Northumberland Beach Huts, Harbourside Shopping and Spurelli Ice Cream; A Day Trip to Amble

Despite having lived in the North East for 4 years now, my list of places to visit is still pretty long. It seems when it comes to ticking off the "to do" list we're pretty laid back, it's certainly not getting any smaller. So when we saw that the North East was due an unexpected weekend of hot weather we decided to make the most of it and plan a day trip to Amble on the Northumberland coast, somewhere that we'd never been before.

We have passed signs to Amble so many times when adventuring up the Northumberland coast, quite often I'll point at them and tell Simon that we "really must visit one day" and then it's forgotten about until the next time. A few people had said to us that there wasn't a lot to do in Amble, but anywhere with a harbour immediately has me curious so we decided to go and check it out for ourselves.

We found a small free car park just under a miles walk from the centre of Amble which was more than OK with us as the weather was beautiful. We strolled along the sand dunes happily people watching - with so many dog walkers and families out and about there were plenty of people to stop and chat to along the way and the views were beautiful.

In no time at all we'd found the Amble beach huts. The eight colourful huts have only recently arrived in Amble and are some of only a few in Northumberland. Sitting pretty in the most beautiful shades of green, yellow and pink they have adorable names like Pier View and Seashell. I was in my element skipping around them with my camera. I guess when you're wearing a dress as colourful as beach huts it's only right yes?

Amble have some of the loveliest beach huts I've ever seen and I'd love to hire one some day soon. Available for only £20.00 for the day, they'd make such a great treat for a family day at the beach. If you fancy hiring one yourself you can hire a beach hut here.

A short stroll from the beach huts and we found ourselves at Amble harbour - a huge stretch of water lined with fishing boats and heaving with people all enjoying the Summer's sunshine. It was around this time that I began to get a little giddy at how much I was loving life. Nothing beats a walk out in the sun on a Saturday and discovering somewhere new in Northumberland to explore is my favourite thing to do!

My favourite part of Amble had to be Amble Harbour Village, a collection of independent shops housed in picture perfect wooden pods. The 15 stores sell a huge range of locally inspired gifts, crafts, food and drink. Decked out in bunting and with the cutest trinkets on sale I found myself wanting to spend all of my money within moments of arriving.

The real reason for our visit to Amble was to finally tick Spurreli Ice Cream Parlour off our foodie list. I've made it my mission this Summer to try all of the best ice creams the North East has to offer and so many people have told me that Amble's offering is one of the very best. I went for a delicious Cherry cone which proceeded to melt all over my hand as soon as I stepped outside of the shop the weather was that hot.  Luckily Spurelli has a handy outdoor seating area right next to the Parlour so we quickly found ourselves some seats to prevent any further ice cream spillage.

I am so happy that we finally decided to stop and explore the cute little harbour town as it turns out Amble is a fantastic place to mooch about and had so much more to see that I ever expected - we left wanting more and I can't wait to go back and try some of the fish and chips (it was so hard to resist getting some when everyone we walked past seemed to have a tray of something delicious)

Sometimes it pays to stop and explore somewhere new, you never know what you might find!  Let me know your favourite discoveries in the North East, we'd love to plan our next adventure.

Apologies that some of these photos are a little blurry, it could perhaps be because it was such a hot day my camera was sweating but in reality I'm guessing I probably put my sticky fingers on the lens - such a professional!