Cliffs and Beaches - Hunstanton, Norfolk

It was what seemed like the first bright winters day for ages, so I decided to go to Hunstanton for a walk.

I parked on the cliff road, put on my hat and gloves and set off. Walking along the grass here I come to a small formal garden with a nice wooden carving of a dog, which I'd not seen on my previous visits, although it looks like it's been here a while. This is just by the remains of St. Edmund's chapel, and I see that there is a quiet area the other side too - but it's too cold today to sit and contemplate I think! Moving on I come to the old lighthouse, and I wonder how it would be to live there - right on the cliffs edge, and amazing views from the tower over the Wash and back over Norfolk too I'm sure. Just along from this are a few "normal" houses, but I suspect they are too far back from the cliff edge to have a sea view. I do briefly look at the cafe here to see if they open, as would be a nice place to stop after my walk for a warming coffee - but they look like they are closed for the winter, which, I suppose, is only to be expected.

My aim is to get to the beach, so I set off at a brisk walk down the somewhat muddy path that leads down to the bottom of the cliff face. When I get to the ramp down to the sea, I spot that there is a walking route continuing up the other side of the cliff - this might well be a good walk to take another time, but right now I have my heart set on sand!

So I get to the beach - the tide is still a fair way out, but it's coming in, so I do need to keep an eye on that as I walk towards Hunstanton. The clifs here are an amazing sight - at the top white chalk, but this abruptly changes to red limestone - called "red chalk" around these parts. The stratification is amazing and quite outstanding.

Walking along the beach in the winter is different - I well remember being along this stretch of coast in the summer in shorts and tee shirt, and taking off my sandals to paddle on the water line and collect shells. Now I need my coat and thick walking boots, but these do make it difficult to walk on the soft sand, and I don't want to get them wet from the sea, so I try for a middle ground of hardish damp sand to walk on.

The cliffs here are home to a large number of birds, not only the seagulls one would expect, but I also spot some pigeons there. Further along I come to the wreck of a boat, and I recall hearing about before. It is the wreck of the "Sheraton" which started life as a trawler but was later moored on the other side of the Wash to be used as a target ship in the Second World War. But she broke free from her mooring in a gale and drifted on to the beach here - even after scrap dealers had most of the boast a section of the hull still remains here.

I am watching the tide come in as I approach the start of the Hunstanton promenade - should I go up there, or will I be safe on the beach for a while yet? I decide to walk along the beach - it is the reason I came here after all - and I start to climb over the groins that are now a feature of the beach. These are interesting, as they form a barrier against which the tide washes up flotsam. But what really gets my attention is one corner made by the sea wall and a groin, a flat piece of sand with innumerable mussel shells lying open, and looking to all the world like a collection of butterflies!

I decide it's time to get up onto the prom, so climb some steps which take me to an area where there are some beach huts all in a row. These are obviously being cleaned for the new season, and the doors are open - so I go look inside them! They have 4 beach chairs, a counter area with a pucket and a washing pail, and I see they also have an electric outlet - very mod-con-ish!

I continue on here, under the pier head (which does not have a pier) and then double back on myself to walk to my car. Rather than follow the road, I cut through the green and up to public gardens. I notice that the park benches here have, rather than the standard uprights, a serpent (or eel?) device holding the back and the seat in place - very cute.

Walking through the park I do see that the cafe here is open, but decide after all not to stop for a hot drink - my walk on the beach was not as cold as I had thought it might be.

And so back to the car, and drive home - a nice sunny winter's day walk in Norfolk.

Sunny Hunny

It is a Sunday and promises gloriously sunny weather, so I decide to head out to Hunstanton for the day.

There is a direct bus from King’s Lynn that runs once an hour, and I turn up at the bus garage 10 minutes early, and there are already a few people waiting, including a family with 3 small children, who are getting increasingly excited as we wait! The bus arrives and the excitement is too much - one of the youngsters squirms away and jumps aboard the bus in front of everyone else. The ride is mostly uneventful, but we do get into a traffic jam as we approach the town, and are delayed by about 20 minutes. As we get closer to the centre, I notice the big parking lot next to the fun fair - and remember my trip here a few weeks ago when it was cold and damp, and there were only 4 cars in the lot, and a duck and ducklings wondering around. Today I’m hoping the duck found a quieter place to be, as the lot is nearly full, and it’s only 10 o’clock!

Getting off the bus, I’m reminded that the tourist board call this Sunny Hunny - and it IS gloriously sunny, and the sky and the sea are amazingly blue. But. It is still windy! I’m just wearing shorts and a tee shirt, and feel momentarily cool - but not for long as I start to mingle with the crowds that head out for the beach.

Hunstanton used to have a pier - this went into disrepair and suffered from a fire some time ago, but where it used to be is a building with amusements and really looking like it should have a pier attached to it! Nearing this I see lots of motor bike - I mean A LOT of them - many people in biker leathers sitting in the sun and mingling with the crowd of day trippers. Walking past these I start off along the promenade - and this has a real “English seaside” feel to it - lots of stalls selling seafood, ice creams and candy floss, hot dogs and coffee, and the inevitable gift shops with cheap souvenirs and buckets and spades - and sun screen and wind breaks, both of which are selling well! On the beach, they even have an area of pony rides, something I’ve not seen for years!



Walking along I see an amphibious vehicle near the beach, and tracks in the sand looking like it comes and goes - oh wow! a “duck tour”!! Yes indeed, they use these old WW2 landing craft for tours, and there is a tour of the Wash due to start in 15 minutes, so I buy a ticket and wait. Soon I see the craft out in the water coming closer - the “Wash Monster”. It comes right up to the promenade, and the front opens down to allow passengers to just walk straight off the craft onto shore.



We soon board and are off for our tour - just a 30 minute ride - that drives for a long way, before it has to engage its propeller and become a craft. Its crew give the appearance of older generation “sea dog” types, and it’s quite odd to see one doing the “the exits are this way” hand signals which one normally see airline stewardesses doing! This trip takes us down to Old Hunstanton, and gives us a great view of the cliffs, which are pretty amazing with a white top part, and then a very clear divide line to dark reds below. We also get a view of a much newer structure - the big turbines that are the entrance to the wash, harvesting some of the wind - at last! A good use for it!



Returning back to land, I start to walk back the way I came, and along the shore line towards the cliffs. As I go I see that the tide is going out and that more and more sand is becoming visible, as well as some of the sandbanks that are a feature of this area of coast. Looking back, I see the Wash Monster has started on a new cruise, this time out to the sandbanks, where people can get out and walk in the middle of the sea!

Eventually the promenade gives way to a normal road, and then I go down onto the beach itself - and my sandals come off so I can feel the cool sand between my toes. In this part of the beach there are moss covered rocks at low tide with tiny pools between them, before you get to the sand and then - eventually - the sea. This is a great area for adventurous young children, and the air is filled with excited squeals as another 5 year old comes face to face with a live crab for the first time. They may only be tiny crabs, but they are alive and move, and I just have to smile at the excitement they cause. I walk way out to the sea, crossing areas of sand that are alternatively dry and wet - you can really see how the sandbanks develop, and how people can get cut off on the sand banks from time to time.

I climb back onto the path, dry my feet as best I can and put my sandals back on, and start looking for somewhere to have lunch. I can see a café on the cliff above me, and a path there, so I climb this, and although it looks like a nice place, and has a decent menu, I’d have to be indoors, and it’s much too nice for that, so I start down the path back to the town. There are a couple of other places that look OK, but I decide that what I really want is a picnic, so in the end I go into a supermarket and buy a ready made meal and a drink, and come back out onto the grass above the “pier”, and sit there to have my late lunch.



This is blissful - sunny, warm and relaxing, and when I finish eating I just lie there and watch the bikers, the people playing ball, and the sea gulls swoop and glide in the breeze. After a while I realise that I’m actually getting too hot, and maybe a bit sun-burned, so I spend a while looking round the souvenir shops, before heading back to the bus station to get the bus back to Lynn. It’s quite late arriving, and I’m really hot and bothered by the time it arrives, and then it is further delayed by an “incident” on the main road back home - but I sit and doze on and off and watch the countryside go past, and get home eventually.

Hunstanton is a fun place for a day out - and I’d like to go and watch the sun set into the sea one day, which is not something you can often do from an east coast resort!







NOTES OF EXPLANATION.
Hunstanton is on a piece of water called “The Wash”, which feeds into the North Sea. The Wash appears like a large indentation in the coastline of the map of eastern England, it’s formed by a large bay with three roughly straight sides meeting at right angles, each about 15 miles (25 kilometres) long. It has a long sandy beach which is very flat, so when the tide goes out it goes out a LONG way. One interesting geographical thing about Hunstanton is that, although it’s on the east coast, because of the curve of The Wash, it actually faces west! For anyone interested, here is the Wiki listing for The Wash: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wash

Norfolk Road Trip (1)

I don’t currently own a car, so I thought I’d rent one for a few days to get out and about. I collected the car last Friday morning, and the first nice experience - it’s a shiny black dead sexy Fiesta Zetec - and just been delivered to them, so I’m the first driver!


My first trip is back to my house and to collect my GPS and my diet cokes, and off to get gas as the tank’s on empty. It’s a bright sunny day, and I open the windows and turn on the radio as I start off down the main road to Norwich, - this is as good as it gets short of having a convertible!! On a whim I turn off at a sign to Pentney Lakes, a quiet country road, so I turn off the radio and drive slower and listen to the sound of the country. And also the smells of the country, which range from sweet to - how shall I put this - agricultural!

I’m soon at Pentney - a new community of log cabins around a lake. There are still plots for sale with planning permission to build your own cabin, and that would be a nice place to spend a long warm summer. Driving past the community, I get better views of the lake and the birds that live there, and see that they actually spill out not just onto the adjacent field, but onto the neighbouring farmer’s fields. Whilst stopping to look at this, I see what appears to be a bit of a building stuck in the middle of a field - except it’s more like a pillar than anything. But there is no sign and no one to ask so I just take a photo and move on.



As I drive I use my GPS to take me the “shortest routes” - I know that this means I get to use the tiny country roads, and that is exactly what I want! At other times I turn the GPS off and just drive - the fields around here are full of pheasants, and from the amount of road kill one sees, they are also very accident prone. I’m a city boy - and I get excited about seeing real wildlife just being there, so I keep slowing to watch the pheasants and rabbits I pass - and the one dear I spot in the distance!! After a while I get used to the single track, two way roads I'm driving on, and don’t panic when I spot a car coming in the opposite direction, although I do get concerned when it’s an enormous farm tractor - will they actually see me in my tiny car!



It’s now lunchtime, so I ask my GPS where there is a restaurant - it takes me to where is says a Little Chef is - only it’s a field!! However, just down the road is a place called “Hollywood Legends” - and how could I resist with a name like that:) It’s a reasonable place, and next to it is the Legends Car Wash. As I sit down and order, a lady arrives and goes looking to have her car washed - only the worker there is in the restaurant about to have his lunch! In a typical friendly Norfolk way, he says he will leave lunch till later, and the lady says for him to finish.
Lunch over, I set out for the coast, again using the small roads and getting really into the rural heart of Norfolk - mile after mile of straight (but tiny) roads through farm land, and the occasional village of just a few cottages with its village sign, and normally a pub and maybe a store too. Some of the places I drive through are probably too small even to be called a village, just 20 or so houses clustered round the road.



Soon I come to Hunstanton, which is quite a popular seaside resort in these parts - and an interesting one for the east coast; because of the way the coastline works, Hunstanton actually looks out west over the water!! It’s not really high season yet, and I drive into the huge parking lot near the amusement rides and there are only 5 other cars here - along with a duck and her ducklings waddling along the road. I stop here just to use the toilet, then drive on further along to Hunstanton Cliff, and park there.



We are on The Wash here - a strip of water from the North Sea that creates what is almost like a mini sea of its own, and here at low tide the sand goes on for miles. I change out of my jeans and driving shoes into shorts and sandals, and walk out the long way to where the sea is, and one can see why this area can be dangerous - as the tide comes in it will cover these flat areas of sand really quickly, and cut people off surrounded by water.



I spend about an hour on this bit of beach - walking and then just sitting in the sand dunes enjoying the sounds and smells, and the sun on my body. But then I get the urge to move on, so I get back in the car to drive some more - but as it turns out, not far. I follow a sign saying “old Hunstanton” and get to another part of the same beach. Here, however, there are many more sand dunes, with lots of beach huts in and among them.



Beach huts always appeal to me; I’ve never been in one, but they seem to encapsulate the essence of the old fashioned British seaside holiday. No water, no plumbing, no electricity, you’re not allowed to sleep in them overnight, and they are shut up all winter. But a “home away from home” by the sea, somewhere to sit and make a cup of tea on the gas stove you keep there. Or to hide from the rain when we’re on the beach coz it’s a holiday and we WILL enjoy it, whatever the climate thinks! On other beaches these huts are in solid straight lines along the promenade, but these are more random - they are dotted among the dunes and are raised up on stilts, maybe to avoid flooding, maybe to give them a better view?
Getting back to the car, and trying to keep most of the sand outside, I set off again along the coast road to Holm and Holm Dunes nature reserve. Once again I park and set out to walk - and here we need to cross a golf course to get to the dunes. There are signs up to show you where to look, and netting to “hide” behind when they are playing. If Hunstanton showed one face of the British Holiday tradition, here at Holms Dunes we come across another sort of vacation, because it’s along the Norfolk Coast Path, and hikers can be seen even this early in the year walking the 50 miles from Hunstanton to Cromer.


But not for me, for today - I walk out along the wild dunes and out onto the sand flats - no Amusement parks or beach huts here - just the open sea and the dunes. It is a glorious day, sunny, and the sounds of birds carried by the wind. The sort of place that makes you want to just stop the world, and take some quiet time.