Britains

A BELOVED lido, boasting elephant slides and splash pads, is set to reopen this Bank Holiday weekend.

This beloved outdoor pool is the last riverside tidal lido in Britain.

The Strand Lido Pool in Gillingham, Medway, will welcome back visitors this Saturday.

Listed as the UK’s only riverside salt water pool, this Kent-based lido uses cleaned river water that is safe for public swimming.

Opened back in 1896, Medway’s only lido has been inviting families to swim for over 130 years.

This Victorian-era lido includes a host of swimming facilities for all ages, including an outdoor leisure pool and toddler paddling pool.

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Children will love the elephant slides into the paddling pool, and cruising along the 300-metre lazy river.

For more advanced swimmers, there is also a central swimming zone, fitted with six 25-metre lengths to get some exercise this summer.

In 2025, The Strand introduced a free-to-use splash pad designed for children aged three to 11.

The splash pad features 30 sensor-activated waterjets in a beach-themed play area, opening at the same time as the lido with no booking required.

Strand visitors can also enjoy refreshments from the cafe, a mini train ride, crazy golf, tennis, a children’s play area and more.

Around the lido, visitors can buy pool inflatables, enjoy a break at the pool-side cafe, and lounge on the seating and sunbeds provided.

To enjoy all this summer fun, entry to The Strand Lido costs £8.15 for adults, and £5.35 for children, with under threes going free.

The pool will be operating on weekends from May 23 with two bookable sessions between 10.30am to 1.30pm, and 2.30pm to 5.30pm.

It will then be open for seven days a week during the school summer holidays – starting from Tuesday, July 21.

Susanna Reid was joined by Richard Madeley during the latest edition of Good Morning Britain

Good Morning Britain star Susanna Reid will be taking a short break from the programme.

Susanna returned to the ITV studio on Thursday (May 21), alongside Richard Madeley, to deliver the day’s biggest headlines from across the UK and around the world.

At the end of the show, Susanna and Richard interviewed a woman who had saved up to £800 a month as part of a new ITV programme called Rising Bills: How Can You Save Money?.

Wrapping up the interview, Susanna said: “I love it. Thank you both for coming in. You can catch Rising Bills: How Can You Save Money? tonight [at] 7.30pm on ITV1 and ITVX.”

The 55-year-old presenter then confirmed that she wouldn’t be on screen next week, which happens to be the May half term.

“Now, I am off next week, but Good Morning Britain is back tomorrow from 6am. Now, it’s time to join Lorraine. Have a great day,” she said.

It’s not yet known which presenter will stand in for Susanna while she’s away, but it usually tends to be either Kate Garraway, Ranvir Singh, or Charlotte Hawkins. Susanna’s announcement comes over a month after her last break from the show, which took place during the Easter holidays.

Elsewhere during today’s GMB, Susanna and Richard discussed the topical headlines with regular commentators Kwasi Kwarteng and Nels Abbey.

Ranvir also announced breaking news after EasyJet confirmed that summer flight bookings are lower than this time last year due to uncertainty linked to the Middle East conflict.

“However, last minute bookings made in the month that you want to travel have increased compared with a year ago,” Ranvir said.

“The airline also reported a pretax loss of £552 million for the six months ending in March.”

Susanna and Richard also interviewed Race Across the World stars Mark Blythen and Margo Oakley, who are competing in tonight’s grand final.

After racing over 11,000km, the final four teams will face one final test of endurance as they embark on the last leg of their journey. To finish the race, the teams must head north from Kharkhorin to reach the shores of the “Blue Pearl of Mongolia”, Lake Khövsgöl.

As they leave the checkpoint, they will face a crucial decision. They could head directly north, a shorter route but one which requires them to go off-road, or add 500km to their journey with a detour via the capital, Ulaanbaatar. Who will reach the finish line first? We’ll have to wait and see.

Good Morning Britain airs weekdays on ITV1 and ITVX at 6am

THE UK’s largest dinosaur themed adventure park is set to open its longest ride yet – and it’s just in time for summer.

Families will be able to enjoy the new attraction from July onwards.

ROARR! theme park in Norfolk has revealed a new 105-metre long attraction, dubbed the site’s “longest ride to date.” 

The Fossil Falls experience will allow visitors to soar down a winding slope, set inside the park’s 85 acres of natural woodland.

The course also features a launch platform, brake ramp and 12-metre tunnel, which riders will be able to glide down inside of an inflatable ring.

The £250,000 investment marks the latest addition to the adventure park’s 25 other attractions.

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Other rides include the Swing-o-saurus and Dippy’s Raceway, with an off-peak day pass priced at around £60 for a family of four.

Ben Francis, park director at ROARR!, told Eastern Daily Press: “Fossil Falls is a fantastic new addition to ROARR! and one we’re really excited to open this summer.

“At 105 metres, it’s our longest ride to date, and we think it’s going to be a real highlight for families visiting the park.

“We’re always looking at ways to invest in and improve the ROARR! experience for our visitors, and Fossil Falls is a brilliant example of that – adding real value for the families who choose to spend their day making memories with us.”

The Dino adventure park is located in just off the A47 and A1067 near Lenwade, and can be reached in just 25 minutes from Norwich by car.

It also holds a variety of activities suitable for children aged zero to 12 years old.

The park will be open from 10am to 5pm, seven days a week, in July and August.

How often do you look down and wonder who created the path your feet are following? Or ask the cause of its curves and dips? Formed over thousands of years, paths form an “internet of feet” – a web of bridleways and hollow ways, drove roads and ridgeways, coffin tracks, pilgrimage trails and city pavements. Whether you’re hiking a National Trail or pottering along a National Trust footpath, there’s a good chance you’re following ancestral steps.

It’s thoughts like these that led me on a journey to track the evolution of British paths for my book, The Path More Travelled. Eleven thousand years ago ice age hunter-gatherers arrived from Europe’s heartlands, moving through the wilderness along broad “routeways”, that later widened to tracks when horses and then wheels were adopted in the bronze age. For more than 2,000 years, traffic moved no faster than the speed of a horse, until the internal combustion engine drove pedestrians off the road just over a century ago.

In search of the capillaries that gave life to every community in Britain, I revisited coast paths, tramped shepherds’ trails and followed the serpentine curls of rivers. Here are a few of my favourite paths that bring history to life.

Sweet Track, Somerset Levels

The hunt for prehistoric paths took me deep into the wetlands of the Somerset Levels, where the Sweet Track was discovered in 1970. Built nearly 6,000 years ago (3806BC) by early farmers who needed access to an island, the collapsed boardwalk was preserved in peat. But a short walk from the Avalon Marshes centre (with an excellent cafe and open-air museum), woodland paths explore Shapwick Heath nature reserve, where a replica section of the Sweet Track teeters through the reeds. Visitors can walk in single file along this narrow, timber causeway and imagine the world of the Neolithic pioneers who colonised Somerset’s reflective waterways long before they were drained and converted to farmland. For modern versions of the Sweet Track, visit the Norfolk Broads and Norfolk coast path, where stilted, planked boardwalks wend their way through reedbeds, salt marshes and swamp woodland known locally as alder carr.

Street of the Dead, Iona

Writing this book led me to the far west of Scotland and the tiny island of Iona, where, after decades of tramping Britain’s paths, I walked for the first time along Sràid nam Marbh, the Street of the Dead. Across Britain, coffin roads, or corpse ways, were used by remote communities to convey their dead to cemeteries. Iona’s is no more than a few hundred metres in length, and most of it takes the form of a narrow, kinking lane leading from the ancient landing beach of Port nam Mairtear (Martyr’s Bay) to the site of a monastery founded in 563. Along this ancient road came the bodies of great Gaelic lords, bound for burial close to the monastery. For many, it’s a “thin place”, where the space between this world and the next narrows. You pass the ruins of an Augustinian nunnery established in around 1200, and the MacLean’s Cross, whose intricately carved floral and animal motifs and outstretched Christ captivated pilgrims. Then the abbey appears and the Street of the Dead, angling across the grass, the final section a short avenue of red granite slabs, sunken by the weight of time into the turf of the abbey precinct. There are very few roads in Britain where you can place your feet on to slabs that have been trodden by so many generations.

Bure Valley Path, Norfolk

One of my favourite walks traces the banks of the River Bure between the market town of Aylsham and the railway village of Hoveton. It’s a typical, gentle Norfolk valley of slow meanders, cascading willows, kingfishers and herons. It was like this 100 years ago, when huge timber sailing barges, wherries, used to glide silently upriver to Aylsham’s mills. Close to the river ran a steam railway line linking Hoveton and Aylsham. Today, the nine-mile Bure Valley Path is a shared walking and cycling route that follows the course of the old railway, now relaid as a narrow-gauge steam line, the Bure Valley Railway. Cycling the path is fun, but a superb walk awaits those who take the steam train from Hoveton to Aylsham then walk back towards Hoveton on the Bure Valley Path for about two miles, where a footpath on the left drops down to the waterside church of St Mary’s in Burgh-next-Aylsham. From here, riverside footpaths head downstream past white-painted watermills and old navigation locks while occasional steam locomotives contribute to the sylvan backdrop. At Coltishall, you can rehydrate at The Rising Sun, stroll along Anchor Street where wherries were built, and then return to the Bure Valley Path for the final two miles back to Hoveton. I know of no other walk so closely related to the eras of wind and steam.

The Ridgeway, Hertfordshire to Wiltshire

The Ridgeway runs for 87 miles from Ivinghoe Beacon high in the Chiltern Hills to the prehistoric stone circle at Avebury in deepest Wiltshire. On its rolling heights, you can walk back to the iron age, when formidable hill forts commanded the vales. The ghosts of warrior-farmers can be sensed most powerfully on the western end of the Ridgeway, where the chalky trail climbs past the ramparts of Uffington, whose banks and ditches – once braced with timber and chalk rubble – enclose an area twice the size of a football pitch. Right beside the fort, a 110-metre long white horse gallops across the down, cut deep into the turf during the late bronze age or early iron age. One mile to the west, the Ridgeway passes the chambered long barrow known as Wayland’s Smithy, which once contained the remains of 14 people dated to between 3590 and 3550BC. The Ridgeway’s knack of time travel has long appealed to writers and photographers, from Thomas Hardy and Richard Jefferies, to Richard Mabey and Fay Godwin, whose book The Oldest Road: The Ridgeway (1975), unravelled the path connecting deep history with a modern national trail.

Holloways, Surrey Hills

A holloway is a sunken path, an old way worn into the land by centuries of feet and hooves. Holloway walls can be almost vertical, cut back to raw rock and roots. Some are like ravines. Others are virtual tunnels, roofed with living trees. Some appear unexpectedly as gentle troughs in the landscape. They occur most dramatically in softer geologies like chalk, sandstone and greensand. Most are just a few minutes’ walk in length, but there are parts of the country where exploration will produce some very enjoyable clusters. There are three modest holloways right beside the White Horse of Uffington on the Ridgeway, cut perhaps in prehistoric times by cattle being moved from their winter quarters in the vale to the summer grasses of the high downs. In Holloway (2012), Robert Macfarlane wrote so poetically of a buried path in the Chideock valley of south Dorset that it’s become a cause of pilgrimage for those of us who look for these places. The Surrey Hills are laced with secretive holloways. Among my favourites are the sunken tracks on the greensand of Leith Hill and farther west, the old holloways of Hascombe Hill and Hydon’s Ball. It’s along these semi-subterranean trackways that you’re most likely to detect the steady plod of Saxon cattle. Or Hobbits.

The Mass Trespass Walk, Derbyshire

The story of countryside access is written in the grit of Kinder Scout, whose frowning sandstone forms the highest point in the Peak District. In April, 1932, an excited gaggle of hikers climbed the footpath from the Derbyshire village of Hayfield up towards the brow of Kinder Scout, where they clashed with squads of gamekeepers intent on preventing public access to the moorland. Legislation followed and today the path up William Clough is described on the National Trust website as the Kinder Scout Mass Trespass Walk. A vigorous eight-mile loop along the crags and back down to Hayfield, it offers the full Pennine repertoire in a single outing, from glittering reservoir to whispering moorland and monumental rocks. It includes Kinder Downfall cascade and a section of the Pennine Way, the earliest of Britain’s national trails. I walked the trail one blustery December day, ambushed by snow flurries and sunshine that spotlit Manchester like spilt crystals on the dark plain. I’ve climbed Kinder from many directions, but this is the route that tells the best story.

Nicholas Crane’s new book, The Path More Travelled, The Secret History of Britain’s Footpaths, is published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson (£25). To support the Guardian, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.

From castles and coastlines to moorland views, we drove the Northumberland 250 in an electric car to see how easy it was to manage the rural route

‘We’re driving the Northumberland 250,’ I told my husband. He looked at me cautiously.

‘It’s the most spectacular route in England, past more than 20 castles, up the Northumberland coast and over the Lindisfarne causeway – which you can only drive at low tide. Then it nips over to Scotland, to a town where Mary Queen of Scots stayed, and back down through England’s biggest forest and the UK Dark Sky Reserve, and along Hadrian’s Wall.’

‘That does actually sound brilliant,’ he said.

‘We’re doing it in an electric car so we can see how easy it is.’

‘Oh no,’ he said.

With petrol prices rocketing, a road trip feels like a luxury too far at the moment, and I liked the environmental appeal of not bringing our exhaust fumes all the way north with us. But we don’t actually have an electric car so – confident that we would find enough charging points – we borrowed one.

Our Škoda Enyaq was a nippy SUV, that made short work of brine-soaked causeways, forest track off-roading and 20% hills, even with junctions at the top (oh, hill starts with an electric engine – where have you been all my life?). It promised as much as 300 miles on a full charge but, bearing in mind that most road trips end up at at least double the loop mileage, we plotted two charging points every day, and kept our fingers crossed that they would a) be working, and b) not have petrol cars parked in them.

Electric car charging on a UK road trip: what to expect

Charging electric cars is still a bit of a lottery – slightly different at every machine. You never rock up at a petrol station forecourt and wonder, ‘how does this pump work, then?’ – but you do with chargers. Most have an app you have to download to use them, so there are moments standing in the rain trying to get signal. A saving grace is other electric car users who are amazingly helpful. Less helpful are petrol drivers who park on the charging spaces.

Charging anxiety got me once, as I poured over the map on our way to Jedburgh, where only one charger showed as working, and nothing else was reachable, but it turned out fine – it was a fast charger so we only had to wait 15 minutes for the previous car to top up before we could.

The Northumberland 250 route: castles, coast and countryside

Northumberland has so many castles. One could get castle-fatigue if they weren’t so incredibly impressive. Bamburgh makes a play for Most Spectacular Castle Anywhere. Alnwick is where Harry Potter learns to fly his Nimbus 2000. Lindisfarne is so remote it becomes an island twice a day. Most deserve at least half a day to do them (and their entrance fee) justice, so my advice is pick one or two and see the rest in passing.

Dunstanburgh was my favourite – a mighty, atmospheric ruin we saw on a sunset walk from the fishing village of Craster. It felt like going back in time – there wasn’t another soul about. But I also loved smaller, free-to-visit places like Edlingham and Twizzel. In Alnwick we skipped the castle in favour of super-sized cherry scones at the Strawberry Lounge café and at Bamburgh we marvelled at the fortress from the beach, but visited The Potted Lobster for lunch instead (one of my best decisions: the Smoked Haddock Chowder).

Holy Island (Lindisfarne) took a little planning around tide times and we arrived in a rainstorm (a rare letdown in a sunny trip). Too wet to even leave the car, we returned the next day to see it in sunshine – the causeway was worth driving four times.

Leaving the coast at Berwick-upon-Tweed I worried the best was behind us, but the drive only got more beautiful. We skipped back and forth over the Scottish border, and headed through Kielder Forest along the 12-mile off-road track, Forest Drive, then down to the wide horizons of the North Pennines.

Where to stay on the Northumberland 250: hotels, lodges and pubs

Picking our pitstops was one of the highlights of the trip. I favoured places with EV charging, but in the end, we only plugged-in for one overnight, fast-charging instead in towns where we lunched. There is a charger on Holy Island, for instance, and one at Kielder Castle – remoteness is no obstacle. I loved the pace this brought to the trip, forcing stops in places we’d normally have driven straight through. It meant we discovered little gems, like Fountain Cottage Café in Bellingham.

We stayed in the lakeside lodge at Blossom Plantation (no EV charging), and drank cava in the hot tub under the stars. The Most Northerly Hotel in England, Marshall Meadows just beyond Berwick, is a ritzy venue and country house hotel. The Pheasant Inn at Kielder Water is everything you could want from a cosy fireside pub, family run with home cooking by Robin, favouring local ingredients – some from their own garden.

I finished the trip with three revelatory resolutions. One, that Northumberland was an epic holiday destination, offering far more than you can pack into five days. Two, that driving the route in an electric car is not only possible, but adds something unexpected – a more thoughtful way to travel. And three, that my next car will be electric.

The Northumberland 250 Itinerary: 5-day trip breakdown

Day 1

Newcastle to Dunstanburgh, via Alnwick, Warksworth and Craster

Highlights and stops: Edlingham Castle (free), Alnwick town for cream tea at The Strawberry Louge, Warkworth Castle, Alnmouth village and beach, Caster village and walk to Dunstanburgh Castle.

Overnight: Zambezi Lodge at Blossom Plantation, near Fallodon

Day 2

Dunstanburgh to Berwick-up-Tweed, via Bamburgh and Lindisfarne

Highlights and stops: Holy Island causeway / Lindisfarne (first thing, due to tide times), Bamburgh Castle, beach and lighthouse, lunch at The Potted Lobster. Berwick-up-Tweed for fish and chips.

Overnight: Marshall Meadows Manor House Hotel, Scottish Border

Day 3

Berwick to Kielder Water, via Twizel, Jedburgh and the Kielder Forest Drive (with a quick return visit to Lindisfarne first thing)

Highlights and stops: Norham Castle, Kirk O’Steil church, Twizel Caslte and river walk to Twizel Viaduct, Jedburgh town, Hindhope Linn waterfall, Kielder Forest Drive

Overnight: The Pheasant Inn, Kielder

Day 4

Kielder to Blanchland, via Hadrian’s Wall and Allenheads

Highlights and stops: Kielder Water and Northumberland National Park, Hadrian’s Wall, Sycamore Gap Tree Memorial, North Pennines National Landscape

Overnight: The Lord Crewe Arms, Blanchland

Day 5

Blanchland to Newcastle, to get the train home

Highlights and stops: Hexham (with its Abbey) Corbridge town, Prudhoe Castle

We drove the route – a total of 530 miles including all our detours and extras – in a fully electric Škoda Enyaq

Westlife have paid tribute to Simon Cowell during an appearance on Britain’s Got Talent, with Shane Filan, Nicky Bryne and Kian Egan all taking to the stage without bandmate Mark Feehily

Westlife have paid tribute to Simon Cowell during an appearance on Britain’s Got Talent.

The band – which features Shane Filan, Nicky Bryne and Kian Egan – performed their biggest hits ahead of their 25th anniversary tour. However, they were without bandmate Mark Feehily, who will also not appear on the tour.

There was no specific mention of Mark, but the trio paid a heartfelt tribute to judge Simon, who was instrumental in their success.

“It’s been a long time since Simon Cowell suggested standing up from our stools on a key change,” Nicky said. Kian went on to pay tribute to Simon and said they wouldn’t have been there without him.

In June, it was confirmed Mark would be absent from the tour. The band said in a statement: “Sadly, Mark will be unable to join the celebrations. We hope he can join us back on stage when he is ready and able. He sends his love and positivity to you all as always.”

Mark announced he would be taking a break from Westlife just days before first ever tour of America in 2024. At the time, he shared: “Hello and much love to you all! It’s Mark here.. Most of you are aware that I have had some health challenges over the past while.

“It actually all started 3.5 years ago in August 2020 when I had surgery. Within a few days of this surgery I was in severe pain and was rushed into A&E. I eventually ended that awful day in ICU (Intensive Care Unit) where I was informed that due to a complication with the surgery, I had developed severe ‘Sepsis‘, a life-threatening infection that would require immediate emergency surgery to rectify the problem and basically save my life.”

He explained that he was in hospital for months during lockdown, and was later told he needed more surgery.

“It was physically and mentally a very difficult time, not to mention traumatic having to spend so long in ICU. In late 2021, I became very ill in Newcastle before a concert and ended up back in A&E, this time being told I had pneumonia. I was told I had to go straight home to recover and regrettably miss the rest of the concerts that December,” he said.

Speaking about Mark missing their big anniversary tour, Kian told us: “We’re devastated he won’t be joining us on this tour. We’ll be missing him every night just as much as the fans will. But he’s given us his full support. This is the 25th anniversary, it’s something that we all felt needed to be celebrated. We hope as soon as he’s ready he’ll be back with us and we look forward to that moment.”

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May 8 (UPI) — Prime Minister Keir Starmer vowed Friday that he would not stand aside following a disastrous Labour performance in “mid-term” local elections in England, Wales and Scotland.

With early results from 46 of the 136 races in England showing Labour losing hundreds of seats in councils to Reform and the Greens, Starmer said while the situation was “really tough,” he had been handed a mandate to change Britain by the electorate in the general election in 2024 and that he intended to fulfil his promise.

He said he believed the message voters had sent in Thursday’s elections was about the “pace of change, how they want their lives improved.”

“Labour was elected to meet those challenges and I’m not going to walk away from those challenges and plunge the country into chaos. I led our party to that victory, that is a five-year mandate to change the country. It was a five-year term I was elected to do, I intend to see that through.”

Acknowledging his government hadn’t done enough to convince people that things could improve, their lives could be better and that there was hope, he said Labour would “in the coming days” set out steps it would take to win over the electorate.

Repeatedly pressed on whether he would lead Labour into the next election, Starmer would only say that he intended to serve the full five years of his term.

Large numbers of Labour MPs believe that the party will lose if Starmer leads it into the next election but do not want him to quit right now, favoring an orderly, consensual process of finding a successor, as opposed to an all-out leadership battle.

Sky News’ chief political correspondent said a member of Starmer’s “top team,” had messaged her saying that he was “the reason Labour risks handing the country to Reform.”

With counting still underway, or yet to begin, in the vast majority of contests for council and mayoral contests, as well parliamentary races in Scotland and Wales, the opposition Conservative Party were also close to 200 seats adrift.

The Green Party and the Liberal Democrats had each added dozens of seats.

Speaking in the London borough of Havering, which Labour lost overnight to Reform UK, leader Nigel Farage hailed what he said was a “truly historic shift in British politics.”

“The pattern that’s emerging across the country is that Labour are being wiped out by Reform in many of their most traditional areas. And what you’re going to see later on today is the Conservative Party being wiped out in their heartlands like Essex,” he said, noting that the county was the heartland of the leadership of the Conservative opposition.

“We’ve been so used to thinking about politics in terms of left and right, and yet what Reform are able to do is to win in areas that have always been Conservative. But equally, we’re proving in a big way we can win in areas that Labour have dominated, frankly, since the end of World War One.

“At the moment, we’re winning one in three of all the seats that are up. But I genuinely think the best is yet to come. I’m very excited about the north-east results, the Yorkshire results, some more to come in the West Midlands. So it’s a big day,” added Farage.

Forecasts put Reform’s eventual gains when the results are complete at as many as 1,000 seats of the 5,000 up for grabs.

In Scotland, where voters are electing all 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament, the ruling Scottish National Party is hanging by a knife edge amid a 17% swing to Reform.

However, the insurgent party’s rise could inadvertently help deliver First Minister John Swinney‘s 65-seat target, thanks to Reform UK candidates taking votes away from challenger parties, particularly those that oppose Scottish independence.

Swinney has said he would treat an SNP majority as a mandate to mount a second bid to secede from the United Kingdom, following a failed independence referendum in 2014.

Swinney told an election debate between the leaders of the five Scottish political parties plus Reform UK last month that holding a second independence referendum by 2028 was “perfectly conceivable.”

In Wales, where voters are electing a Senedd legislature that has been expanded to 96 seats, the ruling Labour administration was on track to lose power for the first time since devolution in 1999 and ending more than a century of Labour dominance in the country.

Plaid Cymru, the Welsh nationalists, and Reform UK, who were neck and neck in the polls, were expected to be the biggest beneficiaries, projected to emerge with 38 and 35 seats, respectively.

Deputy First Minister Huw Irranca-Davies told the BBC that he didn’t think Labour would be in a position to form the next government, saying the party’s campaign had failed to “cut through” to Welsh voters.

A FAMOUS seaside town is getting a £50million rail link as part of a major upgrade.

Described as the “best service since the steam days”, the change will make it easier for tourists to visit “Britain’s Magaluf”.

New and improved rail services will launch in Newquay on May 17, enhancing travel links for the Cornish coastal town.

Locals have hailed this project as “the best service since the steam days”, making rail transport a genuine option for commuting around the area.

The Mid Cornwall Metro, operated by Great Western Rail, has transformed every aspect of their service.

This comes after they received a £56.8million investment from the government, Cornwall Council and the rail sector.

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Now, an hourly train will run between Newquay and Par, locations which are over 20 miles apart.

The journey will also extend to popular destinations such as St Austell, Truro, Penryn and Falmouth.

A convenient “tap in, tap out” system has been extended to cover the whole of Cornwall, letting passengers use a pay as you go scheme.

Trains will run seven days a week and all year round, with Mid Cornwall Metro hoping to offer 700,000 seats each way for passengers travelling between Newquay and Par.

The improvements have come in multiple forms, such as building new passing loops, replacing metres of tracks and installing new signal boxes.

Back in November, a second platform opened at Newquay station for the first time in 40 years, having shut due to a signal box closure in 1987.

As part of the £50million investment, the station was transformed with a completely rebuilt platform and brand-new track.

Now, commuters will be able to travel all around Cornwall in just over a week’s time.

The cliff face bridge leads to an 800-year-old castle, but some visitors have refused to cross due to the ‘pretty scary’ height.

The UK boasts countless historic marvels, yet getting to one of its most stunning and ancient castles can prove remarkably challenging, with some tourists abandoning their visit the moment they catch sight of the crossing. Tintagel Castle Bridge is a fairly recent addition, constructed in 2019 to provide easier access to the 800-year-old castle sharing its name, which sits dramatically atop a rugged coastal island.

It’s frequently cited as one of Britain’s most nerve-wracking bridges, being lengthy, slender and suspended roughly 200 feet above the cliffs, meaning anyone making the crossing can see the ocean waves pounding against the rocks far beneath. The Cornish coastline is notoriously blustery too, so while the bridge is entirely secure, traversing it during powerful winds can leave visitors feeling rather unsettled.

The bridge also features a small gap at its centre, deliberately designed by architects to symbolise the journey from mainland to island, though peering down at the sheer drop below is enough to make anyone’s legs turn to jelly.

Tintagel Castle is deeply entwined with Arthurian legend, widely believed to be King Arthur’s birthplace, which makes it an exceptionally popular visitor attraction. The castle is additionally connected to the tale of Tristan and Iseult, a heartbreaking medieval love story involving a Cornish knight who falls for an Irish princess.

It’s a spectacular location that has been inhabited since the mid-5th century, though the castle structure itself was erected in the early 1200s by Richard, Earl of Cornwall, King Henry III’s brother.

Yet it remains an extraordinarily isolated location, and accessing it before the bridge’s construction proved challenging, requiring visitors to descend hundreds of twisting steps down a cliff face into a valley before climbing back up onto the island.

Throughout the Middle Ages, a natural land bridge linked the two sections, though it vanished sometime between the 14th and 17th centuries.

The new Tintagel Castle Bridge emerged from an architectural competition and was constructed by William Matthews Associates, who designed it to blend seamlessly into the surrounding landscape.

Building Tintagel Castle Bridge cost more than £4million, but it marked the first time in five centuries that the two stretches of land were reconnected.

On Tripadvisor, numerous visitors have given Tintagel Castle Bridge glowing reviews for its stunning views, though many have cautioned that it can feel quite daunting when you first attempt to cross it.

One visitor wrote: “It’s not for the faint-hearted. Looking at it from a distance, when you can see the drop, it looks long and narrow and pretty scary. However, it feels surprisingly safe when you walk across it.”

Another reviewer said: “It’s a beautiful spot, but if you are scared of heights, then don’t bother. You need to walk alongside a drop into the sea to get to a bridge to get over to the castle itself, and then once there, you are faced with narrow paths, one person width only, with drops to the side. “

Another visitor remarked: “Upon seeing the bridge I realised my fear of heights would prevent me from walking over it, it looked amazing but it is also very exposed with iron bars at each side to give you a fantastic view of the sea and cliffs around/beneath you and a small gap in the middle of the bridge where both sections meet.”

The latest live semi final Golden Buzzer act on Britain’s Got Talent was announced by Alesha Dixon and while viewers were happy with the decision, they still had complaints to share

Britain’s Got Talent viewers weren’t impressed by the studio audience as Alesha Dixon chose an act to go straight to the live final. Week two of the live semi-finals got under way and viewers of the ITV competition let their feelings be known as the judge gifted LMA an automatic route through.

The 66-person dance troop, Sadeck Berrabah & LMA, from the Liverpool Media Academy (LMA) University took to the stage and put on a stunning display that more than matched their impressive audition. After Simon labelled it “gobsmackingly beautiful” and called it the best live performance to date, it was left up to Alesha to have her say.

And she did just that. She said: “Do you remember what I said to you in the auditions. That if I had a golden buzzer, I would have given it to you.”

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She then rose to her feet to smash the buzzer and cause the confetti to rain down on the act, leaving them in tears.

Viewers on Twitter/X were pleased with the call, too. One user wrote: “They definitely deserved the golden buzzer #bgt #britainsgottalent” Another added: “Well deserved golden buzzer !!#BritainsGotTalent”

A third commented: “LMA act was so beautiful and deserved the golden buzzer. They could use fans for the final. #BGT #BritainsGotTalent.”

But, despite many agreeing it was a well deserved choice, it was the audience that received complaints online. One user wrote: “The audience screaming “Push The Gold” like they haven’t shouted that after every act! #BGT #BritainsGotTalent“

Another moaned: “#BritainsGotTalent Mute the b****y audience…” And a third said: “The audience on #BGT is ruining the show. It’s like a mob. It would be much better if the audience did the shouting and screaming when the judges stop talking. #BritainsGotTalent.”