St Edmund Way Part 6

Today 11 of us did our penultimate leg of the St Edmund Way, stage six of seven - postponed from last month to allow the route to dry out.

This was the invite from Joyce.

" Wednesday May 8th Section 6 of the St Edmund Way. Pls park at Nayland Village Hall, Church Lane CO6 4JH · (we have permission ) . We then catch the 9.40ambus to Sudbury and walk back to Nayland. There is a deli Mill Street Store & Deli that offers drinks/food + toilet which is available before the bus. If you want coffee beforehand then maybe join me early at 9.15am. A longer walk of 13 miles "

This was our route today.

Here are a few of my photographs.

We congregated at Mill Street Store & Deli.(nice coffee). Joyce discovered that the bus stop we were expecting to join our bus to Sudbury and the start of the walk didn't exist any more, so we headed to the main road to find another stop for our bus.

I can't remember who said "John, you have to take a photograph".

I couldn't possibly comment.

Then our bus came, but turned right off the main road so we had to dash across the road to get to the bus stop. And I got to use my bus pass for a second time!

It was an interesting 50 minute ride to Sudbury with lovely views and tow places where the bus reversed and went back the way it came.

But now we were back on track

The route took us along this back alley through the town...

...and we came to the River Stour here and crossed it.

We were soon high above the town.

We liked this covered path. The camera adjusted the exposure to make it look light but it really was rather dark compared to outside.

Soon we were out in the sunshine. Down here and then a climb up the other side.

We could see Great Henny Church. We were heading there, but first had some paths to walk.

The cow parsley is getting quite tall here.

Great Henny. St. Mary's church is thought to have first been built in the 11th or 12th century and then later extended in the 14th century. The church is also registered as a Small Place of Pilgrimage.

This structure in a corner of the churchyard. The church's wooden spire had been attacked by woodpeckers and this is a wooden decoy. Here is an online new story about it. A local told us that, unfortunately, it doesn't work.

I liked these trees standing proud in the yellowed field against the blue sky.

Don't forget to look back when you walk. Here is a good view of the church behind us.

I managed to resist saying Shaun, who I was walking with as we walked past this field", "Oh look. Shaun, the sheep". They were indeed shorn.

We descended to the Stour valley to the surreal looking Grade 1 listed Lamarsh Church. As Simon Knott's site says, "The top of the tower is surmounted by an elaborate octagonal spire with fairytale dormer windows, by Arthur Blomfield. The whole effect is of a bit broken off of a castle belonging to Mad Ludwig of Bavaria."

Some of us went in to have a look.

The pub in Lamarsh was open and rather tempting, but we still had quite a long way to go.

We had to cross the railway line...

...before reaching Burse, which was our lunch stop.

Here we crossed the River Stour from Essex back into Suffolk.

Up the hill now past the Sloane Avenue of lime trees.

We got a good view back down towards Bures.

We took a shot detour to   St. Stephen's Chapel, dedicated in 1218 and allegedly built on the site of the coronation of King Edmund in AD 876.

I got everyone else to pose for a group phot with the Bures dragon in the background.

Onwards now towards Wiston... or is it Wissington?

We had some great views again.

Here we are at St. Mary's church, which dates from 1135 or even earlier.

Here we found our second dragon...

Shortly afterwards, we rejoined the Stour Valley Path for the last mile or so back to Nayland.... and finally a path I hadn't walked before.

And here we are back in Mill St.

That was a lovely walk. Thanks Joyce for organising and leading us and to the rest for the company. You can find more details of our 14.8 mile route here on MapMyWalk (or download a GPX file here) and more of my photos here on Flickr.

Other related walks you can find on my blog include:

• Stour Valley Dragon Walk (May 2018)
• Sudbury and Bures Walk  (Aug 2019)
• Bures Walk (Jun 2020)
• Three Dragons (and a Tiger) Walk (Sep 2021)
• Three Dragons Walk (Apr 2022)
• Sudbury to Bures Walk (Sep 2022)
• Argers Fen Bluebells and 3 Dragons Walk (Apr 2023)
• Suffolk Walking Festival Wool Towns Walk (May 2023)