Alumni and guests are invited to join the Northumbrian Cambridge Association for their summer outing to the Farne Island.

The Farne Islands are among the wonders of the Northumberland coastline and a prime area for viewing gray seals and a variety of seabirds that make their nests on these rocky outcrops. The island of Inner Farne has great historic and religious significance as the spot where St Cuthbert retreated before and after his time as Bishop of Hexham in the 7th century. A formal monastic cell of Benedictine monks was established on the islands circa 1255 but was dissolved in 1536 as part of King Henry VIII's Dissolution of the Monasteries. The islands are currently owned by the National Trust. Remains still exist of the seventh-century anchorite cell used by Saint Aidan and Saint Cuthbert, as do the remains of a fourteenth-century chapel associated with the cell, known as St Cuthbert's Chapel.

• 11:45 am - Meet at Olde Ship Inn in Seahouses for lunch (everyone settles their own bills)
• 13:45 pm - Trip around Farne Islands, with an hour’s stop-off on Inner Farne to see the birdlife nesting on the cliffs, the old lighthouse and St Cuthbert’s Chapel.

Onboard our boat will be a wildlife expert who will be able to point out the main features, both animate and inanimate, of the islands. Expect to see the Farnes’ colony of grey seals, along with cormorants, kittiwakes, gulls, terns, and the loveable puffins. If we are lucky we may also see dolphins in the waters between the Farnes and the Northumberland coast.