A June holiday in Norfolk
Report by Roger P
“It is only six minutes away” said Anna, as we exited Norwich station, so half an hour later having dragged our bags up hill after hill we found our hotel.
When we told people we were meeting up with friends for a gentle ride in Norfolk they invariably commented that at least it would be flat – unfortunately we thought that too.
Ged, the club trainer, had asked us if we wanted to join the crowd from “Dundee Runners” again – we usually met up to cycle along the rivers in Eastern Germany or the lakes and mountains in Bavaria, but Covid had made booking cycling in Germany difficult, so he had contacted UK Cycle Holidays (https://ukcyclingholidays.co.uk) of Diss to organise a bespoke week of cycling. They booked hotels, provided bikes and shifted luggage to the next destination and provided a local guide in the shape of Phil – who had an encyclopaedic knowledge of every back road and byway.
Next morning bikes were issued – mostly Peugeot 21 speed hybrids but the company had arranged with a local hire shop to provide Anna with a Raleigh E bike with five power levels 9 gears and a good range.
A change of shirt did the trick and the flies immediately sought out the next poor soul to cycle in yellow! We then discovered the empty, undulating narrow potholed roads that wend their way, always into a headwind, up long ascents, dragging up one summit only to find another beyond it. The heat was building to 20 degrees when we stopped at the Workhouse Museum at Gressingham before more narrow lanes with verges of tall grasses and wildflowers lit up by poppies.
Poppies were in fields of wheat, in hedgerows and often in swathes of red covering a whole field. We dragged ourselves up yet another long slow hill with our Scots friends complaining that these were nothing compared to what they usually encountered, but I noticed that even these veteran marathon runners were glad of a chance to get their breath back at the top! After an evening at the Kings Head Inn at North Elmham we set off again towards Kings Lynn on route 1.
Locals told us that it was the hottest day of the year and we were in what they called a hay fever “Bomb” as we slogged into the wind up more “undulations” and short sharp hills, watching through eyes itching, swollen and watery, for Muntjac deer, rabbits and foxes crossing our paths.
Several stops at local Inns were necessary as by now it was twenty six degrees and a distinct need for fluids! Then back on the narrow sunken tracks which occasionally gave way to gaps in the tall hedges where we watched buzzards hunting in the fields. One swooped and grabbed a leveret in his claws but dropped it and all to a chorus of crows cawing and the delicate singing of Larks and the high pitched calls of kestrels as they hunted. We had a small delay when my chain jammed between the cassette and the frame, before we made it to Castle Rising, with its perfect example of a Motte and bailey castle.
The castle at Castle Rising
We stayed nearby and, in the morning, negotiated a pensioner’s rate for the group and visited this splendid English Heritage site, spending an hour exploring the earthworks and the stone keep before picking up route 1 again through to Sandringham. We cycled through the estate, stopping to visit the estate church so well endowed by the Royal Family and admiring its sold silver altar screen. We wobbled and slid past Snettisham along a lane freshly sprayed with tar and coated with a loose thick layer of stone dust and on to Thornham, where we had to charge the E bike overnight for the first time.
Holkham Hall
The lanes to Holkham gave way to a magnificent gateway and a mile or more of drive and then in the distance the Palladian magnificence of Holkham Hall. We freewheeled the mile down to the hall to a break under the trees.
Wondering why life was becoming more difficult and the view diminishing, we again had to sort out the shrinking seat post and unbind the brakes on the Peugeot before we made our way to Burnham Market a neat town of second homes, designer clothes and independent shops and then on via a coastal track to Wells Next the Tea and were entertained by the roar of two Eurofighters dogfighting overhead as we sat on the sea wall eating lunch. We moved on to Holt for the night.
The main track for the next day was alongside “The Poppy line” at Holt station where Martin, the owner of the holiday company, joined us on his Bergamont e mountain bike, explaining that the next mile or two might be a bit challenging on narrow tyres!
The first half mile was deep loose pea gravel, then a meander through a campsite and forestry roads before a steep decent onto a heathland track consisting of narrow rough paths cut through the surface into the thin sand, and all overgrown with bracken, ending in a steep descent through thick woodland on a muddy track laced with tree roots. We made our way to Sheringham and on to Cromer where we again rejoiced in the freewheel down into town. Looking out to sea and the broad horizon we could distinctly see the curvature of the earth and we were glad of a rest on the sea wall before a nearly vertical climb against a head wind and on to Overstrand for the night.
Public loos at Croham pretending to be beach huts
The next day as we set off, one of the bikes emitted a loud noise and slithered to a halt with the chain jammed against the frame and a spoke broken. Martin was called and took bike and rider to the nearest bike shop. The wheel could not be remade that day and the missing member of the group joined us later. We carried on towards Horsham St Faith and the final hotel at Norwich Airport.
We averaged 25 – 30 miles most days at a relaxed easy speed admirably led by Phil on his electric bike – the hotels were good as was the food and the bikes were well used hire bikes each with its own quirks. Martin and Phil went out of their way to make the week enjoyable and we would do it again.
post script by Roger
I have to grin when I hear the quotation from “Private lives” about Norfolk being flat – it may be in the middle but is positively crinkly round the edges!
I do not think that Coward was a cyclist – though it is possible that by almost killing him, a bike may have saved his life. He ran out of the front door and was very badly injured by a cyclist zooming down the hill in the same reckless way they still do. He would have been about seven or eight then and had just done his first gig at a hall in the high street. Later when he was sixteen or seventeen, he tried to enlist in the Artists Rifles and was graded unfit for duty due to the head injury he had sustained. The Somme offensive and the near defeat of 1918 were to come and he may well have become a war casualty and never penned “Private Lives “ or “Very flat – Norfolk”
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