Today was my third of 4 Tuesday pop-up walks. This was the listing..
It is based on a walk from my AA 50 Walks in Suffolk book : number 30 - Ixworth and Pakenham, which I had first done with Dawn in January this year (see here). Curiously, although we had been to Ixworth many times (particularly to eat at The Pyckkerell) we had never walked from there (although I did pass through on the Theatre Royal 200 for 200 last day walk last April). We enjoyed it and I thought then it would make a good Ramblers Tuesday walk. At just 5 miles it is not long, but is full of interest. And OK, I cheated, the picture at the start is from my longer February version of the walk, but it is picturesque too.
I got a call from someone yesterday asking if the walk was cancelled. He had seen on the Bury St Edmunds Ramblers website that the other pop-up walks scheduled today had been cancelled because of the heat wave. In the end he decided not to come and I got a couple of other people say they weren't coming too. But I didn't cancel my walk as it is very gentle and I had two options to shorten it if needed.
In the end, I needn't have worried; we had a bit of cloud cover so didn't have the sun beating down on us and even got a little sprinkle of light rain for a few minutes half way round our walk to keep us cool.
This was our route today.
There were, in the end, only four of us, but that didn't matter. It was great to catch up with Sue and John and we set a comfortable leisurely pace that still got us back to the start by 12:30.
Here are some of my photos.
We know how to do social distancing.
Walking round St. Mary's church, Sue pointed out that this was a walnut tree.
Yes it was just like the one I'd seen on this walk, about a month ago, but rather bigger.
We stopped to admire the Grade I listed Ixworth Abbey house, which incorporates ruins of the 12th century Augustinian Ixworth Priory... and has a cricket pitch in the grounds.
Crossing the Black Bourne we heard shrieks of excitement from children playing in the water. "I saw a lobster!", said one of them. That will be one of those invasive signal crayfishes, I'm guessing.
We walked across fields for a while with lovely views. I liked these hay bales in the field ahead of us just before we turned back.
Soon we go our first view of the Pakenham Windmill.
And, just before the windmill what did we see? Another walnut tree!
The windmill is an impressive 5 story structure originally built in 1817. I told my walkers that Pakenham has the distinction of being the only village in England to have both a working windmill and a working watermill. Mind you, they could have read that for themselves on the sign on the gate!
What was that lurking at the side of the windmill? It is a little replica! I'd not noticed that before. I checked my photos from other walks. It wasn't there when I did this one in May. I wonder what it is for? This story may explain the origin.
We descended to Fulmer bridge. The stream here, which leads to the watermill, is rather overgrown. "Is that watercress?", we wondered.
We walked through the delightful hamlet of Grimstone End. Sue suggested the name came from it being grim to work with the millstones at the water mill. I can't find any corroboration of that, but this article describes the lime burning industry here.
Whatever.. we enjoyed this cottage garden.
And what did we see in a garden? Another walnut tree!
We came across an unusual road sign.
Shortly after, we reached the Watermill and its mill pond, complete with topiary from the business next door.
We spotted some house martins flitting about and then saw these nests in the eaves of the watermill building.
We were on the home leg now and got another view of the windmill as we headed back to Ixworth.
We paused just before the end to admire the village sign and read the panels about the history of Ixworth.
The earliest house here dates from 1314, the panels said. This one, perhaps?
No. It's this one.
Well that was a lovely walk. Thanks to Sue, John and Dawn for coming. We didn't overexert or overheat ourselves did we?
You can see more details of our walk here on MapMyWalk and more of my photos here on Flickr.
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