Month: April 2024

Since Bob and I saw so much of the St Edmundsbury Cathedral yesterday during our walk around the abbey grounds, we decided to go back today to get a tour of the inside of the church/now cathedral. As we learned, the building is the epitome of both old and new, although the construction succeeded in melding the two so that it looks like a cohesive whole.

The building began as the Church of St James, and the old building (originally constructed in the 11th century) is the part that you first enter.

The tour guide stated that the Diocese of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich was created in 1914, which required the creation of a cathedral. Since this was at the end of WWI, followed by financial constraints and then WWII, the construction of the cathedral didn’t get started until after 1943 when Stephen Dykes Bower was selected as the architect. Normally, Ipswich, being the larger and the county seat, would have been the chosen location. However, all of the historic churches in Ipswich are located in the city center with no room for expansion, so the St James church in Bury was selected.

After our tour, we stopped in the lovely cathedral gift shop and also in the tourist information center, where we picked up lots of additional information on what to do in the local area.

Bob and I arrived by train into Bury St. Edmunds at 10:30 Saturday morning, where we were met by our current homeowner and driven to our current housesit. We had a great chat over a cuppa and then a walkthrough before they headed off for Norway.

We are sitting for two dogs. The sweet, but fierce Mollie (she will get her choice of dog beds), and the lovable Angus, who just can’t get enough affection.

They get at least two walks a day and also have a lovely garden to play in, now that we have sun again!

Bury St. Edmunds, commonly referred to as Bury, is a historic market and cathedral town in West Suffolk. Although it has a population of about 45,000 (much bigger than we were expecting), it does not have the city designation. It is best known for the Bury St Edmunds Abbey and the St Edmundsbury Cathedral. We started with the Abbey this morning.

Although, perhaps we should start with a little history from long ago. It seems that King Edmund of East Anglia fought against a Danish (site of our next housesit!) invasion on November 20, 869. He was captured but refused to give up his Christian faith. The Danes then killed him by tying him to a tree, shooting him with arrows, and then decapitating him. When Edmund’s men came to retrieve him after the battle, they found his body but not his head. A wolf’s cries alerted the men to the head that the wolf was guarding, and when the head was placed with the body it fused back on. Thus, he became St Edmund and the Patron Saint of England from 869 to 1350.

Edmund’s body was buried in the abbey, the ruins and grounds of which we explored today.

Another brief foray into history. The Magna Carta is England’s foundational document for their democracy, a bit like the US Constitution, but written in 1215. In 1214, the Archbishop of Canterbury secretly brought a number of barons to the Bury Abbey to discuss the unpopular King John, which was the first step towards the signing of the Magna Carta. I prefer my history lessons in beautiful surroundings!

Bob and I have had a lovely visit in Cambridge. It is so nice to train into a place and know where to go without getting out the Google Maps to direct us!

Yesterday, we had a great meet-up with prior homeowners (and now friends) Peter and Sue, whose home and adorable cat we cared for in October/November of 2022 while they were exploring New Zealand and cheering on the England Women’s Rugby Team in the Covid-delayed 2021 World Cup.

After checking into the Ibis by the train station, though not as early as we expected, don’t get Bob started on that, we met up with Peter, Sue, and Hugo at their home. We went to a local farm market, shops, and cafe for coffee and cake and some shopping before going back to their house to continue the visit. By this time, Hugo had awoken from his nap and came right up to us on the couch as if to welcome us back. He got right on Bob’s lap and purred contentedly. It was the sweetest thing.

Hugo is full of personality and reminded all of us later when it was his dinner time.

Hugo’s humans and us had a great dinner at Tawa, a local Indian restaurant that Bob and I had enjoyed during our first visit.

Today, Sue took me to Newnham College to see the gardens and “have a cuppa,” as they say in the cafe on campus.

Bob and I later walked into the town center and down by the River Cam to reacquaint ourselves with more of Cambridge. We stumbled onto Downing College that had some areas open to the public.

One of the places open to the public on the Downing College campus is the Heinz Gallery, where they were having an exhibition by Issam Kourbaj.

Tomorrow we get back to housesitting by meeting with our homeowners in Bury (pronounced Berry) St. Edmunds.

Today, was all about reading and books, although a bit differently than we expected. We started with a leisurely morning reading the paper, and John Crace making me laugh with his word phrasing

Then we headed off to the National Centre for Writing where we thought we would learn a bit about English writers. We did not, but we did learn about Dragon Hall, the lovely medieval building in which the Centre is housed. It was built around 1427 by a wealthy merchant.

While we didn’t learn anything about writers from our tour, the National Centre for Writing does seem to host a number of writing related events for the community and even has a cottage nearby to house writers or translators in residence. Also, I picked up a brochure that we would use for another walking tour of the city after we checked out the public library that Bob had researched for us.

The impressive sounding Norfolk and Norwich Millenium Library is housed in an impressive modern building called The Forum, which also houses cafes and other businesses.

After exploring the library, we headed out to do the walking route to find the book-themed benches around Norwich. During our walk, we also popped into the department store, Jarrold’s, which we had seen yesterday but hadn’t explored (very impressive food hall and 4 restaurants within the store!), and stopped into a local bakery, which used to just be a stall in the market but has now transferred into a brick and mortar building, for a lovely cheese scone. The walk also took us through a number of small alleyways in Norwich, so it made for a great walk even with the on again/off again rain that was not noted in our weather app.

Fun find of the day, and in memory of Bob’s dad who worked for the US Postal Service for many years.

Norwich is a city within the county of Norfolk, England. It is about 100 miles northeast of London and has a population of about 144,000. It claims to be the most complete medieval city in the UK. In 2012, it was designated as England’s first UNESCO City of Literature. (We hope to learn more about that tomorrow.)

Our inn had a handy map to help us explore, so we identified some places of interest to visit and headed out in the misty day.

We had seen that the Plantation Gardens were a must see, and they are located very close to the cathedral. We paid the 2 pounds to visit the small, but very lovely Italian gardens. The gardens were established over 100 years ago in an abandoned chalk quarry.

Bob and I arrived in Norwich this afternoon at about 3:20 after having traveled by train from Eastbourne to London, switching stations in London by tube, and then onward to Norwich. We had a short 10 minute walk to our hotel, where we’ll be for 3 nights.

Shortly after unpacking we went for a walk along the riverside walking path that we could catch near the train station.

We’re looking forward to exploring more of Norwich tomorrow.

After completing the multi-day hike and before a day of travel to Norwich tomorrow (a train, a tube and another train), Bob and I have had a pretty lazy day in Eastbourne.

We had the free breakfast at the hotel (a good buffet of hot and cold options), and then headed to a launderette to do some much needed laundry. The launderette was staffed, so we could get the proper coinage (7 pounds here for a wash versus 6 in Winchester) and we had a nice chat with a man, originally from South America but who has been in England for 60 years and has served king and country (his words) by serving some time in the military. He helped us as well with the machines.

From there, we walked to the rail station to print our tickets for tomorrow. After folding and packing our clothes. We had a lovely but windy walk on the promenade and out to the pier.

We have just woken up from a nap and feel quite content not doing much else today.

Bob and I completed the South Downs Way (SDW) at about 2:00 pm this afternoon. Today, we are the Big Head photo after almost 130 miles (according to Bob’s fitness tracker) with mileage to and from our accommodations included.

Today’s route was just over 13 miles with the most climbs balanced by awesome views, as we went up and over the Seven Sisters, down into Birling Gap, up and over Beachy Head, which seemed never-ending and then steeply down only to be taken backup and over a couple more hills to get into Eastbourne. There will be wine and a proper meal out tonight. Photos below.

We left The Dorset Inn in Lewes this morning a little less pleased with it than initially after the coffee machine in the room didn’t work and they offered only a continental breakfast of store-bought rolls, some fruit, cereal, and yogurt, and bread for make-your-own toast. That isn’t horrible, but there were no plates (but a few bowls), and when the other guest eating at the same time as us asked for butter for the toast, the staff member brought him 2 pats of butter. We would have had to ask for our own. Quite a unique experience and good for a story.

On the way back out of Lewes to return to the trail, Bob found us a route that took us by the home of Anne of Cleves, so we could at least get a photo. Anne was the 4th wife of Henry VIII, so was Queen for about 7 months in 1540. She was lucky enough to get out of the marriage with just an annulment instead of a beheading.

Bob tells me that today’s walk was the same length as yesterday’s, but it felt much different. We had an hour and 20 minute walk back to the trail, much of it steeply uphill, and that was only one of quite a few hill climbs today. We also had quite the downpour for about 30 or 40 minutes atop a couple of the hills later in the walk, that we luckily had dressed for before it started. However, after the burst, we were treated to sun that helped dry us out.

Bob and I really enjoyed our stay at the Tallai House last night. The room was cute and comfortable, and the host couple were very nice. Breakfast was also very good. I’m on a three day streak of salmon and scrambled eggs with toast for breakfast, and this morning, Bob joined me with the same order.

Our walk today was 15 miles from Pyecombe to Lewes (pronounced Lewis not Lou’s). The walk directly to Lewes would be much shorter, but the directions kept us west of Lewes for a bit along the South Downs Way before heading us back towards Lewes for a 3.3 mile walk off the trail to our inn, which gave us an opportunity to see a bit of this relatively large town (population 17,000).

We arrived at the inn in Lewes at about 2:10 and for the first time on this trip when we have arrived before check-in time (generally 3:00 pm, although yesterday it was 4:00), we were able to get into our room. It’s just always nice to be able to settle in, shower, etc., when we get into town, especially in the smaller communities with nothing else really to do. Our room here is also the largest so far, which adds to the comfort of the stay.

It was a good walk with good weather. Some cold winds initially, but the sun stayed out for most of the walk and helped to warm things up.