Easy hikes and walks around Wylam

George Stephenson's birthplace is a simple stone worker's cottage on the north bank of the River Tyne in Wylam, built circa 1760 to house mining families, and where the future railway pioneer was born in 1781. A Grade II* listed building owned by the National Trust, it is now a historic house museum with original furnishings and displays about Stephenson's childhood and early locomotives, and is opened to visitors by costume guides who wish to experience the living conditions of a Georgian mining family.

Please note it closes at 1600

To understand why this rather modest-looking house remains an attractive destination for visitors to Wylam to this day, we must go back several centuries in history. To be precise, to June 9, 1781. On that day, a baby named George Stephenson was born here – of course, no one at the time could have imagined that this man would later become an engineer and a famous railway pioneer beyond the borders of the British Isles. A picture of his famous locomotive, the "Rocket," can be found at the following link on Wikipedia =>> https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Stephenson#/media/Datei:Stephenson's_Rocket.jpg

good for a look around

Its the coffee TREE Cafe a good stop off if your heading back into Newcastle along the river. Home made cakes good coffee.

The Wylam Waggonway was built in 1748 by John Blackett to carry coal from the Wylam Colliery over a five-mile (approximately eight-kilometre) route to the staithes at Lemington on the River Tyne. Initially using wooden rails and oxen for traction, it was fitted with iron plate rails in 1808 and from 1813 housed the first commercial steam locomotives Puffing Billy and Wylam Dilly. It fell into disuse after the colliery closed around 1868, became part of the Scotswood, Newburn & Wylam Railway in 1875 and now serves largely as a walking and cycle path within the Tyne Riverside Country Park.

In the forecourt stands the Great War Memorial, unveiled in 1923 to commemorate local residents who died in the First World War. The memorial, an ornamental Latin cross of Windy Nook stone on an octagonal plinth with bronze plaques, stands on War Memorial Green near Wylam Bridge. It was later supplemented for the Second World War and has been a Grade II listed building since 2017 for its historical and architectural value.

The Hagg Bank Bridge, also known as the Points Bridge or Half-Moon Bridge, is a Grade II* listed pedestrian bridge spanning the River Tyne at Wylam. It was originally built in 1876 as a railway bridge for the Scotswood, Newburn & Wylam Railway. W.G. Laws's design incorporated a 73-metre single rib arch with no piers in the river, an innovation at the time and likely inspiration for later bridges such as the Tyne Bridge and Sydney Harbour Bridge. Following the closure of the railway line in 1968, the bridge was reopened in 1975 as a walkway and cycle path linking Wylam with the Tyne Riverside Country Park.