They are very different but Northumberland is stunning. It has the most beautiful beaches and they are often empty even in summer. It's a county of varied atmosphere:
The North Pennines in the south-west is striking, hilly, very rural and in places wild and bleak but beautiful- small villages, tiny lanes, patchwork fields, stone walls and soaring moorlands and it tips over into Cumbria.
The Tyne valley is lovely from the sources of the Tyne in the west high moorlands down through Hexham and Corbridge market towns with their early Christian and Roman history, alongside Hadrian's wall down to Tynemouth and the North sea- seaside resorts of Whitley Bay, Cullercoats fishing village, St Mary's island.
There's Kielder reservoirs in the west near the border with Scotland.
The North Northumberland coast is lovely -Seahouses, Bamburgh, Budle Bay, Ross, The Farne Islands, Holy Island, Berwick. You can walk all day and see dolphins, seals, birds, stunningly beautiful beaches and big skies and rarely a person. Cheswick beach is somewhere I have gone since being a child and is almost always empty.
The border from east to west with Scotland is full of beautiful towns and villages both sides.
I could praise Northumberland all day but we try to keep it a bit of a secret or people will start coming up here.