Today we did the third stage of our mission to walk the entirety of the 93 mile Angles Way.
This was the invite from Joyce.
"Friday Feb 24th. Denmark Street, Diss. Please park here for the day and meet outside the Angel Café. We will be ready to walk at 9.30am. The Angel Cafe is open at 9am if you would like an early coffee/toilet.
The route takes us from Denmark Street, Diss to Diss Mere (toilets/coffee) and on to share the Boudicca Way for a little way and lots of other Norfolk Villages. Some of the route will be recognisable from the Daffodil Dawdle and Mid Suffolk Footpath that a few have walked in the past. Out lunch stop will be at Brockdish Church (approx 10 miles from Diss). If time allows we will then pop into the Kings Head at Brockdish for drinks as we pass this pub. It will be approx. 14.5 miles to Harleston . At the end of the walk we will take the 581 bus back to Diss and our onward journeys. Our return bus leaves Harleston at 16.10pm and drops us at Diss at 16.35pm. It is then a very short walk back to our cars from Park Road. I have double checked these times with the bus company. Stage 3 will mean a later finish but then we are further away from home. I hope you'll join me. "
I had three passengers with me and we arrived at 9:01am, just after the café opened and in time for a coffee before we started.
This was our route today.
Here are a few of my photos.
After parking, we made a beeline for the
Angel café.
I got curious about the previous use of the building when, with my best mirror writing reading skills I deciphered the words in the window to say "Counting House". The front door says this...
And there is a photo by the table we sat at...
Well the
Fair Green website explains all.... "
Baldry’s Yard is a former brewery, known once as the Lower Brewery. The Brewery was fed by water from a pit called The Liquor Pit in Croft Lane (this pit continued in use until 1948). Several of the brewery buildings survive, including the malthouses (now converted into houses) and the Counting House (now The Angel Café). The associated large house was originally a Medieval hall house, and was converted into a gothic villa in the early 19th century."
We were joined by the others walking today and assembled at the start - this signpost where we finished last Friday.
We headed for
Diss Mere, which gave the town its name. Diss is the only market town in England built around a large lake. It is 6 acres in size and an important example of a natural lake basin with the water
level maintained by a number of underground springs. The sediments of Diss Mere have been used to
investigate the past environment of Norfolk and the Mere is an important site in the development of this
science.
A thriving and bustling town has grown up around the Mere and retains a great sense of history. Diss lies on the Norfolk – Suffolk border. Mentioned in the Domesday Book as a moderately sized Royal Manor, the importance of Diss increased when a market was established which brought wealth to the town. Flemish weavers came across the Channel and throughout the 16th and 17th centuries wool, hemp and linen were the chief industries.
It was market day in the town. We walked past but didn't stop.
Fortunately there was a footbridge so we didn't have to wade through the ford here.
I asked Joyce if she remembered this signpost. When we did part 1 of the Boudicca Way for a second time in September 2021 (see
here) she asked me to take a photo of it to remind here to plan doing the Angles Way with Miranda... and now were doing it! This is the point where the two routes diverge.
The daffodils are out....
...and the snowdrops still are too. Looking through the trees the swathes look like patches of snow.
I stopped to photograph this bunny in a field we passed.
This was a lovely lane. I'm looking back the way we came here.
Path missing! We had to walk across this field and were glad the ground was dry.
In the distance we could see Hoxne church.
We were in quiet rolling countryside here and actually a fair way from the River Waveney.
We stopped here for our drinks break. The impressive house is Hall Farm.
We descended and crossed the A143 to reach the river.
We reached the point where the
Mid-Suffolk Footpath ends where it meets the Angles Way, although we didn't go all the way to here when we walked it in 2019 (see
here).
I remember crossing this bridge on the
Daffodil Dawdle.
...and our first primroses of the year....
...in among the snowdrops at the side of this lovely lane.
...where we took a brief detour to warm ourselves up at the
Old Kings Head pub. Robert kindly bought me a 1/2 pint of
Wolf Ale.
But we had the rest of our walk to do.
We passed a cow shed with some cute little calves.
Now we crossed the River Waveney into Suffolk near Syleham. The watermill at Syleham by
the toll bridge to Brockdish, originally a corn mill, it was converted in 1839 to a linen mill and thriving
garment factory which employed over 100 people into the mid-19th century. The mill has been converted into private houses and the factory site now has four houses built at the turn of the 21st century.
Someone has a good stock of firewood.
We now had a stretch along the south side of the river and a brief shower, which only lasted about 5 minutes.
We passed at the bottom of a slope with horses grazing further up. All of a sudden they all came galloping towards us and started following us. It was a little alarming when they showed an interest in some of our backpacks.
They followed us all the way to the stile at the end of the field.
We were glad to escape their attention.
A little further on we came to some more calves. No trouble from them!
Now we came to our only bit of mud on the whole walk. Given that we were walking in Februrary, which is normally quite wet, we were lucky more of our paths today weren't muddy too.
...and recrossed the river back into Norfolk.
Not far now to the end of our walk for today, but first we had to climb the hill from the river towards Harleston.
And this was the official and of our stage today... and our starting point for next.
It was just a short walk from there into the centre of the town. Now we got another shower but were able to get out of it in the bus shelter.
And here was our bus back to Diss.
A great days walk with lots of varied terrain, scenery and points of interest. We were really lucky with the weather too. Thank-you Joyce for organising and leading us and to the rest for the company. I'm looking forward to next week's instalment already!
You can see more of my photos
here on Flickr and more details of out route
here on MapMyWalk,
You can read more about today's stage here:
You can read more about the Angles way using these resources:
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