stone. The heather is thick, the upper slopes steep and Diane’s tolerance low. She toughed it out nevertheless but “looks” were exchanged. 

I’d therefore firmly recommend sticking to the path which, by turning left at an obvious junction on the ridge, will deliver you to the stone with much less effort. This was the route taken by “the family” whose approach was was heralded by the increasing volume of relentless chatter. I shouldn’t be hard on the kids who rightly appeared to be having a whale of a time. The two women in the group however, were completely distracted, loudly discussing some mutual friend or relative whose problems I was becoming increasingly intimate with (it was impossible not to listen, I swear).

The Drake Stone

Regardless of ambient background noise, the Drake Stone itself is impressive – more so than I realised from the pictures I’ve seen. Its massive bulk attracts many climbers but as neither of us possess either the skill or equipment we gave it a miss. Being as detached as it is, it’s often described as an “erratic”, rocks moved by the glacial action of ice. True erratics however, are usually transported into areas of bedrock where they wouldn’t otherwise be found (boulders of granite, from Shap, are littered throughout lower Teesdale for instance).

Like the outcrops around it, it belongs to a strata of Carboniferous bedrock (around 350 million years old) known as the “Fell Sandstone Formation”. Apart from various initials, on its vertical faces are distinct areas of inclined “cross-bedding”. These, usually diagonal or wavy lines, indicate the action of wind and/or water on sediments as they begin to accumulate.

The name apparently is derived from the Anglo-Saxon for “dragon” with the stone itself being associated with several legends. Harbottle was said to have had unusually low levels of child mortality thanks to the children being “passed over the stone”. It seems somewhat hard to believe given the obvious hazards involved!

Harbottle Lough, Wild Swimming & Goldcrests

Sooner than we would have liked, we left “the family” to air their affairs in private and set off in the direction of Harbottle Lough (lake). Here we passed through another group of walkers who seemed to be able to communicate without forcing anyone over 50 metres away to have to listen. As we climbed over the ridge, towards the forest, I looked back to see some of them wild-swimming. It looked rather idyllic in the sunshine.  

The views were put on hold as we descended through the wood, now surrounded only by bird-song, the insistent calls of Goldcrests being most prominent. On emerging from the trees I decided on a route change: rather than turning east on the track, back to the road, as planned, we’d head directly downhill. This would take us over open fell down to the floodplain at Barrow. We’d then need to cross the River Coquet, by what was hopefully a ford, to gain the footpath to Alwinton.

Floods & Fiddling

In hindsight this may have been a mistake but, if I’d stuck to the original plan, I think the problem might only have been postponed. When we reached the floodplain at Barrow it quickly became obvious that recent heavy rain had flooded the fords. Crossing the Barrow Burn, and possibly the River Coquet, was no longer an option.

We persisted to cross the fast-flowing burn via one of those suspended fences that appear to be designed to trap debris. I wouldn’t advise it and probably wouldn’t have used it if it wasn’t as sturdy and well fixed as it was but priorities at the time seemed to insist otherwise. Apart from the impact of the flooding, the problem stemmed from the fact that I couldn’t trace the course of the burn easily on the map, due to the detail. It ran along the base of a steep, wooded slope, adjacent to fence and contour lines. I wasn’t even sure which watercourse it was — the Barrow or the Coquet.

It only resolved itself when we eventually came across the Coquet — exactly where it was supposed to be — after we’d crossed the burn. Alas, it too proved to be uncrossable. So we retraced our steps via the same sketchy method and hiked over the fell, above the wood, losing a fair bit of time in the process.

Alwinton

Finally, back on the road, we were able to cross both the River Coquet and River Alwin as easily as I’d imagined it would have been, by means of the respective road bridges. Only minutes afterwards we were sitting in the pub in Alwinton where we spent the best part of an hour.

Problems encountered thus far hadn’t dissuaded Diane from her routine of foraging and we were loaded down with a substantial haul of mushrooms. Amongst them were many tasty “ceps” in which the landlady, who was a chef, took great interest. So, while Diane discussed all things funghi, I absorbed myself in the map.

By now it was around 4 pm. It had taken us about three-and-a-half hours to cover not that many more miles. I decided to curtail the planned route, opting to continue on an ancient but still popular trail known as Clennell Street. This would allow us to visit the site of an Iron-Age hillfort at Castle Hills, overlooking Alwinton.

We’d then make a short loop, descending to the village of Clennell, of which the focal point is Clennell Hall. The hall (now a hotel) dates to the c13th. It was a defensive “pele tower” during the times of the Border Reivers before its subsequent grandiose expansion. A surfaced lane would return us to the Harbottle-Alwinton road which we’d use to speed progress back to Harbottle, hopefully with time to take a look at the castle.

Castle Hills & Clennell Hall

The moderate effort it takes to reach the Castle Hills hillfort site is well worth it, though it’s not nearly as hard as others in the Cheviots. In fairness, any ascent straight out of a pub is probably going to feel harder than it should. With the afternoon light heading rapidly towards the “Golden Hour” it was indeed a fine place to be at that time.

From now on the going would be fairly easy, though with rather too much road in the latter part for my liking. Leaving behind the ghosts of civilizations past, we descended past secluded Clennell Street Cottage, on a long, grassy slope down to the village itself. Here, the River Alwin flows briefly out of Kidland Forest, past the hall, heading to its confluence with the River Coquet. On the map, I’ve shown the longer, more obvious route into the village as the one we took was interfered with by several wind-fallen trees. 

Harbottle Castle

Once we were back on the road the final couple of miles to the car passed quickly. On arrival we dropped off the dead-weight of mushrooms and continued uphill to the castle. Only now was the glorious evening sunshine occasionally being blocked by a couple of ominously large rain clouds. These were the first we’d seen all day, despite the forecast.

The castle is of significant historical importance, built on a precipitous motte and just enough structure to give a sense of its original presence. Constructed by royal command of Henry II, it was built to defend the southern (English) end of Clennell Street from the Scots by whom it was captured briefly in 1174.

The original lords of the manor were the Umfravilles, an important Anglo-Scottish family until sometime around the c15th. After that, it became associated with a who’s who of important names in the late-medieval period of the Border Reivers: Careys, Dacres and Musgraves.

Its austere walls and formidable position provided a haven for Henry VIII’s sister Margaret Tudor when her husband James IV of Scotland was killed by the English at the Battle of Flodden in 1513. It was during Henry’s reign that the castle’s defences were improved to include the addition of gun-loops, one of which can still be seen.

As interesting as the castle was, with rain beginning to threaten, we decided to make our way back down to the car. On the way, Diane disappeared under the trees by the moat to make a final collection of “Jelly Ear” mushrooms which, surprisingly, weren’t growing on rotting Elder branches — where you typically find them. I have no idea how she does it.

Just as we closed the gate into the car-park, the first and only shower of the day began. It amounted to little however and had no influence on the haste with which we shed boots and packs. By the time we finally waved goodbye to the Drake Stone (around 6 pm) the only evidence of the minuscule amount of wet weather we’d experienced was a rather attractive rainbow hanging romantically over the castle.

Finally…

The route shown, for which I’ve published the GPX file, is NOT the one we walked. That worked out to be around 8.5 miles and given the problems caused by the flooding, should be treated with caution regarding its viability. Heat maps show the way-marked footpath as being used but the only crossings are vulnerable fords where you could possibly get wet feet even when watercourses are low. the The route shown should be problem-free however and makes for a compact day out, strenuous in places but with lovely views and lots of features.