Lynford Walk

What a lovely crisp winter's day for a walk. The sun was shining, the ground was (a bit) frosty. and the snowdrops were out in abundance. We met at Lynford Stag, and this was our route...

It is many years since I was last here, but I've blogged about it before when we first visited and then again when we returned. I'm not sure I've been there since until today. Here is a selection of my photos from the walk today.

 

Chris gave us an interesting introduction to the walk explaining the history of the stag and the Hall.

There was a bit of ice on the lakes but not enough to support the weight of more than a duck.

 

The fighting bulls statue by Lynford Hall . Read all about it here.

 

Lynford Hall Lodge.

 We stopped at the lake. Now where else away from the coast would you find a sandy beach as good as this?

 

We walked through the magnificent arboretum.

 

There were lots of snowdrops!

 

We wondered about the purpose of this structure. After an Internet search I am none the wiser. This doesn't help.

 

The area is very popular with bird-watchers. Like this chap we met.

 

We cam across some Highland cattle. This one was particularly cute and (potentially) cuddly.

 

And here we are back at the stag.

A lovely morning's walk. Thanks, Chris!
Here is a slideshow of my photos (Flash required)...

or you can see them here on Flickr. And you can see more details of our route in my MapMyWalk log.

Dunwich and Minsmere Walk

I hadn't been for ages, but it's Dawn's favourite place on the coast to go for a walk and it was her turn to decide where to go. Dunwich Heath. Not content with just doing one of the waymarked trails, we took a route we had walked before, heading North through the heath before turning South West and circumnavigating the Minsmere nature reserve. This was our route.

Although a bit windy it wasn't too cold and it stayed dry until just after we finished. Here are a few photos from along the route.

We stopped for lunch at the wonderful Eel's Foot pub. The sausage baguette was very filling and the Adnams Old Ale very moreish. Fortunately, I wasn't driving. Frequented by the BBC Springwatch crew, there are signatures all over the ceiling. I particularly liked that Melanie signed herself as Head of Better. W1A was such a good spoof!

We took a short detour to visit the ruins of  Leiston Abbey Chapel, which is all that remains of the original abbey. The view of it looking south made an odd juxtaposition with Sizewell B power station in the background.

We passed this nice flock, some of whom took to the air.

As we walked along the sea-front I stopped at the public viewing platform to try out the extra zoom of my new camera.

We ended at the foot of the cliffs with a view along the beach to Southwold in the distance.

A nice 6 1/2 mile walk. Here is a slideshow of my pictures (Flash required).

You can see them all here on Flickr and see more details of our route in my MapMyWalk log.

Jumbo Blogging Day

Times Cryptic Jumbo No 1362 - 12th January

I ground to a halt about 2 thirds of the way through this with the LHS proving somewhat recalcitrant. In the end, though, I finished in under an hour, so on the whole it's not too hard (there are plenty of clues visiting from Quick Cryptic land). I started to worry that I was going to stay stuck and struggle to complete the puzzle... and the blog, but a couple of penny-drops saw me home. One or two clues still have me a little puzzled, though. [Edit: I Finally saw the one that I didn't understand at all - 30D only in my last edit before publishing]. Comments to help unbefuddle me welcome! There are several lovely clues and smooth surfaces to enjoy. In addition to that troublesome 30D, I liked  25A, 38A, 12D and 15D , but, best of all, the concise and witty 23D. Thanks for the entertainment, setter! How did you all get on?

( Read all about it... )

Mallorca Walking Festival

This is exciting. I'm joining some friends for another walking festival in April... La Primavera Mallorca Walking Event. And I've signed up to do 30km each day. Gulp! I never thought a year ago I would be spending my birthday this year walking in Spain! I wonder if there will be as many crazy Dutch people as there were in Marbella? Looking forward to it already.

Lavenham to Preston St. Mary Walk

This was the first time this year I was able to get out to join the Ramblers Tuesday walk. It was a lovely day for it! No route to share, unfortunately, as I failed to correctly restart my tracking app after our stop for a break.

Lavenham was looking at its picturesque best in the winter sunshine as we walked down from the car park.

As we headed across a field, I got taller and taller as the mud stuck to my boots. Looking back we got a nice view of Lavenham,

Here is a selection of my photos from along the way.

 

Break time. Wish I had brought myself some coffee!.

Lavenham Church in the distance... not far now.

Decision time... do we go on the muddy path or back along the High Street? The mud-avoiders won the vote

This one would be my picture postcard of the day.

Here is a slide show of all my photos (Flash required)

You can also see my pictures here on Flickr.

Thanks Barbara and Bill for a great walk!