Day Fourteen - London - 24 May

It was the last day of our holidays in England before setting off for a couple of days in Singapore to break our journey home. It was a hot and hazy day and it quickly sapped our energy. We stored our luggage at the hotel and headed via the Underground to Greenwich to see the Cutty Sark and the Royal Greenwich Observatory the home of the Prime Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time. It took us about an hour and a half to get there via three different train routes.

On first sight the Cutty Sark looked larger than we expected at the end of Greenwich High Street on the edge of the Thames River. By the time we arrived it was very hot and our view down the Thames was restricted due to the haze. It was very hot within the boat’s hull and it didn’t take Henk nor I long to realise we needed to have a break in the café and have a cool drink. When we recovered we felt we could go back and tour the remainder of the boat.

The name Cutty Sark comes from a Lowland Scott’s term for a ladies’ short shift. This garment was worn by the witch Nannie in Robert Burn’s poem Tam O’Shanter. Tam was chased by Nannie and he just managed to escape, but not before she pulled out the tail of Tam’s horse. The figurehead of the Cutty Sark is Nannie the witch with an outstretched arm with the horse’s tail. There was also a display of a large number of ships’ figureheads at the Cutty Sark exhibition.

The ship has been beautifully restored and is now three metres above the ground floating with supports over the refurbished dry dock. We then moved onto the Royal Observatory at the top of the hill. We decided to go through the park rather than through the main street of Greenwich. Unfortunately, the signs to the observatory ran out and we had to ask several times for directions. Making it more difficult was the large equestrian arena which is being built in the park for the Olympics. We had to walk around this before climbing the hill. By the time we got to the top we were very hot. The view from the hill down the Thames was very good despite the haze.

We lined up with everyone else to place one foot in the west and the other in the east before setting off to the Observatory exhibition. We returned to the hotel by five o’clock to be organised to get to the airport for six o’clock. This is the last of our holiday blog. We have had a wonderful and varied holiday touring the Isle of Wight, the Channel Islands, waking from the west to east of England on the Coast to Coast walk, East Anglia and finally London.

Day Thirteen - Cambridge to London - 23 May

Today was part travelling, part sightseeing and then catching up with friends. We left Cambridge at nine thirty and we had a good drive down to the Jury’s Inn at Hatton Cross which is very near Heathrow Airport. I drove and Henk directed me with the help of the car’s GPS and we arrived at about eleven o’clock. We decided to drop our bags at the hotel first and then take the hire car back to the company at Terminal 5. The hire company dropped us off at our hotel so we needn’t had come to the hotel first. We were concerned about having to drag our heavy bags onto public transport to get to the hotel. We were keen to get into the heart of London and walked the five minutes to the Hatton Cross Underground station near our hotel getting off at Kingsbridge.

It took nearly an hour on the train which brought home to us how big London is. We emerged from the station onto the very busy Brompton Road and close to Harrods. We spent about twenty minutes in Harrods and it all got a bit too much for us. It was very crowded and we were hungry as it was getting close to two o‘clock. We could only see a few genuine shoppers with the majority being tourists like us.

After having lunch in a little café across the road from Harrods we regained our energy and we ventured back and did some exploring of the massive and very stylish store. At the end of each sale the shop assistant asks do you need directions to any other section. In a section called “Cheap and Cheerful” I found a cardigan I liked for a mere three hundred and ninety-five pounds! There was a statue of Lady Diana and Dodi Al Fayed with the inscription “Innocent Victims”.

The windows of the shop were celebrating the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and each major designer had designed a crown. They were all very stunning. There was also a replica of the Queen’s beautiful Coronation gown in the window.

We spent the remainder of the afternoon at nearby Hyde Park. There were many people making the most of the very warm, sunny day with quite a few hiring deck chairs and sunbaking. Late in the afternoon we set off on the Underground again to Clapham Common to meet up with our friends, Alexander, Anna and Lachlan.

We arranged to meet at six thirty. Alexander and Anna have been in London for a year and Lachlan was in the city to attend a friend’s wedding. Alexander and Anna decided that rather than go to their very popular local pub, The Windmill, that we should have a picnic on the Common and make the most of warm evening. They were very organised and had the food and drinks ready for us. It was a good move and very relaxing. There were many people around the very large Common doing the same thing. Lachlan had to leave earlier to catch a couple of trains to where he was staying north of London. It was lovely to catch up and exchange news. We left Alexander and Anna at about nine and we arrived back at our hotel at about ten fifteen.

Day Twelve - Cambridge - 22 May

Today was the best weather we have experienced since arriving in the UK seven weeks ago. It was both sunny and warm. We have had sunshine on a couple of days but it was cold. We walked from our B&B into the centre of Cambridge to get some exercise. It took thirty-five minutes and we then spent all day walking. We made the most of the sunshine and caught a punt on the River Cam which runs through Cambridge.

It’s a small tributary of the River Great Ouse which we came across in Norfolk. We decided to hire a punt with a guide rather than try and do the punting ourselves. The tour covers 1.6kms of the River Cam known as the College Backs as you pass the backs of the colleges.

Our guide was very good covering the history of the buildings and bridges as we passed them. We probably saw the Cam Backs on one of the best days of the year; we couldn’t stop taking photos.

The Bridge of Sighs and King’s College Chapel were the standouts along the way. The Bridge of Sighs is a very pretty little bridge completed in 1831. We had a late lunch with good views of King’s College Chapel and then moved onto the Cambridge University Botanic Garden which was about a ten minute walk from the city centre. It was a much larger garden than we expected sitting on forty acres and our brochure said it had over eight thousand species.

It was a beautiful, sunny afternoon and ideal to walk around the gardens. Once again we couldn’t stop taking photos of the lovely flowers and gardens.

We decided to go to the King’s College Chapel for Evensong at five thirty and we had an hour to kill before lining up to go in. We were feeling quite hot and ventured into a coffee house to cool down. We had an interesting time listening to a Chinese lady being tutored in English at the next table. The Chinese lady was practising English for an exam and had to describe photos placed in front of her. She couldn’t say “squirrel” and kept saying “squarell”. After ten minutes the tutor said it wasn’t important and she may not have to use the word very often. I think the next time Henk and I see a “squarell” we will think of the Chinese lady. Evensong was a service of forty-five minutes and the choirboys sang beautifully. Some were so tiny they could hardly see over the choir stalls. Following the service and thanks to a taxi driver we found the biggest UK Wetherspoons pub in an ex-cinema in Cambridge and had a great salmon dish for dinner. We love Wetherspoons pubs as they are cheap and cheerful, the standard is always good and they have WiFi. We caught the bus home and we were back at the B&B at eight o’clock which gave us time to repack before heading to London tomorrow morning.

Day Eleven - Ely to Cambridge - 21 May

We had a leisurely breakfast and then drove thirty minutes west to Cambridge arriving at our accommodation, Caroline Guesthouse about ten thirty. We were able to park our car at the front of the house and immediately caught a bus into the city. The bus stop is across the road from our accommodation and one comes along every ten minutes so Henk has found a good location. The bus took about ten minutes to get to the city and we found a tea room to fortify ourselves for a bus tour of the city. The bus was a hop-on, hop-off one giving a commentary as we motored around the city for one and a half hours.

Henk and I like doing these tours as they give a good background to the city and plenty ideas of where we would like to visit. Cambridge is a lovely university town with beautiful stone carved buildings comprising thirty-one colleges and thirty-one thousand bicycles. Apparently the students aren’t allowed to have a car and consequently there are bicycles everywhere and very few cars in the city centre.

After lunch we visited the magnificent King’s College Chapel. It was built in the late fourteen hundreds and early fifteen hundreds. The carved wooden screen between the nave and the chancel has the carved initials of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn.

The chapel has the world’s largest fan vault which looks so fine it’s difficult to believe that the vaults can hold up the building. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to tour the remainder of the King’s College buildings as it is exam time.

We moved onto the unusual and small Round Church building which goes back to 1130AD and makes it one of the oldest buildings in Cambridge. It was built following the First Crusade and is one of only four remaining round churches in England. At four thirty we called it quits and caught the bus back to our accommodation. Our host was waiting for us and he was very efficient with the paperwork and breakfast orders. He recommended the pub called The Rock about a twenty minute walk away and it was very good and obviously popular with the locals. We watched the second episode of the Seven Up series which I have been watching since I was twenty-four years old. The participants are now fifty-six and it’s fascinating to see what they are doing with their lives. Tomorrow we do more exploring of Cambridge before moving onto London the following day. It was another cold and overcast day but tomorrow’s temperature might be a bit warmer.

Day Ten - Ely - 20 May

We spent the majority of the day at Ely Cathedral which is one of the seven Wonders of the Medieval World. We had a leisurely breakfast, Skyped Henk’s parents, phoned my sister, Sandra who is holidaying in Cornwall and then set off for the Sunday service at the Cathedral. It was a cold day and the Cathedral was not heated. The service started with a procession of the twenty-four boy choristers who live within the precinct and is one of the few remaining residential choirs. Their voices rose high through the Cathedral and it was lovely to hear. The service lasted one hour and twenty minutes and the sermon was on “choice”. Henk’s choice was probably not to have gone to the service but it was good to see the Cathedral during a service! At the end of the service my legs were stiff from the cold.

We walked around the Cathedral and then joined a tour of Ely’s Octagon Tower which is described as a wonder of medieval engineering. Our elderly tour guide asked if any of us was scared of heights and Henk bravely put up his hand. We were to discover later there were a few more! The present octagonal tower replaced the earlier central tower which collapsed in 1322.

We initially climbed a narrow stone spiralling staircase to the high first floor and thought that wasn’t so bad. We then climbed on narrower stone stairs to come out on the edge of a lead roof with a half metre walking platform and an open railing alongside. We had to walk along the platform to a low door to go up more narrow steps. It was on the platform that we found the others who didn’t like heights. It was a long way down to the grass below. We climbed inside to the side of the tower and stood behind the large painted angels which can be seen from the altar below.

The guide opened a couple of the large wooden panels and we could see way below to the church floor. From here we climbed very narrow spiralling steps to arrive on the tower’s lead roof.

We stood on the outside of the stained glass windows and the guide told us not to get too close to them as he didn’t want anyone falling through them as they would be too hard to replace! We gingerly walked around the entire sloping roof taking in the views.

There was quite a mist in the distance but nevertheless the views were extensive. It was freezing on top of the roof and I realised I couldn’t feel my feet. It was a relief to climb down the stairs to get out of the cold. Henk and I thoroughly enjoyed the tour and learned quite a deal about the Cathedral. We retreated to the Almonry Tea Room for a late lunch at two o’clock. I had soup to warm me up and thaw out my legs and feet. On the tour one of the people mentioned that they read in a newspaper that this May could be one of the coldest on record. We walked through the pedestrian mall back to our hotel. I read the newspaper and had a long, hot bath and Henk searched online for accommodation for Cambridge. For the first time since we arrived in the UK seven weeks ago we had a Sunday roast. It was good to have some vegetables other than potato and peas which seems to be served with almost everything. Tomorrow we move onto Cambridge for two nights before moving onto London.

Day Nine - Ely - 19 May

We have now moved onto the beautiful small city of Ely which is about an hour’s drive west of Diss and have moved from the county of Norfolk to Cambridgeshire. We hadn’t booked any accommodation as we decided we would do that through the Tourist Information Centre at Ely.

This was not a good idea as they had nothing available in town in our price range and we should have booked much earlier. However, the lady in the TIC suggested we try the hotel called “The Lamb” and we managed to get the last room. We were very lucky as the busyness seems to be because it’s a weekend and there is a wedding in town. The hotel is in a good position only fifty metres from the large and beautiful Ely Cathedral which we will visit tomorrow. Parking at the hotel could have been difficult as the places are limited but once again we were lucky as the Lamborghini car which was attracting a lot of attention moved on and we got the last car park.

We returned to the TIC which is housed in Oliver Cromwell’s house and toured the house with its interesting history of Cromwell’s life. There was also a very good video of the history on the development of the Fens. At the completion of the tour we headed down the pedestrian way to the city centre for lunch.

A busy market was taking place and it had a wide range of food which was very tempting. We headed to a very tiny two storey tea room called “Tea for Two”.

It was very cosy on the second storey. Following lunch Henk and I headed to the Ely Museum and the highlight was a very old film on the lost art of eel catching. Ely’s name is said to come from a word meaning “Eel Island” and taxes at one time were paid in eels. Late in the afternoon I had a nap and Henk spent an hour walking around the paths around the city. After dinner at our hotel Henk and I walked for about an hour around the pretty city with Henk showing me the sights he had seen earlier. We walked down to the River Great Ouse which has little canal boats lining the shore. Everything seems to pertain to eels! The temperatures are low and it is very overcast but we must be getting used to the weather as we would never go walking in Australia in such conditions!

Day Eight - Sandringham and North Norfolk Coast - 18 May

We were on the road at nine o’clock and arrived at Sandringham at ten thirty just in time for morning tea. The traffic wasn’t too busy and along the way we saw all the familiar East Anglia features such as the flat landscape, expansive skies, pink-coloured thatched houses, churches, water towers and acres and acres of large pigs with their little Nissan huts. We now know where the majority of English bacon comes from! We bought tickets which allowed us to tour Sandringham house, the museum and the gardens. We went straight to the house which has been the private home of four generations of monarchs including Queen Elizabeth II.

It was surprisingly “homely” and interesting to see where the Royal Family spend their winter holidays. The older guides in each of the rooms were very friendly and knowledgeable. There was personal memorabilia such as photos and gifts to each other and jigsaws which the Queen enjoys doing for relaxation. The public are only allowed into the ground floor which incorporates a number of living areas and the dining area where the Royal Family have Christmas dinner. Henk and I moved onto the museum which is set apart from the house.

It gave a chronological account of the monarchs associated with the house and had model toy cars given to the Royal Family by car manufacturers and crafts people for use by the royal children. We had lunch at the Stable Tea Room next to the museum. We immediately realised why the tearoom got its name when we walked in as there were four tables squashed into each former stall. It was novel!

We walked around the beautiful gardens and visited the very small but beautiful Church of St Mary Magdalene which is used regularly by the Royal Family and Estate Staff.

It is the church we see at Christmas when the Family go to the Christmas service. It has an exquisite ornate silver alter and personal memorials to members of the Royal Family including the Queen Mother and George IV. We left Sandringham about two o’clock and headed north and drove along the coastline to the east and rounded the corner and headed south. The tide was out and many boats were high and dry when we stopped at Burnahm Overy Staithe.

We could have stopped at all the little villages along the way as they were very pretty with narrow streets. We had afternoon tea at Cley Next the Sea as we were keen to see the windmill on the shore. We found that Cley has not been “next the sea” for about three hundred years due to land reclamation. We also saw Apache helicopters hovering low to the ground near the windmill.

We took roads heading south avoiding the busy Norwich area and arrived back at the house just after six. We had a very good touring day. It’s our last night in the house and we were busy getting organised for our departure tomorrow morning. We aren’t sure if we will stay at Ely or Cambridge or both over the next few days. We will work that out tomorrow.

Day Seven - Diss - 17 May

We ended up having an unplanned rest day and it was very enjoyable. Liz and Tomas left to return to Hereford at nine o’clock. We had a lovely week with them touring the Norfolk and Suffolk countryside and it was good to catch up again. The house we have leased was very suitable for the four of us and has been ideally situated to tour East Anglia. Henk and I will be in the house for a further two nights and will leave on Saturday morning. After Liz and Tomas left Henk decided to clean our walking boots which we had left in the garage. It took him quite some time to get the boots clean and it’s necessary to do this so we can get them through Brisbane Customs.

We walked from our house into Diss which takes about fifteen minutes mostly along a pretty country lane alongside farmland. We spent sometime having coffee in an interesting bookshop overlooking the Mere with its fountain. We had coffee at this place on our first day and it is very pleasant. We walked around Diss and it was a contrast to when we were there last Friday as there was no market.

We spent sometime in the Tourist Information Centre gathering information on Ely, Cambridge and Sandringham. We have decided to visit Sandringham, the Queen’s Norfolk retreat, tomorrow. It will take about one and a half hours to drive north west of Diss to get there. When we leave on Saturday morning we plan to spend one night at Ely on our way to Cambridge for three nights before heading to London. When we walked back to the house in the early afternoon we had every intention to drive to Eye, a small town nearby but our energy was waning and we decided that we needed a rest day. I read the paper, we watched a DVD and did our washing. I cooked dinner which was the first time I have cooked since we left Brisbane on 2 April. We enjoyed eating in.

Day Six - The Broads (Horning, Ranworth, Potter Heigham and Thurne) - 16 May

We had a lovely sunny day touring The Broads. We travelled north bypassing Norwich and headed to Horning which means “the folk who live on high ground between the rivers“. I drove, Henk navigated, Liz was cultural advisor and Tomas relaxed. When we arrived at ten twenty we found a tour boat leaving at ten thirty and we quickly got organised to get on board. The commentary on the one and a half hour cruise was very good and gave a good overview of The Broads. We initially motored up the Bure River before turning into a dyke and into Ranworth Broad.

The land was very flat and it is only one foot above sea level. The reeds grown on The Broads are used for roof thatching and two and a half acres of reeds would thatch a roof. Apparently the Norfolk reeds are the best to use for thatching and will last for eighty years compared to straw which lasts for twenty-five years. The Broads, so named because of the broad expanse of water, were man-made due to people during the middle ages mining the peat bog and drying it for fuel for their fires. The dried peat bog became very popular and it was sent to many parts of the country. Eventually large holes were left in the ground and these filled with water which constitutes The Broads today. After the cruise we walked around the pretty waterside village of Horning and then moved onto Ranworth another little place on the edge of The Broads.

We had lunch at the local pub and went on to explore St Helen’s Church a short walk from the pub. Tomas, Henk and I climbed the tower of the church - 89 very narrow stone steps, one wooden ladder, one steel ladder and then through a hatch to climb onto the roof. The views over The Broads were very good. On top of the roof was a weather vane which looked very large compared to when we saw it from the ground. St Helen’s is a fourteenth and fifteenth century church with a painted medieval screen which is said to be the most complete and best example in the country. Surprisingly, there was no one in the church monitoring visitors to ensure that the rare artefacts were protected or overseeing anyone climbing the tower. We had afternoon tea at St Helen’s quaint little tea room with home made cakes including the Norfolk Slice which was very tasty. We moved onto Potter Heigham keen to see its fifteenth century stone bridge which is now classed as an ancient monument. It is very low and boats need to remove their masts before being able to pass underneath. Norfolk is unique for its variety of village signs and each sign tells a story of the history or legends relative to the area.

Potter Heigham’s sign was quite detailed in depicting its history. On the way back to Palgrave we called into Thurne to see two well known windmills and these were outstanding sitting alongside the water. We didn’t arrive back to Palgrave until six o’clock and decided to go straight to our local pub, The Cock Inn, for dinner. This is Liz and Tomas’s last day with us as they will be returning to Hereford after breakfast tomorrow. Henk and I don’t leave until Saturday.

Day Five - Lavenham, Long Melford - 15 May

The weather forecast was partly sunny, heavy rain at times, showers, hail and unseasonably cold. It was all that was forecast and we postponed our day trip to The Broads until tomorrow hoping for better weather. We headed south to two beautiful old Suffolk wool towns of Lavenham and Long Melford which were about an hour’s drive from our little village of Pelgrave. Both are unusual for the Norfolk and Suffolk area as they are on small hills with views to the flat country side. Tomas drove, Liz navigated and Henk and I sat in the back taking it all in. Lavenham was a wonderful surprise as it was a small town comprising of many streets of old timber-framed medieval houses.

The High Street was long and wide with very quaint little speciality shops within the medieval buildings and many of their windows were decorated for the Queen’s Jubilee. There is a competition for the best dressed window and many were enthusiastically taking part. We drove up and down the quiet High Street until we found a suitable tea room.

After our cuppa and cake we walked down the street to be greeted by rain and then some hail. Tomas and Henk took to the car and Liz and I took to a shop to do some browsing and shopping. Once the weather improved we walked the streets with its astonishing array of medieval houses and buildings such as the white-washed Guild Hall and the mustard coloured Little Hall built in 1390 and improved in 1425-50.

One house in Shilling St was where Jane Taylor wrote in 1823 the nursery rhyme “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. When we arrived at Long Melford we drove down the long two mile main street from which its name derives. The town also had lovely buildings which we enjoyed but we were thoroughly spoilt by Lavenham.

We had lunch at the stylish Black Lion Hotel which is located at the beginning of the long High Street and sits under the shadow of the very large and impressive Holy Trinity Church. Whilst eating lunch we watched the heavy rain and hail bounce off the road and cars. The weather was very changeable all day. Liz, Henk and I had Long Melford sausage open sandwiches and they were very tasty.

After lunch the weather had cleared to sunny skies and we walked up the small road to the church to explore it. It was a lovely church with beautiful stain glass windows. One window had the Duchess of Norfolk, Elizabeth Talbot with a large headdress. John Tenniel used her as the model for the Duchess in “Alice in Wonderland”. We had a great day touring and even passed a windmill at small village of Stanton on the way home. We had to stop to take a photo. Tomas decided to cook dinner for us rather than go out. I haven’t cooked a meal since I left Australia on 2 April. It was a welcome change to have a home-cooked meal.

Day Four - Norwich - 14 May

We decided to catch the bus from Diss to Norwich for the day. It was an overcast and quite cold day but despite this we had a very good day sightseeing around the capital of Norfolk. We were very organised and drove to the bus station far too early for the bus and as it was cold we spent thirty minutes in the car reading the background on Norwich and fogging up with windows! It took about an hour to get to Norwich through a number of small villages across Norfolk’s flat plains. When we alighted from the bus we stood outside a Waterson’s book store which had a coffee shop. It was eleven o’clock and we were ready for a coffee so we walked straight up the bookstore’s steps into the warmth. Liz moved on to visit the cathedrals to photograph some of the stain glass windows for her workshop and Tomas, Henk and I caught a hop-on and hop-off red double-decker bus to give us an overview of the city and to get our bearings. We really enjoyed the commentary on the bus as it was very informative. During Victorian times Norwich had enough churches to visit a different one every Sunday for a year and enough pubs to visit a different one each day for a year. There aren’t as many churches and pubs now but there still seemed to be plenty of them around. We were all impressed with Norwich.

It was much larger than we had expected and had a good combination of old and new. We met Liz for a late lunch at the Norwich Cathedral refectory and then toured the cathedral. It is a spectacular building over nine hundred years old and is said to be one of the finest complete Romanesque buildings in Europe with the highest Norman tower and largest monastic cloisters in England. We were fascinated by the medieval roof boss sculptures of which there is a thousand of them.

When we left the cathedral grounds we walked through the lovely cobbled street of Elm Hill which is often used for films. It takes its name from the Elm trees that once stood in the square but died from Dutch Elm Disease and has since been replaced with Plane trees. Liz and I visited the very large open market and Henk and Tomas visited Surrey House with its exquisite marble.

We walked through the beautiful Royal Arcade with its wide range of little shops. We found a country clothing shop celebrating the Diamond Jubilee in an amusing way with the Queen, Prince William and the Duchess of Cambridge in their window.

We caught the five thirty bus back to Diss and thought we would we would go to our local pub, The Cock Inn (don’t laugh!), for dinner. Unfortunately, food is not served on Monday or Tuesday and we moved onto the local fish and chip shop for takeaway. Just as we arrived the heavens opened and Henk and Tomas braved the rain to buy our dinner.