‘Anything Roman, I'm fascinated': hiking Hadrian's Wall with a Muslim women's walking group

The Guardian

23-05-2025

As far as walls go, they don't get much more epic than Hadrian's. Stretching 73 miles across the north of England from Bowness-on-Solway to Wallsend, it connects two coasts, 14 forts and huge sweeps of scenic countryside. It's still inspiring a sense of awe almost 2,000 years after its creation, as Amira, Ayisha and Najma – three of the organisers behind Muslim hiking and adventure group the Wanderlust Women – discovered. Venturing from the rocky crags of Steel Rigg to Houseteads, Britain's best-preserved Roman fort, via the Sycamore Gap memorial, they discovered some of the wall's most spectacular sites. 'You can feel the history here, just being able to see all the ruins and everything. The landscape is so vast and so beautiful. It's literally breathtaking,' Ayisha says.
Experiences of this kind are something that Amira, the Wanderlust Women's founder, is determined to help her community access. Inheriting a love of the outdoors from her mother, she wanted other Muslim women to feel as at home in nature as she does. So she created the Wanderlust Women in 2020 and, in the years since, has taken scores of women on trips across the UK and abroad, bonding through faith and challenging the stereotype of the 'typical' hiker. As Amira says: 'We walk proudly outside because it is our place to be, it's everyone's place to be.'
The women walked from Steel Rigg to Houseteads Roman fort via the Sycamore Gap memorial
Accessibility is a major issue in the countryside – a study found that the most white-dominated areas of the UK have 144% more local paths than the most ethnically diverse ones. Amira sees opportunity in the proximity of Hadrian's Wall to cities in the north of England and Scotland. 'We have a lot of community members who are from Newcastle. There's a large percentage of ethnic minority people from that area who probably don't even know how to get here,' she says.
A Wanderlust Women trip to Hadrian's Wall has the double benefit of not only making the landscape more accessible to Muslim women, but its history too. Started in AD122 on the orders of emperor Hadrian, the wall took some six years to build and protected and marked the north-western edge of the Roman empire. As well as soldiers, it was a meeting point and trading post for civilians from across Europe and north Africa. 'That sort of history has always fascinated me, the legends and the stories and the myths behind it,' says Ayisha. 'So having the opportunity to come out here with other people has been really nice.'
It isn't just the wall that history fans can discover as they traverse its breadth. Other relics include a time capsule of excavated Roman treasures in the form of the Corbridge hoard, as well as ruins of castles and priories that witnessed some of the most tumultuous times in British history. Najma, who had been to Hadrian's Wall before, still finds plenty to surprise and delight. 'As a youngster, I was obsessed with Roman culture and the empire and Greek mythology. Anything Roman, I'm fascinated. So it's lovely to come here and to do it again, because it feels like the first time.'
As a parent, Najma can see the wall's potential to captivate big and little kids alike. 'It's a great place to come and imagine how the Roman army lived here and what they did. I can imagine little kids who have a great imagination would love it,' she says. At Housesteads fort, the trio's destination, kid-friendly discoveries await, including interactive exhibitions and the chance to dress up as Romans. You can also check out an impressive set of communal latrines and water channels – the best preserved Roman loos in Britain.
Housesteads fort's well-preserved communal latrines
Hadrian's Wall certainly delivers on a sense of fantasy as well as history. It inspired the Wall in Game of Thrones – 700 sheer feet of ice patrolled by a caped band of brothers called the Night's Watch. Although Hadrian's Wall never reached the dizzy heights of 700ft, it did originally stand at a rather impressive 4.5 metres (15ft). In the centuries since, its stones have been repurposed all over the surrounding counties. Despite being shorter these days, the wall's sense of drama remains, as Ayisha says: 'I would totally recommend it for the atmosphere alone. When I go out to landscapes like this, I imagine being in Lord of the Rings. I'm on my own little adventure … trying to seek out a ring or find a sword in a stone.'
The joy of the day's adventure is something Amira, Ayisha and Najma are determined to share with their community – they are already planning a return Wanderlust Women trip. Amira says: 'Hadrian's Wall is like a bucket-list moment. Now that we've been here, we've experienced it, we can do it on a scale where it's accessible to everyone.'
As well as bringing more hikers herself, Amira foresees that simply sharing their visit on social media will help show Muslim women that they belong in this historic landscape. 'There's like a ripple effect. I know for a fact that when we start posting that we've been here, people will go: 'Oh! Where is that?'
To help plan your own Roman adventure at Hadrian's Wall, visit here