Northumberland Wins National Park of the Year Award

Northumberland National Park has won the prestigious accolade of National Park of The Year in the BBC Countryfile Magazine Awards 2015/16.

Northumberland National Park’s win follows its nomination by BBC presenter Ellie Harrison. Ellie’s nomination highlighted the National Park’s “meadows, moorland, peat bogs and ancient woodlands” and its “vivid history, solitude, dark skies and superb wildlife such as stoats, black grouse and red squirrels.”

Last year 1.69 million people visited the park and surrounding areas. The most popular reasons for visiting were a long walk (48%), and a short walk (45%). Next is eating out (27%), visiting a historic site (26%), visiting an attraction (21%), photography (15%), car touring (8%), and cycling/mountain biking (7%).

With fewer than 2,000 inhabitants, Northumberland National Park is the most sparsely populated UK National Park at 0.02 people per hectare. Open access land accounts for 72% of the Park and there are 1,140km of public rights of way, and a further 90km of permissive routes.

Our cottages in Bamburgh are the perfect b

ase to explore Northumberland National Park.