Bardwell Walk

Today we did a "3 Mills" walk from Bardwell.

This was the invite from Joyce...

"Wednesday 15th February The 3 Mills walk from Bardwell. This 12 mile walk involves stretches of road walking but it's a pretty good route for Winter. We will visit Sapiston, RAF Honington, TrostonWoods + Ixworth Thorpe. We will also pop into Woosters Bakery as we pass on the way back.  Please park at The Grumpy Goat  IP31 1AB for a 10.30am start. I'll be there for coffee beforehand at 10.10am. Lifts available from Mildenhall at 9.40am ".

I was there in good time to have a coffee before the start, with Steve at first, but then the others joined us, and we set out just after 10:30.

This was our route...

Here are a few of my photos...

This is The Grumpy Goat. 

I saw the paintings on the far wall and was instantly reminded of  Tokyo at night in the rain. "Why was that?", you might think. Read all a bout it in the separate post Rainy Tokyo at Night.

Above the entrance/exit door was a Grumpy Goat picture.

We set off along the quiet country lanes.

We saw some crocuses and aconites by the wayside

As we neared Sapiston Church we met these three in a field.

I remembered admiring Grange house when I first saw it on this walk.

We visited St. Andrew's Church.

It is quite plain inside and rather charming and peaceful.

And, of course, it had snowdrops.

At the farm next door they have these interesting sheep black sheep, some of which have more than 2 horns. I think they could be Hebridean Sheep.

Onwards now round the back of the first (disused) mill...

...and across the Black Bourne

There is a stand of startling white silver birch trees just across the river.

I managed to catch this yellowhammer before it flew off.

We passed, at a distance, some deer.

After reaching Ixworth Thorpe for the first time we turned North-West towards RAF Honington and then turned south towards Troston.

We stopped at a picnic table in Troston Woods for our lunch

Tania and Andy joined us here and walked with us on to Troston, where we left them to have a pub lunch.

We passed, but didn't visit, St. Mary, Troston church. You can read about when we did visit it on a walk this time last year here.

We returned via Ixworth Thorpe, this time passing the village sign.

We came to our second mill, a watermill, now called Mill Farm, on the Black Bourne as we neared Bardwell.

We crossed the Black Bourne one more time to return to Bardwell village.

We visited St. Peter and St. Paul's church.

Here we saw some lovely stained glass...

...and the remains of some mediaeval wall paintings.

Our third and final mill was the Grade II listed Bardwell Windmill. You can follow progress of the restoration and events there via their Facebook page here.

The mill was closed but we visited Wooster's Bakery next door.

Frome here it was a just a short walk round the edge of the village back to The Grumpy Goat.

A nice walk on a pleasant winter's day. Thank-you Joyce for leading us round and to the others for the company.

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