Nacton Shores Walk

Today we did a walk I had missed the first time around from the Nacton Shores picnic site on the banks of the River Orwell.

We walked along the river to Levington, Levington Marina  and then Loompit Lake before returning inland. This was the invite:

"Tuesday October 25th Nacton Shores picnic site car park in Shore Lane, Nacton. Closest post code is IP10 0ER. Our walk will begin at 10.30amand it's a beautiful estuary walk by the River Orwell. It's a very different landscape. We will wander to Levington Church which boasts of the most Heavenly churchyard in Suffolk (and it is lovely). We will skip the pub next door and head to a newish coffee stop called The Harbourside Kitchen. Nick can recommend the bacon and sausage baps. 

We then head to Loompit Lake and then some interesting paths and woodland. The mileage will be 10 miles and the walk contains a lot of trip hazards and tree roots. Hoping to be back in Bury by 3.45pm." 

This was our route:

A lot of it was familiar to me from the Orwell Challenge walk which I've done 3 times, most recently in 2021 - see here. We walked at a bit more leisurely pace today and we were joined by Dawn and my house guests for a few days - my sister Kirsty (who had walked with us in Devon last year - see here) and her husband David.

Here are a few of my photos:

Here we are at the start.

Across the river we could see Pin Mill which I'd taken Kirsty and David to many years ago.

We headed inland along the boardwalk to Levington church.

By now we  had good views of Felixstowe docks.

We had a short drinks break at St. Peter's Church. 

Back at the river we continued to get lovely views along the river...

...and inland too. We would see these poplars again later from the other side.

At Levington Marina we admired the boats and visited the  Harbourside kitchen.

The bacon and sausage "huffers" were indeed good.

Back to the shore;

After turning inland we stopped here for our lunch.

I remembered this bit of down and up again from the Orwell Challenge. After 19 miles the climb then was not welcome, but it was no problem today.

Look who we found.

Kirsty loves donkeys. And then we came across a small herd of deer including a white deer.

Back through the woods now...

...to the start.

Weren't we lucky with the weather? Thank-you Joyce for a lovely walk and to the lovely people for the company. It was a great showcase of the delights of Suffolk to Kirsty and David too.

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