If it's a step back in time you're looking for, then Beamish (in County Durham, to the south of NewcastleGateshead) should be very high on your list of places to pay a visit.
It's a unique open air musuem providing a living, working experience of life as it was in the North in the early 1800s and 1900s. Britain's favourite open air museum, set in over 300 acres of beautiful countryside, has countless attractions which include working trams and steam engines plus a station, a colliery village (take a trip underground into a drift mine), a town (complete with sweet factory, printworks and a public house - yes, it serves drinks), Pockerly Manor, a farm and also a period fairground. Beamish has the distinction of winning countless awards since it first opened including European Museum of the Year.
Hourly 28/28A bus from Eldon Square Bus Station, Newcastle
