Norwich & Marriott's Way - a Cycling Perambulation

My first cycling trip away this year took place in June, when I decided to explore the disused railway lines of Norfolk. The £58 price of a return to Norwich from Kent surprised me, especially as I'd saved no small sum by breaking the ticketed journey in half at Manningtree in order to use a railcard. Oh, the arcane ways of the railways! When I reached Stratford domestic station an announcement incessantly repeated 'Would Inspector Sans please go to the operations room immediately.' There were some emergency announcements too which they then announced were only a test and that there was no need to evacuate. This made me wonder if the incessantly repeated sentence was merely a coded warning to staff of a potential 'real life' emergency, made nonsensical so as not to panic the passengers.

I changed trains at Colchester and unusually a girl asked if I wanted a burger heated up. I've never tried a cold one, but if this is a delicacy in Essex, so be it! I was impressed upon my arrival in Norwich, as the stately station building seemed like a mini version of Lime Street Station in Liverpool. I headed up towards the castle mound, which was quite an incline for the relatively flat county of Norfolk, eventually getting my bearings to pick up the Marriott's Way Heritage Trail, a 26-mile loop named after the chief engineer of the Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway, William Marriott. Apparently M&GN was nicknamed 'muddle and go nowhere' by passengers.

My route passed over the River Wensum on a footbridge and there was a short footpath section through the former railway station at Hellesdon. The scenery was much more diverse than I'd expected, having previously found the western part of Norfolk to be flatter than your average pancake.

At the village of Drayton, Station Road was signed as private, so I took a V-shaped course via the village centre which was very pretty. Initially Marriott's Way continued via a wooded cutting. The bridge over the dual carriageway A1270 marked the half way point to Reepham (pronounced 'reefam') according to the sign. It was then very wooded, with a parallel lane to the right. I stopped for a rest and a guy in a van nearby had a woman's voice on loudspeaker; it was very loud indeed and I wondered if the caller realised she was being broadcast. In this age of data protection perhaps the driver had a duty to inform her!

Beyond was a long wooded descent. There was a detour near Attlebridge where a station is now private. The route still seemed rural when passing industry and an old man gave me a good old fashioned 'how do?' at one point. I soon came to Whitwell and Reepham Station where there is half a mile of restored line. I got a Guinness at the bar and sat on a bench while a group of motorcyclists met up. There is much for the rail enthusiast here. The trail beyond to Reepham itself via the big loop of Themelthorpe had a rougher surface and I read somewhere that this bend that linked two different lines was once the sharpest on the UK network.

I detoured into Reepham, which had a quaint village centre, to use the shop. I then consumed three quarters of a pork pie and an iced coffee drink in the churchyard which once contained three churches. Two remain and appear joined together.

I took a back-street back up to Marriott's Way and then rode the last six miles to Aylsham via Cawston. Aylsham has a very nice market square, and naturally I called into a pub to write up these notes. World Cup football was on TV and a band were setting up and winding wires around a young lady who seemed to be getting in their way. With 'Knocking on Heaven's Door' as a sound-check, my attention was diverted from Ronaldo and chums, although most folk resolutely kept their eyes on the ball.

Upon leaving I walked through the churchyard and got a spring roll in a Chinese restaurant. I then biked to a wood to the south of the town via a suburban cycle way and across a field on a footpath. It was a very comfortable place to camp and I had a brief territorial wander before getting into the sleeping bag.

I awoke at 5.30am. Natural light seems to restore me to a lark's sleeping pattern from the annoyingly impractical owl's hours that I usually gravitate towards. I got up at about 6.30 and rode back to Aylsham town centre, picking up the Bure Valley path which runs beside a narrow gauge railway. This reminded me of the Romney Hythe & Dymchurch railway in Kent, and path and rails share the track bed amenably, unlike the two pigeons that were fighting furiously on a bank. I was unable to intervene in an 'Oi, you two, cut it out!' kind of way as the rails were between me and warring birds. As it leaves the town, the line goes through the only railway tunnel in Norfolk. The path goes over the top.

This path was narrower than yesterday's trail and rougher. There had been a light shower while I was in the sleeping bag, but now it came on quite strong. I headed for the top of a cutting and set my tarpaulin up, preparing for the worst, but it soon eased and I was on my way again.

The route presented me with a long slow climb via Coltishall to Hoveton & Wroxham Station. The main line joins just before the station and there is a book shop on the platform of the narrow gauge station. I found my way to the centre of Hoveton which was awash with tourists and headed for a pub to consume the obligatory breakfast in a conservatory, looking out towards the Broad. After a visit to the tourist info centre, I decided to head for the small village of Spixworth. Crossing the Broad via a bridge, I was then in Wroxham and I had to use the pedestrian crossing to disrupt the endless flow of cars in order to get across the main road onto Church Lane. Eventually, I found myself on a track which became quite bleak and open. Once back on lanes, I phoned my friend Simon Crow, a very nice chap who writes exceedingly gruesome horror novels; he lives in Norwich. I waited for his arrival on a bench in Spixworth, just a few miles north of the city. His fiancée, drove us to a pub about a mile up the road which looked more rustic than the nearest alehouse. The conversation couldn't have been too excruciating as I was kindly given a lift back too!

Reunited with my bike, I continued west along the lanes via Horsham St Faith and Horsford, where I picked up Dog Lane, which turned into another bridleway and became quite rutted through an evergreen forest. It then detoured south to the dual carriageway A1270 and I rode the parallel path. I eventually branched off northward into another wood on a byway. There was a steep climb which I walked up; I wasn't expecting to be relegated to Shanks' pony at all in Norfolk, but this climb was of the 'no messing' variety. The path then continued next to a fenced off compound and went across the middle of a field, more like a footpath than a byway by now, but legal to ride I hasten to add.

I used the lane to get to Attlebridge, but was devastated to find nothing there as I was tired and thirsty. I'm not sure why I am always so surprised to find this! In desperation, I pounded along the main road to the next village - Lenwade. The garage shop was just closing, but just as I thought my ride was descending into farce or starvation, I found a pub a bit further up the road. I had a pint of lemonade and a Cromer crab with salad and warm bread. The landlord was lively and welcoming and the gents' loos were outside (very 'retro').

I then rode down to the common, but it wasn't common enough as the gates were locked, so I headed up a lane back to Marriott's Way and turned east in search of a place to camp. After a few miles I decided to camp at the top of a cutting. As I settled down, I heard a noise which I was a bit worried could be a tree creaking as a large trunk had fallen nearby.

I was back in 'owl mode' as I snoozed until 8.45 the next day, when I packed up and headed east on the cycle way. When I got to Drayton I headed for a café. It was very busy so it took a quite a long time to get each of my two pots of tea, but they gave me extra items with my breakfast which was delicious with black pudding and scrambled egg. Sorry vegans.

I then rode the remaining miles to Norwich, riding a bit of the river path from the end of the trail and chaining my bike up by the bus stops near the cathedral. A young man was going ballistic on his phone at some poor unfortunate soul – not the best intro to the city for me! Eventually I met up with Simon again and he explained to me that there seem to be more 'characters' in Norwich on Sundays than the rest of the week, before showing me the market square where I think I can remember buying a book on interpreting dreams when I was thirteen. Thirty years later they still make little sense but I view them more like free entertainment.

After a visit to a café which seemed church-like inside, we walked up to the castle on top of its mound and had a brief look at the two main shopping centres before gravitating towards a Wetherspoons pub. My father is something of an enthusiast of these pubs; I have yet to come near to his tally but usually relish visiting a branch of the chain that he's yet to discover. Our final place to visit was the cathedral with the grave of Edith Cavell outside. Edith was a British nurse who saved lives on both sides during World War I but was sentenced to death by firing squad for helping 200 Allied prisoners escape from German-occupied Belgium. Not quite on a level with crossing borders to flee a country, my journey home was nevertheless epic, starting at 5pm, with me finally walking through the door of my home just before midnight. This was largely due to some high jinks involving throwing things onto the electric cables. High jinks; low IQ. I had a notion of wanting to visit Colchester, but I didn't mean sitting for two hours on the station in the hope that a train might eventually come along. The café stayed open late to accommodate the masses and consequently saved my sanity. Well, the can of Guinness did at least!

If you enjoy reading the write ups of these trips, there are plenty more to read about in my book, 'Stair Rods and Stars.' The digital editions of most my books are now free, so why not have a look on Kindle, iBooks, etc. and go 'the full cycle?'

Desert Island Albums - 2018 [Adam's Music Reviews #2]

A few years ago I wrote a kind of 'Desert Island Discs' for this blog, listing ten of my all time favourite albums. As I was recently nominated on Facebook to do exactly this, I thought I'd post an updated list. I say updated; as you'll see the centre of gravity seems to be about 1971! The first three albums and descriptions are the same as in my 2013 list, being perennial favourites, whilst those further down the list are works that I've come to appreciate more since I last blogged about this. In keeping with the BBC Radio 4 'Desert Island Discs' tradition, I have made sure one classical album is included, replacing Beethoven's 3rd Symphony (from last time) with a bit of Gershwin. The musical musings and humour continue in '2021: A Musical Odyssey' - now available in digital and paperback formats.

Pink Floyd – The Dark Side of the Moon (1973). 'Money' is about the only song on this album which receives regular airplay (usually edited because of the rude word), but the album spent 6 consecutive years on the UK album chart. All human life is explained in the lyrics. 'Time' is particularly apt. If I had to pick a second PF album it would be a tough choice between 'The Wall' and the totally bonkers 'Ummagumma'.
[High point for me: the segue from Time into Breathe (Reprise)]

The Beatles – White Album (1968). The sequel to Magical Mystery Tour (which in turn followed Sgt Pepper). On this album, the Beatles did whatever they felt like with no constraints towards commercialism. Styles vary from folk to Charleston to country and western to heavy metal, and 'Revolution 9' simulates the effect of waking up during a series of bizarre dreams, before Ringo lulls us back to sleep with 'Good Night'.
[High point for me: the segue from '...Bungalow Bill' into 'While my Guitar Gently Weeps' (George's finest)]

Bob Dylan – Bringing It All Back Home (1965). Lyrically I think this is Dylan's masterpiece. You've got 'Mr Tambourine Man' and 'Subterranean Homesick Blues', but for me the highlight is the verbal deluge of 'It's alright Ma, I'm Only Bleeding'. This album is half folk and half rock – both sides of Mr Zimmerman's oeuvre. For a second Dylan choice, 1996's 'Time Out of Mind' comes close, but so do about ten others!

Rolling Stones – Sticky Fingers (1971). The Stones emerged from their brief dabble with psychedelia with what I regard to be their three finest albums; Beggars Banquet, Let it Bleed and this one. Opening with Brown Sugar, which amazingly still gets radio airplay in these more politically correct times, the classics keep on coming. Wild Horses heralded further 70s ballads, but it is the extended jam of 'Can You Hear Me Knocking?' which really highlights the band's musicality. The final four tracks show that even at their most decadent, the Stones could be amazingly mellow. The album's conclusion, 'Moonlight Mile,' is a little-known classic that deserves regular airplay. Great for sitting round a campfire!

Led Zeppelin III – (1970). Whilst 'IV' had the all-time classic (Stairway to Heaven) and the world's most sampled drumbeat (When the Levee Breaks), 'III' is an album of two halves. The first half opens with the archetypal Zeppelin of Immigrant Song and includes the 7-minute blues epic 'Since I've been Loving You' as well as 'Out on the Tiles' (similar to 'Good Times, Bad Times' from the first album), but it is the relaxed folky second half that surprises, particularly Tangerine and That's The Way. Great for sitting round a camp-... oh I've done that one!

David Bowie – The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1972). In younger days, I was a bigger fan of this album's predecessor, Hunky Dory, for it's eclecticism and Rick Wakeman's piano playing. However, for pure escapism, 'Ziggy' is a masterpiece. The first three tracks run together like a trilogy, as do the final three. The filling is equally good. Bowie starts out theatrically with Five Years and Mick Ronson's soaring guitar solos excel throughout. It's a bold statement, but this album provides a rare glimpse of something beyond the mundane.

Travis – Good Feeling (1997). I saw Travis perform as a warm-up band before they were famous and dismissed them as 'Oasis wannabes.' I was wrong. 'The Man Who...' gets all the plaudits, but this was the group's raw debut. Like so many on this list, it's an album of two halves. 'All I Want to do is Rock' is a simple, yet rousing opener and 'Tied to the Nineties' sums up how we may have felt at the time about what now seems to have been a 'classic' decade. The love songs come thick and fast at the end. Travis have never seemed so impassioned since, although once they unplugged the guitars and found a formula, they would achieve stardom.

The Kinks – Muswell Hillbillies (1971). The Kinks' 'Arthur' album of 1969 has never been far from my CD player, but just a couple of years later came this little-known classic. The songs are something of a catalogue of disorders, dealing with alcoholism, anorexia and anxiety (and that's just the 'A's), but the subjects are always dealt with humorously, and Ray Davies even recommends a good old fashioned cure for all – 'have a cup of tea!' A folky feel pervades and sadly the pub that appears on the album cover is now in a state of disrepair. The opening track sums it up; it starts quietly, when the drums kick in they never sounded better and then it builds to Ray's deranged shout of 'I'm a 20th century man but I don't wanna be here.' Brilliant!

Photo: Myself outside the Archway Tavern which features on the album cover.

John Lennon – Plastic Ono Band (1970). Before we got the 'John as a saint' persona (which he never courted), we had this – a raging diatribe against all society's norms. This would have been something as a shock for those who remember the Beatles as lovable clowns from their early years. Working Class Hero is a classic, although I would advise a '12' certificate if you have kids. 'Look at Me' is a very nice introspective acoustic track, and in case anybody was hoping for a continuation of the Beatles career, John laments 'The dream is over' on the penultimate track. After some activism, John would settle into family life before his tragic demise, and comparing the relaxed feel of his final songs with this album is like comparing chalk and cheese.

George Gershwin – Piano Concerto in F / Rhapsody in Blue / An American in Paris (1924-1928). The version I have features Daniel Blumenthal on piano and may have even been the first classical album I appreciated. 'Piano concerto in F' always returns fatalistically to the same dramatic orchestral chord, with variations that include the bluesy second movement and a high-speed summary of all that went before (the third movement). An American in Paris includes the orchestrated sound of car horns before mellowing into its more famous romantic theme, and Rhapsody in Blue has an opening that is perhaps second only to 'Beethoven's fifth' when it comes to fame, but entertains with around twenty minutes of piano dominated themes.