We learn more about Jesmond Dene and find out why people visit

National World - LocalTV

Jesmond Dene is very popular with people across the north east as a place to go walking or just for something to do. It is highly rated as one of the best things to do in Newcastle. So we visited Jesmond Dene to learn a little bit more about its history and to find out why it is so popular.

Transcript

00:00 Jesmond Dane is such a popular place with the people of Newcastle. A long time

00:04 ago it was home to a huge amount of wildlife including beavers and even

00:08 bears and wild boars. In the 1850s William Armstrong bought a lot of the

00:13 land and transformed it into the park we have today. He transformed a lot of the

00:17 waterways creating the iconic waterfall and many bridges so people could admire

00:22 it. So there is a lot of history going along Jesmond Dane including a royal

00:26 opening. So all of the royal family came the Royal train stopped in Newcastle the

00:33 family then went up to Rothbury and they were welcomed by the Armstrong's got

00:39 into their carriage spent the night the next day they came down again to Newcastle

00:45 Central and from that point on they process through the town up Heaton Road

00:49 through Heaton Park main gates all the way through to Armstrong Bridge across

00:57 the top road Jesmond Dane Road to Banqueting Hall opened the park and the

01:03 king was given a key apparently. Princess Alexandra planted a turkey oak in the

01:09 garden she was given a silver spade and one of the friends of Jesmond Dane

01:14 called Don Maguire many years ago wanted to get the spade back and he wrote to

01:20 the palace and he did actually get it back for Newcastle and it's in the

01:25 laying art gallery now. The key though they couldn't find and they assumed that

01:30 King Prince Edward at the time later King Edward must have liked it and kept

01:36 it as a personal possession. So that's quite a nice story isn't it and on the

01:40 same day they went to open the Newcastle Library and the Hancock Museum which was

01:46 called the Natural History Museum they had a fantastic lunch with we can see

01:52 the menu there was several courses so it was a really grand occasion and people

01:58 were totally thronging the streets. Jesmond Dane has changed a lot now with

02:03 an accessible walking path along the water as well as Pets Corner but why do

02:07 people come to Jesmond Dane? So people come because their parents have been

02:12 when they were children their grandparents come their great

02:16 grandparents as I was saying in my case there's several generations of being

02:20 here and I think it just becomes part of you so you think oh right where am I

02:27 going to go today let's go to Jesmond Dane. Animals to look at, birds if you

02:34 want a bird watch lots of people you'll see with cameras set up looking for

02:39 birds. Occasionally you can hear woodpeckers which is great you can hear

02:44 owls we've got everything you could want and that's why people come and it is a

02:51 nice safe place. It's an open park so we don't have any gates. When Armstrong first

02:58 gave it to the city there were about five or six lodges most of them are gone

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