THE PEDDARS WAY and NORFOLK COAST PATH About the Author Phoebe Is an Award-Winning Travel Writer, Broadcaster and Photographer
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THE PEDDARS WAY AND NORFOLK COAST PATH About the Author Phoebe is an award-winning travel writer, broadcaster and photographer. THE PEDDARS WAY AND She writes extensively for a range of newspapers and magazines in the UK and overseas and hosts the Wander Woman podcast. She contributes regu- NORFOLK COAST PATH larly to BBC Radio 4’s From Our Own Correspondent and is often seen on BBC Breakfast talking travel and adventure. 130 MILE NATIONAL TRAIL – NORFOLK’S BEST She delights in long distance walking with her self-shot film on the Appalachian Trail shortlisted for Travel Media Award. She walked the INLAND AND COASTAL SCENERY little-known Wanderlust Way in a day to raise money for the Duke of Edinburgh’s Diamond Challenge and in 2017 completed the Arctic Circle by Phoebe Smith Trail in Greenland, hiking from Ice Cap to Ocean, solo, over eight days. In 2014 she became the first person to camp solo at all the extreme points of mainland Britain on consecutive nights. And at Christmas 2018 she walked across Britain solo following Hadrian’s Wall from Sunderland to Bowness- on-Solway, dressed as Wander Woman, over four days. She raised over £16,000 for Centrepoint, the young people’s homeless charity. Her other books include Extreme Sleeps: Adventures of a Wild Camper; Wild Nights: Camping Britain’s Extremes; Britain’s Best Small Hills; Wilderness Weekends: Wild Adventures in Britain’s Rugged Corners. JUNIPER HOUSE, MURLEY MOSS, OXENHOLME ROAD, KENDAL, CUMBRIA LA9 7RL www.cicerone.co.uk © Phoebe Smith 2019 Second edition 2019 CONTENTS ISBN: 978 1 85284 750 0 First edition 2013 Map key ...................................................... 6 Printed by KHL Printing, Singapore. Overview map ................................................. 7 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British INTRODUCTION .............................................. 9 Library. Geology ..................................................... 11 All photographs © Phoebe Smith and Neil S Price. History of Norfolk .............................................. 11 History of the trail .............................................. 14 © Crown copyright 2019 OS PU100012932. Wildlife ..................................................... 16 Plants and flowers ............................................. 17 Dedication Art ......................................................... 19 What to take .................................................. 19 For my Mum and Dad who were there when I took my Waymarking, access and maps .................................... 20 first steps on a much longer journey… Emergencies .................................................. 21 Using this guide ............................................... 21 Acknowledgements Getting there ................................................. 22 With thanks to Neil without whom some of these amazing photos would never Getting around ................................................ 23 have appeared. When to go .................................................. 24 In which direction? ............................................. 24 Accommodation ............................................... 26 Updates to this Guide Health and safety .............................................. 26 While every effort is made by our authors to ensure the accuracy of guide- Practicalities .................................................. 27 books as they go to print, changes can occur during the lifetime of an edi- tion. Any updates that we know of for this guide will be on the Cicerone Stage 1 Knettishall Heath to Little Cressingham ..................... 29 website (www.cicerone.co.uk/750/updates), so please check before plan- Stage 2 Little Cressingham to Castle Acre ......................... 42 ning your trip. We also advise that you check information about such Stage 3 Castle Acre to Sedgeford ................................ 55 things as transport, accommodation and shops locally. Even rights of way Stage 4 Sedgeford to Hunstanton ................................ 65 can be altered over time. We are always grateful for information about any Stage 5 Hunstanton to Burnham Deepdale ........................ 76 discrepancies between a guidebook and the facts on the ground, sent by Stage 6 Burnham Deepdale to Stiffkey ............................ 88 email to [email protected] or by post to Cicerone, Juniper House, Stage 7 Stiffkey to Cley next the Sea ............................ 100 Murley Moss, Oxenholme Road, Kendal LA9 7RL. Stage 8 Cley next the Sea to Cromer ............................ 108 Register your book: To sign up to receive free updates, special offers Stage 9 Cromer to Sea Palling ................................. 121 and GPX files where available, register your book at www.cicerone.co.uk. Stage 10 Sea Palling to Caister-on-Sea ............................ 131 Stage 11 Caister-on-Sea to Hopton-on-Sea ........................ 138 Front cover: Feeling solid ground beneath boots as the path leaves the beach at Appendix A Route summary table .............................. 145 Gramborough Hill (Stage 8) Appendix B Useful contacts ................................... 146 6 T HE Cley next the Sea and Weybourne (Stage8) Weybourne theSeaand next Cley between Path partsas are oftheNorfolk Coast thesea, upby soonswallowed are Footprints P Route symbolsonOSmapextracts EDDARS W AY AND route direction finish ofroute start ofroute route N ORFOLK For OSlegendseemaps. For C OAS T P A T H Features on the overview map ontheoverview Features Natural Beauty Natural Area ofOutstanding Forest Park/National Forest National park Urban area County/Unitary boundary Brancaster Wells- THE WASH Roads next-the-Sea N Holkham Blakeney Holme next Cley next the Sea the Sea Burnham Stiffkey Cromer Hunstanton A149 Deepdale Sheringham 0 20 Sedgeford Norfolk Coast km Holt A149 A148 North 0 10 miles Fakenham Walsham A149 A148 Aylsham R Bure Stalham A140 A Sea Palling 1078 A1065 A1067 A NORFOLK R Hoveton THE 1062 A149 W Castle Acre e BROADS A47 King’s Lynn ns A47 Dereham A47 um Caister-on-Sea Norwich A1064 Yare A47 A1122 R Acle Great Swaffham Yarmouth A1 Wymondham R Yare 1 2 2 Watton Downham A1075 A146 A1101 A12 Hopton- March Market A134 A11 Loddon on-Sea A10 Little Cressingham A143 Attleborough Beccles Bungay Lowestoft O A140 VERVIE Little Ouse R A144 Littleport A145 A143 Chatteris A1101 A1066 Diss W Harleston A1065 ey MA n 7 A11Thetford Ely e P Knettishall Heath R Wav Halesworth Mildenhall A1123 A142 A143 Southwold A134 CAMBRIDGESHIRE THE PEDDARS WAY AND NORFOLK COAST PATH Crab baskets and boats in the fishermen’s yard at Brancaster Staithe (Stage 5) INTRODUCTION The Norfolk Coast Path encounters cliffs at Weybourne (Stage 8) Wilderness is something so many of us the feeling of unbridled wilderness. search for on our small island. Many Despite an ever-growing population, will tell you that – if anywhere – it can this region is still one of the most be found in the mountainous hinter- unpopulated in the country. Take a land of the Scottish Highlands; others break in the Breckland woods just will argue that, if you know where to minutes from the start of the route and look, it can be discovered within the you’ll experience just how quiet, and southern extremities of Snowdonia. how still, this eastern corner of Britain Few, if any, will try to convince you can be. Better yet, visit in the win- that it can reside here, in East Anglia. ter when the wind carries a frosting But it does. of snow that cakes the golden sand The landscape through which the dunes in crisp white powder and ices old Peddars Way and Norfolk Coast the hedgerows with a dazzling coat of Path cleaves its very determined way rime. is very special. Stand on Blakeney The significance of the route is Point or on the edge of the beach at borne out by its long history since the Holkham, or even the dunes of Holme the invading Romans set the native next the Sea in the bracing wind, and Iceni (whose ancestors had used it you will feel how wild this stretch of long before their captors arrived) the coastline can truly be. And it’s not task of constructing part of it in AD61 just the landscape that can evoke under the gaze of ancient Bronze Age 8 9 THE PEDDARS WAY AND NORFOLK COAST PATH HISTORY OF NORFOLK tumuli. Indeed, even before then, have had two mirror-opposite experi- attempt to lure you from the path as and gravel ridges (in Cromer and people had lived under the big skies ences within a period of hours. you make your way past open vistas of south of Blakeney), the mix of which, amid the saltmarshes, cliffs and sandy On the Peddars Way, Roman sparkling sand. Further along the route along with sand, created the Brecks. beaches for many millennia. roads make way for more modern tar- come wooden beach huts and family This unique gorse-covered sandy A combination of two separately mac affairs until you’re plunged back parties, followed by crumbling military heath, covering 1015km2, is tra- designated paths, this 216km (133 into walkways lined with Scots pine. remains from World War II and the versed on parts of the early stages of mile) National Trail could certainly, Picture-perfect chocolate-box villages wide open expanses of farmland dot- the Peddars Way in north Suffolk and above all others in the UK’s network, lead you to vast clay fields smattered ted with de-sailed windmills, before south Norfolk. After this glaciation and be described as a walk of two halves. with lumps of white-coated flint and reaching the piers and maritime trap- erosion a series