Amy Louise

Happy Sunday, hope you’re all well

January for me felt like the longest month on the planet, even longer than before the pandemic. I was super pleased to see the back of it BUT I did love being able to get out and go for a few daily walks, either by myself or with my mam (sometimes my dad too). Exercise is very important even if its just as simple as heading out all wrapped up warm for a walk. With the UK still being in a national lockdown and travel being only for essential journeys, I’ve loved exploring my city. If you’re not aware I’m from Sunderland in the North East of England not far from Newcastle upon tyne. Many people think the north stops at Leeds or Manchester but not it doesn’t. My little city is only a little over an hour away from York and Edinburgh and I adore that as I love day trips there. I actually can’t wait to be able to visit again once the pandemic is over! There up there on my little travel list!. So here’s a few of my local walks within 5miles of my house.

My town centre

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The town centre is for me about a 25 to 30 minute walk which is perfect for me. You can get the bus or the metro (train service) but I if I can tend to walk. Whilst there’s not much there , there is quite a few developments going on. There’s some nice bars and restaurants, a shopping centre, a football stadium and other sports facilities, the empire theatre, the museum and winter gardens, a centre park, a few churches a cinema, a bowling alley as well as the university library, campus and a college campus. It also has a few central hotels as well, thrown in there and a bus and rail terminal. I actually really enjoyed having a little wander when there was no-one around. Although I do miss work as I work in retail and can’t WAIT to hopefully have my routine back and have a purpose for leaving the house other than to go on daily walks.

Roker Beach

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As Sunderland is on the coast we have a few beaches. This is one which is Ryhope beach isn’t as popular as often gets forgotten about in my opinion. I think mainly because as you can see its not your usual sandy beach. When we went we literally had it to ourselves apart from a few dog walkers, but it was COLD. Our beaches run up the north east coast so this one here rolls onto Hendon beach, onto Roker and Seaburn beaches. If you continue along (road wise) you will end up in Northumberland. I love being by the beach I just instantly feel calm. Whilst I adore the beach and being by the sea I’m not a great lover of sand, even when I’m on holiday abroad, I just feel it gets EVERYWHERE for days on end!.

River Wear

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This is one of my favourite walks to do as I love looking out at the views!. The Northern Spire bridge was built only 3 years ago this year!. It pretty much just connects to retail parks and a huge sainsburys supermarket but it is in talks to develop the river banks in the future. The spire isn’t far from another bridge and from that one this is the view you get. One side of the bridge looks out over the shipyards where they used to make ships in Sunderland and the Spire bridge, and the other looks onto the Stadium of light football ground and wearmouth bridge. I love doing this walk as I’m out for around an hour in total going over one bridge walking along the river and over the other one.

Local parks

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Like the beaches we have quite a few parks in Sunderland and I absolutely love that. These photos were taken at Barnes park which is a local one within walking distance, other at Doxford park which is about a 10 to 15 minute drive away. Herrington park is again about a 10 minute drive. That country park is opposite Penshaw Monument and it’s recently been a park that has been busy but easy to socially distance and very able to find little quite spots as it’s quite big!. I love seeing the seasons change and having a good walk around when it’s not raining of course. Whilst sometimes these parks don’t inspire me and I sometimes find it hard taking photos there as I have so many over the years its good just to get a half an hours exercise in taking in the fresh air.

Silksworth Lakes

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I’ve lived in this city all my life and I never knew these lakes existed! Thank you lockdown for making me explore my city more haha. There are two big lakes which backs onto housing estates and onto silksworth ski slopes. They have fishing torments here as well and it was such a peace yet muddy walk. I’m so pleased to of came across them and will definitely be back visiting again at some point in the future.

These were my January local lockdown walks and I’m pleased that it’s making my explore my city more as it really is a lovely little place despite what people say about it haha. I did set myself a little February challenge of going for a walk a day but they weather up north has just been like most places in the UK terrible! Here’s hoping the weather picks up soon, I am dreaming of blue skies and warmer days haha. Hopefully we will come out of lockdown soon but for now my hometown is my playground!.

Have you discovered any new places where you live?

Thank you for reading xxx

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