Day One - Diss - Wymondham - New Buckenham - 11 May

We arrived at Palgrave, a very small village within walking distance of Diss late yesterday afternoon. It took us about five hours to drive from north England and we arrived at the same time that Liz and Tomas had arrived from Hereford. It was lovely to catch up with them again and we haven’t stopped talking. The house we are renting is excellent, very roomy and a good location to visit the Norfolk and Suffolk area. We soon discovered that Diss is close to the border of Norfolk and Suffolk and as these two counties make up East Anglia I perhaps should have named the blog East Anglia. We had a slow start as washing had to be done and we were still unwinding from our walk.

We firstly explored the busy walking mall, Mere Street at Diss and found this ancient market town was having its regular Friday market on Market Hill at the top of Mere Street. Morning tea was at a tea room overlooking the town’s Mere, a six acre lake sitting alongside Mere Street which began at the end of the last Ice Age about 10,000BC when a hollow was formed by the local collapse of the underlying chalk bedrock. We decided to have a late lunch at the attractive, historic market town of Wymondham (pronounced Win-dum) a twenty minute drive north of Diss. On the way along tiny local lanes we called in to the church at East Harley as Liz was keen to see the medieval stained glass windows.

Wymondham has a unique building called The Market Cross in the market place and was built in 1617-18. It now houses the Tourist Information Centre and stands alongside the current market stalls. We had a tasty lunch at The Cross Keys pub before heading down to the impressive Abbey church which was founded in 1107. We had afternoon tea at The Green Dragon, a late fifteenth century building near the Abbey. It is the oldest inn in the town and the bar area was quite tiny inside. They were busily preparing for a wedding reception. We were keen to see a windmill and we drove through Diss to Billingford a very short distance east of Diss.

It was quite an imposing structure in good condition. We are sure to see more whilst we are here in the East Anglia area. Dinner was very tasty take-away fish and chips from the highly recommended local fish and chip shop at Palgrave. It was mostly a sunny day and we are enjoying the flat landscape of the area with its vast expanse of sky. The weather is looking good for tomorrow and we will make the most of it and head for the coast. Photos: Diss market; Market Cross at Wymondham, Windmill at Billingford.