Needham Market Ramblers Walk

Today was my first Bury St. Edmunds Ramblers walk for a while. A lot of it was familiar as it was an extended version of a morning half of a walk at Needham Market I did in August. No rain today, but it was a bit cloudy. We started at Needham Lake and walked South-west into the countryside to Tarston Hall before turning back via the hamlet of Darmsden and a stretch of the River Gipping. This was our route.

And here are a few of my photos...

Helen giving us her briefing.

The lake.

And off we went through and out of the town.

We were heading for Darmsden Church... but not yet. Dominant sights of the day were Electricity pylons and Rape flowers.

Nice cowslips!

We only caught a glimpes of Tarston Hall as we walked round it at the far point of our walk.

We had our break at St. Andrews Church, Darmsden.

We passed through the hamlet of Darmsden. I liked Kiln Cottage.

...and this old car.

The last part of our walk was along the River Gipping.

There are plans to restore this lock.

A nice stroll along the river.

And here we are nearly back at the start.

It's a pity the sun didn't come out until after we had finished, but thanks, Helen for a lovely walk.

You can see more of my photos here on Flickr and see more detail of our route on MapMyWalk

Beyton Circular Walk

I scoped out a short walk cutting down my earlier Hesset Walk and drew it up ready to use. Dawn was up for a walk at the weekend before last and I suggested doing it. "Oh no. Not Beyton. I might run into some of my pupils". Hmm. Well the sixth form of Thurston Community College, where she teaches, is in the old Beyton Middle School. Never mind. We went for a walk into town instead.

But today it was just me, so I thought I would try it out. This was my route.

Starting at Beyton Church, which has plenty of parking, I headed north up Church St. 'til the footpath sign just after the school warning sign. From here I had a couple of miles of lovely countryside.

It was good reminder. I got lots of lovely birdsong along the way.

I admired these little blue flowers alongside the path. Now what are they? Let me think... my memory is so poor, Oh now I remember.. forget-me-nots.

The horses had their blankets on as it wasn't  particularly warm. But it was warm enough for me to be in a T-shirt.
The woods beside the path were full of bluebells.

And the hedgerow had plenty of Honesty flowers....

...and stitchwort.

The trees were a lovely shade of green with their new leaves.

Eventually I reached the road and was glad of the path along the edge of the field to avoid walking on the road.

Soon I got to the edge of Hesset village.

Now I am retracing my steps from my earlier walk. See here and its associated Flickr album for more pictures from that. As a reminder, here is one of houses with pargetting.

I walked past Beyton House. Very impressive.

They had some lovely blue and white bluebells in the garden

Looking for the footpath back to the church, you may have difficulty finding the sign...

Now it was across the fields behind the sixth form...

...back to the churchyard, replete with cowslips.

A gentle 5 miles stroll. You can find more details of the route here on MapMyWalk. Shame it wasn't sunny, but very pleasant, nonetheless. And I gave my new walking shoes a decent try-out, ready for the Bury to Lavenham this Friday.... more anon, but there is beer to drink first, as you will see!

Diabolo

Coming soon. Some Diabolo beer.

Primary fermentation fiinised and siphoned off to clarification stage today - bottling in 7-10 days time. It already tastes good and appears to be over 8% ABV. That will be some Christmas presents for this year sorted once it has had a decent time in bottle.

Ed's Non-Leaving Do

This was funny... and fun. Ed was coming to the end of his contract so he organised a leaving do for today. As I had recruited him, I thought I ought to see him off, so I changed my working days this week from Wednesday and Thursday to Thursday and Friday and bought my train tickets so I could drink and not drive.

And then Ed was persuaded to stay for another month... and he may be coming back in a different role for even longer. "So are you rescheduling your leaving do, then, Ed?", I asked. "No. No. It's still going ahead!" he replied.

Well he had done some organising! He had arranged to use the CASS centre, which was a rather nice idea as it's just across the way from the office and we would get to mingle with some of our colleagues at The Press, having their Friday after-work drinks.

And, what is more, he had arranged for the band he plays in, The Stormy Mondays, to provide some entertainment!

They had a decent-sized audience to play to.

Now here's something... they had a guest guitarist for a couple of numbers. Our team-mate Ben joined them! It's no good trying to hide behind the speaker, Ben. we can still see you!

They even got people up dancing.

At the end of the set, Ed had a keyboard solo.

Thanks, Ed "Jools" Graham (and the rest of the band) for a memorable evening. And it's not good-bye, but "See you in the office next week". Lol.

QC Blogging day

Times Quick Cryptic No 1339 by Teazel

Our Friday entertainment today comes from Teazel. And a very neat puzzle it is too. Lots of very straightforward clues to give the less-experienced a good foothold, I think, and a good variety of clue types. Lessons today include how to spot a definition by example, the use of the NATO phonetic alphabet, insertions, deletions, anagrams, charades, a double definition and a lovely semi-&lit. But my COD goes to 18d for the little joke in the wordplay. Only 1a and 2d gave me any significant pause for thought as I completed this in 4:50. Thanks Teazel! How did everyone else get on?

( Read all about it... )

Prize Crossword Win!

I got a letter from News UK today...

Woo! But whatever happened to my runners up prize from the Mephisto in March? I sent another message to the Sunday Times Crossword editor., who previously said..

...saying...

Bradfield Woods Spring Flowers

This is a must-do Spring walk. The last time I went I was too early, so today I thought I'd have a quick late-afternoon walk at Bradfield Woods to see the spring flowers. [Regular readers may remember my autumn visit and it featured several times in my old blog].

Today it was just me and I did the Blue route followed by the Orange route.

The paths were bone-dry. About time we had some rain! But everything was green and growing and I saw plenty of lovely flowers. Those that I photographed today include primroses, early purple orchids, wood anemones (although these were coming to an end), violas, bluebells (now fully out), ramsons (aka wild garlic) just coming out, bugles, stitchwort and, of course, the rare oxlips. Here they are... not quite in that order, but I'm sure you can work out which is which.

Lovely!

You can see a few more of my photos here on Flickr and more details of the route here on MapMyWalk.