NCN 1 Woodbridge to Norwich
Beccles
Stage 5 of the NCN Route 1 (Dover to the Shetland Isles)
Woodbridge to Norwich 108Km
Journal Note written on a country lane north of Woodbridge
The early morning light has a fragility to it which I want to hold and protect in the cup of my hand. A weak sun highlights changing leaves and a tractor out before dawn drags clouds of seagulls behind its harrow. Distant roads hum with traffic and in an oak tree of many centuries, a steady ‘eek, eek, eek’ emits from the misshapen trunk. A late brood? A creaking limb? The Green Man? Crab apples like red and yellow boules lie across the road and at the entrance driveway to a house there is a box of bulging Bramley apples lying on the grass, beside an honesty box. From inside trees, the rasp of crows and jackdaws claws at the air the motionless air and the jolting of a titanium bike frame on Suffolk’s rough and narrow lanes, awakens the body of a cyclist.
The land of pigeons
They applaud with their wings as they launch
into the late summer air from a
brown, grainy field
at the sound of an air gun.
As a pack they bullet themselves against the low grey cloud
streamlined air-balls out-flanking the sparrow hawks
who track them from the trees.
They rise like musical notes high in the octaves of sky
and hang as a semibreve
before the final crescendo dive
onto the field once more,
where in a few bars of silence
the soft steady beat of bobbing begins again.
Defoe on ‘High-Suffolk
I find very little remarkable on this side of Suffolk. It is full of rich feeding grounds and large farms, most employed in dairies for making the Suffolk butter and cheese.
Journal note written in the grounds of Framlingham Castle.
Every house is painted. Suffolk pink, winter sky blue, dark day grey, vanilla ice and raspberry creams. The Crown hotel in the main square has served coffee outside to a couple. The man wears a thick jersey and cagoule and his hand is digging in a rear pocket of his beige shorts searching for a wallet. She is guiding her wind-tousled hair with a finger and thumb behind her left ear. Her right hand holds the coffee-cup, as yet unfinished. The waitress in her black dress and white pinafore lingers with a tray. She watches him, he watches the young girl who looks away to the distance.
Framlingham
Journal note written at Framlingham Castle
Two boys released from the prison of a car race across the green barbican of grass shouting ‘aaaaaarrggggh’ at the castle walls. A dog follows joining in the pursuit with barking. One of the boys finds a stick on the grass and grabs it without breaking stride and makes for the brother/cousin/friend whom he lances. There is a squeal and fall and more barking from the dog as the parents walk in their unhurried way to the fallen. The stick-sword is raised by the victor pointing to the sky and the smile of triumph creases the face of the blond-haired warrior. Mum says, you must be careful, Harry, who now vanquished by the fear of the parental blast lowers his sword and smile and looks with concern at the whimpering boy in the grass.
The castle looks as the children’s history books say a castle should appear, with a menacing curtain wall linked by towers, barbican killing grounds, and arrow slits from where the authority of the conqueror rained upon the subjugated people. The castle successors now delight in selling plastic swords (made in China), pots of ‘Local Suffolk Honey,’ and prettily photographed books of other romantic ruins.
Framlingham Castle
WhatsApp message home
I’ve ridden through the swathes of earth-greens, of different hues and minerals. Now in Norwich.
Defoe on the same earth-hued lands
I can’t omit, that this country of Suffolk is particularly famous for furnishing the city of London and all the counties around, with turkeys; and that it is thought, there are more turkeys bred in this county, and that part of Norfolk that adjoins to it, than in all the rest of England. I received an account from a person living on the place, that they have counted 300 droves of turkeys (for they drive them on foot) pass in one season over Stratford Bridge on the River Stour. These droves, as they say, generally contain from three hundred to a thousand each drove; so that one may suppose them to contain 500 one with another, which is 150000 in all.
The Suffolk Countryside
Continuum
The ride changes from corn fields and large farms to water meadows through which the river Waveney flows. It’s a bucolic land of green and richness.
Defoe on Norwich
Norwich is an ancient, rich and populous city….where…. the inhabitants being all busy at their manufactures, dwell in their garrets at their looms, and in the combing shops, so they call them, twisting-mills and other work-houses’.
Journal notes whilst waiting in the queue to enter the Cathedral
The man checking bookings has a clipboard. He asks everyone for their name. He reminds me of St Peter, as painted by Michelangelo, with his cloud-like grey beard. St. Peter is checking if people have booked on-line.
A couple six in front of me are turned away.
The couple four in front are told to wait ‘over there.’
St Peter allows me in!
Journal Note written in Norwich Cathedral
I sit on a solitary chair in the nave, resting tired legs.
A woman has trouble placing her candle onto the iron hoop where she hopes it will burn and her prayers might be answered. Each time she turns away, it falls to the floor. She returns to retrieve it, re-lights it from a neighbouring flame, places it and turns to leave. It falls again and the process is repeated. I’m about to rise and help her, but a verger fast approaches, arms outstretched, a smile upon his ruddy face. Quickly he picks up the candle, re-lights it and with a much practised hand, impales it onto a spike, where it continues to glow. The woman thanks him and continues to stand and look into its flame.
The money box for the candles is full. The verger in black cassock, his candle duties done, now stands beside it smiling, his hands resting upon his tummy. A man in jeans and a cream jersey comes rushing across the nave jangling keys. He looks harassed, but opens the box and from underneath the slit, wrestles a much folded plastic £10 note. The verger watches like a crow, his head askance at all the money pouring out into a plastic bag. The empty box is re-positioned and locked, and the treasurer scurries back into the shadows. The verger, his protection of the money box fulfilled, and with the candles still burning, now paces upon the huge stone flags of the floor. He has folded his left arm behind his back and his right hand reaches behind to clasp it. His white hair is coloured by the refracted light from the stained glass windows. He approaches people standing in ones and twos and asks where are they from. He asks if they have had a good journey and where they are staying and how long will they might stay in Norfolk.
‘I’m a Catholic,’ I hear a woman say to him. ‘I am in the wrong Church, but it doesn’t matter because he’s still the same God’.
The verger raises his heavily haired right eyebrow at this and she drops her water bottle. He stoops to pick it up for her and together they walk away towards the chancel screen. Click, click, click, go his shoes, his left arm still folded behind his back, his head turned towards the Catholic woman.
Little moments of wonder shaft down from the great bosses in the roof - Adam is coerced by Eve, Abraham raises his knife to his son’s throat, Noah shepherds his animals onto an improbably small boat. Green men leer from capitals, medieval merchant-men stick out their tongues and old bishops lie rigid in their stone copes. I am dwarfed by the enormity of the place and all the sanctity it has accrued through the ages. I am humbled and liberated.
Norwich Cathedral
Journal notes made in the Wellington Apartments, Norwich
I have rented a suite of rooms for the night in an apartment hotel. It is cheaper than most out-of-city box-room hotels. There is a bedroom, a living room with a sofa and a kitchen with a microwave. Had a pint of Ghost Pale Ale in St Andrew’s Brewery but they were not serving food so I bought a Tesco's Macaroni Microwave Meal because all the restaurants appear to be shut. The TV tells of Covid spreading again across northern England. I might have to halt my tour. Another lockdown is mooted by a government minister.