You Are Here – Newcastle Upon Tyne

While on vacation I missed to add two new mugs from the You Are Here series list. Starbucks in not very consistent in releasing those – one week we get nothing, the other week we get two. Anyway, please welcome Newcastle Upon Tyne mug.
This city from North East England, also commonly called simply Newcastle, is the most populous in this region. As you can see from the pic, The Castle is seen on the front of mug, which gave the name for the city. There is an interesting story behind this – there was a Roman fort initially built to protect the bridge over River Tyne. Then this fort was replaced with “motte-and-bailey” – wooden tower on top of an earthen mound surrounded by a moat and wooden stockade (bailey). During construction people were referring to it as “New Castle”. You got it, right? Unfortunately not a trace of this construction survived through years and as the new stone keep was built here between 1172 and 1177. A stone bailey replaced the wooden one. In the following years this fortification was repaired and upgraded many times and now servers as a tourist attraction.
Another very interesting landmark is Gateshead Millennium Bridge – pedestrian and cyclist tilt bridge. In order to allow ships to pass the bridge rotates (tilts). I was not even aware bridges with such design are possible.