Like Harris, the Northumberland study is in a remote rural area, this time on the mainland of Britain in the north-east of England. Just south of the Scottish border, almost equidistant from the west and east coasts, the valley of the North Tyne river rises in the Cheviot Hills above Kielder Water, a reservoir surrounded by Kielder Forest. The largest villages are downstream, including the main settlement of Bellingham. The North Tyne valley study area includes the four civil parishes of Bellingham, Kielder, Falstone and Tarset and Greystead, covering around 530 km2 (see Figure 5.1). The south-east part of the study area is within the boundaries of Northumberland National Park, which was designated in 1956. The National Park is the most northerly and most remote from large urban areas, least visited and least populated of the ten National Parks in England. The travel time by car to the city of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, which has a population of around 800,000, is 80 minutes from Kielder, or around 50 minutes from Bellingham.

There is a wealth of history in the area, with many scheduled monuments, listed buildings and archaeological sites. In the Middle Ages, this was one of the most dangerous parts of England and inhabitants had to live in a state of constant alert. Scotland and England were frequently at war and ‘Border reivers’ (raiders) along the Anglo-Scottish border robbed the entire county without regard to the nationality of their victims. Today, the beautiful valley is much more peaceful and home to just over 2,000 people – one of the lowest population densities in England. Most residents live in the Bellingham parish (1,325), followed by Tarset and Greystead (262), Falstone (245) and Kielder (187) (Office for National Statistics, 2018).

Although these four parishes are situated near one another, they are quite different. Tarset and Greystead parish and Kielder parish are two of the most sparsely populated parishes in the UK (1.5 people per km2 in Tarset and Greystead), with ageing demographic profiles and a high proportion of older residents. The population has declined in recent decades in Kielder (-9 per cent between 2002 and 2017), a village developed by the Forestry Commission in the 1950s to accommodate the large number of workers expected to work in Kielder Forest.