Weekend in Norfolk
Margo planned a bed-and-breakfast weekend for us in King's Lynn in the Norfolk area of East Anglia. If England looks like a bunny to you, we spent the weekend on the top of its bum.
On Friday Margo picked up Sarah and drove to King's Lynn. I took a train from London to Cambridge and another to King's Lynn, arriving in time for a late dinner consisting of a sandwich, crisps and a chocolate bar I picked up at a petrol station along the way to our bed and breakfast.
Our B & B cost a mere £20 per person per night, and it was just worth it - but no more. The establishment is a converted duplex. The interior has funky smells of cooking. Our rooms were wee. Margo and Sarah had a single bed each, and I had a single in the next room.
After breakfast the next morning, we drove to the town centre and walked about. Our first destination was the tourist information centre but it wasn't yet open, but we did walk a few steps past to the riverfront. This statue is of George Vancouver, he who charted much of the Pacific Northwest coastline. He was originally from King's Lynn.
We next sought out the Saturday Market that Margo had read about, only to find that it disappointingly consisted of a mere two stalls of fruit and veg. So we spent a while walking the high streets, visiting a few charity shops and Woolworths as Margo was on the hunt for materials for the Victorian costume that Sarah is expected to wear Monday. (These costumes are a contentious issue that I've encouraged Margo to post about separately.) Then we took a break in a coffee shop.
We returned to the car and drove northeast to the next town of Hunstanton, which was right on the coast. (We also passed near Sandringham, the Royal Family retreat.) Like many coastal towns, it has a boardwalk that we strolled a bit.
By now it was after lunch and we were getting hungry so we looked for a roadside restaurant where we could get lunch and pints. On a lark we chose the Caley Hall Hotel and were pleasantly surprised to dine on the finest pub food we've yet had in the UK: Margo had a lamb shank, I had a chicken-and-mozzarella ciabatta sandwich, and Sarah voluntarily chose pasta with tomato sauce, so we achieved the near-impossible feat of having a pub lunch with no fried ingredients. Only two taps though, and nothing interesting, so I settled for a bottle of Fuller's London Pride. But it was non-smoking, and the nearby sunny lounge, with leather chairs, bookshelves and board games, overlooking a large patio, was so inviting that we got brochures and would consider a future retreat there.
Since we'd dined as well as we could have expected for dinner, we decided to return to our room and relax and nap for a while. We later walked to a nearby pub for snacks and pints, but it wasn't worth writing about.
In the morning, we couldn't think of much reason to linger, and had laundry and cleaning to catch up on back in Ipswich, so we made our return.
On Friday Margo picked up Sarah and drove to King's Lynn. I took a train from London to Cambridge and another to King's Lynn, arriving in time for a late dinner consisting of a sandwich, crisps and a chocolate bar I picked up at a petrol station along the way to our bed and breakfast.
Our B & B cost a mere £20 per person per night, and it was just worth it - but no more. The establishment is a converted duplex. The interior has funky smells of cooking. Our rooms were wee. Margo and Sarah had a single bed each, and I had a single in the next room.
After breakfast the next morning, we drove to the town centre and walked about. Our first destination was the tourist information centre but it wasn't yet open, but we did walk a few steps past to the riverfront. This statue is of George Vancouver, he who charted much of the Pacific Northwest coastline. He was originally from King's Lynn.
We next sought out the Saturday Market that Margo had read about, only to find that it disappointingly consisted of a mere two stalls of fruit and veg. So we spent a while walking the high streets, visiting a few charity shops and Woolworths as Margo was on the hunt for materials for the Victorian costume that Sarah is expected to wear Monday. (These costumes are a contentious issue that I've encouraged Margo to post about separately.) Then we took a break in a coffee shop.
We returned to the car and drove northeast to the next town of Hunstanton, which was right on the coast. (We also passed near Sandringham, the Royal Family retreat.) Like many coastal towns, it has a boardwalk that we strolled a bit.
By now it was after lunch and we were getting hungry so we looked for a roadside restaurant where we could get lunch and pints. On a lark we chose the Caley Hall Hotel and were pleasantly surprised to dine on the finest pub food we've yet had in the UK: Margo had a lamb shank, I had a chicken-and-mozzarella ciabatta sandwich, and Sarah voluntarily chose pasta with tomato sauce, so we achieved the near-impossible feat of having a pub lunch with no fried ingredients. Only two taps though, and nothing interesting, so I settled for a bottle of Fuller's London Pride. But it was non-smoking, and the nearby sunny lounge, with leather chairs, bookshelves and board games, overlooking a large patio, was so inviting that we got brochures and would consider a future retreat there.
Since we'd dined as well as we could have expected for dinner, we decided to return to our room and relax and nap for a while. We later walked to a nearby pub for snacks and pints, but it wasn't worth writing about.
In the morning, we couldn't think of much reason to linger, and had laundry and cleaning to catch up on back in Ipswich, so we made our return.
posted by Michael Nelson at 8:27 am
1 Comments:
Sounds like a nice trip. We had a hike on Sunday in the gorge. Our first outdoor outing in months. It was sunny! Tuesday it was sunny and hit 66 degrees here! Spring!!
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