"We will be meeting at Needham Lakes next Wednesday (Aug 29th) at 10.30am. I'll be leading a 4.5 mile walk to begin and then another 5 mile loop after a stop at our cars or maybe Alder Carr Farm shop? You are free to do the first walk or both.", said the invite from Joyce.
It was pouring with rain. "Where are my waterproof trousers?", I asked Mrs Interred. I had searched the reorganised garage in vain. "I think I threw them out", was the answer. No matter. I would just wear my shorts - it wasn't cold.
Needham Lake is a free countryside attraction centred around a flooded gravel pit close to Needham Market . It was over 10 years since I first visited with the family, as you can see here, but I never had done any of the River Gipping walk.
We met as planned, although we had to go searching for Roland, who had parked in the area used for Car Boot sales.We started with a loop through the town and then south before turning north-east, visiting St. Andrews Church, Darmsden, crossing the railway line, and returning along the lovely River Gipping. Along the way, the rain stopped and we were able to take our waterproofs off.
We ate our picnic lunch back at the lake car-park (we weren't going to sit on the wet benches at the picnic tables). Needham Lake is allegedly the second most visited completely free attraction in Suffolk. We wondered how there could be any evidence for that - maybe an online survey? We liked that the car park was free. We did not like that the picnic site had no bins any more. How odd!
We then did our second loop heading along the river and then North-East past the (closed) Fen Alder Carr Nature Reserve. It rained off and on as we did our second loop, but we didn't mind. After a delightful stretch through the wood and along a wide bridleway alongside some fields we re-crossed the A14 and visited Alder Carr Farm Shop for tea. I'd already stopped there on my way to the rendezvous and had a delicious pasty from the shop for my lunch. From there we crossed the river by the impressive Hawks Mill. and returned through the back streets of the town and the Nature Reserve by the lake.
Here is a view of our route.
Here are a few photos from along the way.
The lake in the rain
The Cattle Tunnel was an interesting way of crossing the railway line into the town
This is Darmsden Church. I took one of the leaflets...
The River Gipping
There were lots of these rather pretty flowers along the river. They turned out to be Himalayan Balsam. "Himalayan balsam (Impatiens glandulifera) is a relative of the busy Lizzie, but reaches well over head height, and is a major weed problem, especially on riverbanks and waste land, but can also invade gardens. It grows rapidly and spreads quickly, smothering other vegetation as it goes." Oh dear.
No bins... at a picnic site?
Along with blackberries, damsons, sloes and hops, we found these lovely red berries on our afternoon walk. What were they? I used this site to check, and they look like cranberries to me. Am I right?
St. Marys Creeting Church
It may have been grey adn a bit rainy, but we still got some lovely vistas.
We loved this broad path. "Doesn't that look like they are having a nice country stroll", said Roland.
We came across these lovely looking apples. I tried one, but I took one that wasn't quite ripe. Very tasty, though.
We enjoyed our tea stop at Alder Carr Farm shop.
The rather impressive Hawks Mill.
And then we were back where we started at the lake!. A great double walk. Thanks Joyce for leading us and Nicky and Roland for the additional company.
I took quite a few more photos - and you can see all of them individually here. The slide show below shows them all in sequence.
Created with flickr slideshow.
You can also see more details of our route on MapMyWalk.
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