Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Category: Norfolk

  • Caldecote – Bus Stop

    Caldecote – Bus Stop

    This bus stop sign is at least ten years old, although at some stage it has become part of the hedge. The sign helpfully informs anyone walking by looking for a bus stop that there are no buses that serve this area. I’m not sure that the council is generally in the habit of meandering around the countryside putting up signs in remote locations saying there’s no bus stop, so I assume that there was once a service.

    The public transport situation isn’t good around here, especially given that Oxburgh Hall is located near to this closed bus stop. Oxburgh Hall themselves don’t even put walking as an option to get there (quite rightly, very few people would decide to walk there in the way I did), although do suggest cycling. For those getting a train, the advice is “Downham Market, 10 miles, then taxi, no public transport”. Marvellous….

  • Oxborough – Bedingfield Arms

    Oxborough – Bedingfield Arms

    This historic country pub has the benefit of being opposite the entrance to Oxburgh Hall, the large National Trust property. Like the country house, it’s not accessible by public transport, so it’s car-only or by bike. Or you can walk from Swaffham as I did, but this is probably not a common option.

    There’s a well-managed system given the current crisis, which was to wait at a designated area for a member of staff to seat customers. This designated area has a bell to summon staff, which makes entire common sense, but being slightly British I felt it made me look too demanding to press it. Not this proved to be an issue, a staff member came over after ten seconds anyway, resolving that potential dilemma.

    I think that there were tables inside for customers who wanted them, but I was happy in the beer garden. The staff member took the order and then brought the drinks over, all very simple. The pub was asking for customers to pay by card, but since I prefer this payment solution, this didn’t prove to be a problem.

    There was a choice of only two real ales, and no craft beer, but since the pub re-opened yesterday that’s at least better than nothing. The Woodfordes Wherry was well-kept and at the appropriate temperature. I’d have preferred something a little more innovative, but it’s a local beer and I’m sure it’s a popular option. I think it was priced at around £3.60, which is entirely reasonable for a pub in this location.

    The pub’s menu was quite broad, although I felt slightly sorry for the serving staff after three groups in a row asked for sandwiches. The staff politely explained that they weren’t an option at the moment and the three groups then didn’t order any food at all.

    I didn’t order food since I was half-way through what transpired to be a 20-mile walk, and sometimes anything too stodgy at lunchtime can be hard work to walk off. Having said that, if there had been an intriguing dark beer, then I might have ordered the cod and chips. But there wasn’t, so I didn’t.

    I have no idea.

    This is a perfectly pleasant pub, it’s got a charm to it and the owners are quite honest in their responses to TripAdvisor reviews. I like the:

    “One of the chefs has chosen an alternative place to work where the pressure is less and better for his nerves.”

    and:

    “A new chapter has begun with the return of Patron Chef, Giles Cunliffe, who is very personable and often ‘out front’ happy to be in touch with his customers and not hiding in the kitchen!”

    and I like the honesty with this response to one long-winded review:

    “Paragraphs make for easier reading…”

    I appreciate responses that are to the point and answer the question. Some chains insist with posting responses such as ‘all your feedback is really important to us’ and then some bland and dull apology. Anyway, all very relaxing and a peaceful way to spend 45 minutes.

  • Swaffham – Snailspit Farm

    Swaffham – Snailspit Farm

    I misread this farm’s name at first and it’s probably evident what I thought the sign said. It’s actually derived from Snail’s Pit, a local lake.

  • Shingham – St. Botolph’s Church

    Shingham – St. Botolph’s Church

    There isn’t much to Shingham and it has been a little subsumed into Beachemwell now, but its glorious church has remained. The above photo was taken from the main road (I say main road, but it’s not exactly the Las Vegas Strip) and I’ve no idea why the church is stuck back there. The land in the foreground wasn’t part of the church’s land even a century ago and was just part of the field.

    It’s not known when the church was built, some histories suggests the thirteenth and others suggest the fourteenth centuries.

    There’s something about this beautiful south door which to my very untrained eye just feels like the church is twelfth or thirteenth century. I hadn’t realised at the time that John Sell Cotman greatly appreciated this door and it’s pleasing to see the arch is still as he drew it nearly 200 years ago, with nothing dropped off.

    The church was redundant by the mid-nineteenth century, as there simply weren’t enough people in the local area to support it. The thatched roof had mostly fallen in by the late nineteenth century and the walls were in a bad state of repair by this time. However, there was a saviour, money was raised at the beginning of the twentieth century to repair the church, to put an iron roof on, to re-plaster the walls and to fix the broken floor. All of the work was completed in just five weeks in early 1904, an impressive effort.

    Despite the restoration in 1904, not much had ever really changed with the church. The interior had been modernised a bit, but it retained its seventeenth-century pulpit and communion rails, as well as having some medieval benches. Unfortunately, the church is nearly never open now, so it’s hard to see inside. But, very little was ever added to this church, so although the roof isn’t really entirely in keeping with the structure, it feels like little else has changed here over the last millennium.

    A correspondent for the Illustrated London News visited the church in 1892, commenting that “in living memory, the parish clerk was a woman, who led the responses, gave out the hymns, knocked the boys on the head during the service when necessary, and in the absence of the rector, prepared the young parishioners for confirmation”. No wonder the boys stopped going…..

  • Fakenham – The Old Fire Station (Heritage Trail 26)

    Fakenham – The Old Fire Station (Heritage Trail 26)

    Since I was back in Fakenham today, I thought I’d tick off a few more heritage trail sights. Not that I took much care in this, I meandered about until I had found a few, it’s more exciting that way to stumble across stuff.

    Some care has gone into this fire station building at Hall Staithe, which was constructed out of brick in 1911 (the fire station, not the staithe). The cars parked in front make it a little harder to see the building clearly, but it was clearly a functional structure. Well, functional for the height of fire engines at the time, probably not quite so useful for the current ones.

    The decorative effort that has gone into the building and the heritage trail sign is also visible, noting that both then and now, the fire station is manned by volunteers. The new replacement fire station is much larger and it’s now located on Norwich Road in the town.

    The heritage trail’s web-site has some glorious photos of how it used to look when it was in use.

  • Acle – St. Edmund’s Church (Robert Aldous Faulke)

    Acle – St. Edmund’s Church (Robert Aldous Faulke)

    This grave stands out in the churchyard because of its design, but it was the content that was the saddest, the death of a five-month old boy. Robert Aldous Faulke was baptised in the church on 13 September 1860 and he was the son of Robert Cooper Faulke and Anna Maria Faulke. Robert Cooper Faulke worked as a miller and farmer, employing three men and one boy, looking after 98 acres. There must have been some wealth, as the cost of such a headstone would have been relatively substantial.

    Robert died on 20 February 1861 and was buried on 25 February 1861 and the bottom of his beautiful gravestone reads “he died for Adam sinned, he lives for Jesus died”. It must have made for a painful census for the family, as the 1861 national register was taken on 7 April, just a few weeks after the death of Robert. One notable thing is that the census lists 7-month old Fanny Elizabeth as the only child, which made me realise that Robert was a twin (I had otherwise missed that his sister was baptised on the same day).

  • Dereham – Church of St. Nicholas (Overgrown Grave)

    Dereham – Church of St. Nicholas (Overgrown Grave)

    In a similar vein to the grave at Attleborough church that was overgrown, there’s something quite corporeal and spiritual (if something can be both these things) when graves get covered like this.

  • Dereham – Town Sign

    Dereham – Town Sign

    Dereham has a town sign which hangs over the High Street which was placed here in 1954, to mark the 1,300th birthday of when the town was founded. Realistically, this is probably a bit of a made-up date as there’s no historic evidence for this, but it’ll do as a best guess until someone can prove otherwise.

    The story goes that the settlement of Dereham was founded by St. Withburga and there’s a tale that goes alongside this that the Virgin Mary guided her towards a stream where there were deer who provided milk to sustain her. Sounds about as likely as the more recent Castle Barnard story, but I won’t go there……

    The next bit of the story, which explains the town sign, is that an evil local man didn’t like the deer being so generous to St. Withburga, so he tried to kill the lovely deer. Unfortunately, he was a bit inept and he fell off his horse and broke his neck. It’s not exactly a fairy tale story you’d tell to children, but that’s the imagery that Dereham wanted on its sign.

    And here’s how it looked in 1960.

     

  • Dereham – Former Guildhall

    Dereham – Former Guildhall

    This is the former Dereham Guildhall and although heavily modernised, some sections from the sixteenth century remain in the wall and basement. It’s also been tidied up from when George Plunkett came to Dereham and took a photograph of it.

    What is interesting from a heritage point of view is this, evidence of a separate property that is now joined with the main building. Those blocked up windows tell a story of their own, some are clearly evident, but there are a couple of harder to see blocked up windows on the first floor.

  • Dereham – Name Origin

    Dereham – Name Origin

    Since I had an afternoon in sunny Dereham, here’s what The Concise Oxford Dictionary Of English Placenames has to say about the history of the town name.

    Dereham, Norfolk. Derham in Domesday Book, Estderham in 1428. Likely the Old English, Deorhamm, for an enclosure for deer.

    There are two Derehams in Norfolk, the larger of the two is also known as East Dereham and West Dereham is around 25 miles away, nearer to Downham Market. A nice and simple town meaning, which has remained gloriously unchanged (well, nearly) for a millennium.