Visiting the folks
Occurred around July 2008
We were watching a doco on archaeology when Bury St Edmunds popped up. Sounded interesting with its history dating back to Roman times and before. It also looked beautiful. Tim looked up, "Suffolk is it?" We'd been thinking about taking a look at the "folks" for a while, that is Suffolk and Norfolk. We'd done a fair amount of exploring out west – Devon, Dorset etc – since arriving in England but had missed the eastern counties. Perhaps because the geography wasn't so dramatic but the time had come.
I got out our trusty touring guide and opened to Suffolk. "We could head for Cambridge, then over to Bury St Edmunds and on to Norwich. From there to the coast."
"Three days?" he asked. I looked at the map carefully before nodding. We'd been fooled before as the distances in England look small compared to Western Australia where we think nothing of a 500 km (300 mile) day's trip. Experience had taught us to slow down and take time when travelling here. But this looked easy with Cambridge on the M11 and some decent A roads from there.
I'd like to tell you about Norwich and the wonderful fishing ports we found along the coast but fact is we got stuck in Bury St E. This is partly because we found a lovely farmhouse B&B (Apple Mount Farmhouse) that seduced us so we stayed the two nights there and partly because this area is so fascinating we spent all our time exploring close by. Bury St Edmunds is named for the Saxon King Edmund who is buried here and the whole area is an historian's delight. The abbey ruins are of note as is West Stow just north of Bury St E where there's a reconstructed Anglo/Saxon farming settlement.
For those interested in historic buildings the National Trust Ickworth House is a knock out. The park-like grounds designed by Capability Brown do the buildings great justice. Easy to spend a whole day here!
Close to our B&B the village of Lavenham was a favourite with its fabulous preserved streetscapes and the wonderful Swan Hotel (see photo) – not to be missed. Talking of hotels the Nutshell in Bury St E is reputed to be the smallest pub in the UK at 15ft x 7ft. Our guidebook stated that it could only fit 10 – 15 people at a time but when we dropped in there was a very large gentleman occupying a fair amount of it. When we squeezed in the total was 9 people and it was cosy.
The call back to London came all too soon but we vowed to continue our tour of the "folks" at a later time.
Submitted by Robyn - 22 Aug 2008