Clare Walks

Today it was my turn to lead walks for Joyce's Weekly Walking group. This was the invite...

"Monday June 14th . John will be leading a two-part walk from Clare Castle Country Park,  Malting Lane, Clare - postcode CO10 8NW. Parking charges of £2 for the day apply at the car park there. The morning walk (10am) will be the popular Clare to Cavendish and back walk of about 7 miles. Following a packed lunch (please bring your own) al fresco at the country park, in the afternoon (1pm) there will be an extra loop to Stoke-by-Clare of a similar distance. Feel free to do one or both walks – meet to start walking at 10am for the morning walk or 1pm for the afternoon. No need to book, but if you are joining for the afternoon it would be helpful to know you will be coming – please let John know via email"

It was another very hot day but although I offered to do a shorter walk in the afternoon we did the two-parter as planned.

These were our routes, both based on walks from excellent  Clare Walks collection. In the morning we did the Clare to Cavendish (Circular Walk 3) and in the afternoon a variation on The Claret Hall walk (Circular Walk 5), extending the walk into the village to visit Stoke-by-Clare and returning mostly by the same route, but with a little diversion at the end to visit Clare Priory.

Here are a few of my photos...

We met at Clare Castle Country Park as planned. I was joined by regulars Roland, Jane, local boy Steve and Ann, who was the only one who hadn't been here before.

We admired Old Mill House with its lovely garden sloping down to the River Stour.

We also passed the Grade II listed Bower Hall.

and, our favourite, Pentlow Mill, just before we crossed the Stour once again back into Suffolk and into Cavendish.

The sheep by the river were staying in the shade.

The telephone box, like many others these days, has been converted into a library.

Cavendish is very picturesque. We stopped for a drinks break underneath that tree in the photo.

Jane got an ice0cream from the village shop.

We were amused by this stone in the wall of the school next to us.

Our route back to Clare was on a stretch of  the Stour Valley Path on the Suffolk side of the river. We got some nice views... and pretty poppies.

Back at the country park we lunched by the river. Steve and Roland left us, but we were joined by Glen, Tim and Helen for the afternoon walk to Stoke-by-Clare and back.

It was very warm but there were a few more clouds around to give us occasional shade.

After climbing up to Claret Hall and following the path along through some trees we emerged to a view of Stoke-by-Clare.

We came across some people making hay while the sun shone.

Another drinks stop on a green - this time in Stoke-by-Clare

We walked through the village to the Church of St. John the Baptist...

...which was open, so we went in to have a look. As Simon Knott says on his Churches of Suffolk site...

"Like many industrial places, Stoke by Clare was a hotbed of Protestantism by the early years of the 16th century. The Dean of the college was Matthew Parker; later, as an advisor to the brief but furious fundamentalist regime of Edward VI, and Archbishop of Canterbury under Elizabeth I, he was such a ruthless investigator and rooter out of Catholic practices, he earned the epithet 'nosy' Parker. For the moment, however, he was a major power-player in the struggle that would ultimately take England out of Europe. Parker's influence fell heavily on St John the Baptist, and it was one of the flagship preaching houses of the reformers. His pulpit is still in situ, a 15th century wineglass affair, barely 20" across inside."

The sign by the pulpit says that although this was believed to be the smallest in England, there is one that is only 17" in diameter at Badley near Needham Market. We've been there - in November last year. I checked my blog entry for it, but the pulpit doesn't look that small.

We enjoyed the flowers in the cottage gardens. This rose is rather unusual.

Then it was back across the Stour into Essex again.

While we were still close to the river there were plenty of insects about. I managed to catch this banded demoiselle resting.

At the end of our walk we visited Clare Priory, which I had first visited on the Magna Carta walk.

It has a lovely garden....

...and was a nice end to our walk - we went out the gate and the car park was only 100m or so away.

Two lovely walks. Thank-you everyone for joining me, and especially Ann and Jane who kept me company on both.

You can find more detail of our routes on MapMyWalk Cavendish route, Stoke-by-Clare route and more of my photos from today here on Flickr, and from my recce last week here.