Across the East of England
Definition
South of the Trent, east of the A6, north of London and the Thames Estuary. Slight adjustments here and there,
eg the Icknield Way Path runs from Norfolk to the 'southern' Chilterns but the whole route is mostly 'eastern'
so it's written up here.
Why walk here
It's all too easy to start with the negatives. No hills. No drama. Agriculture: no sheep dotted around, or not many anyway.
Just one big field after another.
In truth, that is perhaps the most common response to the offer of a walk in eastern England, and like so many easy prejudices,
it's a clumsy stereotype and plain wrong. Precisely because eastern England is often overlooked by the tourist in general
and the walker in particular, it's a remarkably quiet patch for the traveller.
It's a quarter of England, with no cities bigger than Peterborough and Norwich, both well under the 200,000
of a typical London borough or northern town. The M11 is its one motorway, Stansted its one large airport.
So there are vast tracts that remain undespoiled by the industrial revolution, if not the agricultural.
And while big-field syndrome can still be found, the rights of way through the region as often as not follow ancient hedgeways
that happily remain.
Sky is good, and the lack of heights mean there is a lot of it, and given the dry climate it's more likely to be a clear sky,
blue with cloud, than elsewhere. Big sky merges effectively with sea: the long coastline, over centuries more subject to sea-incursion
than anywhere else in these isles, remains a testing-place for the forces of water. The flats of north Norfolk and Essex
remain internationally-important nesting grounds; the shingly Suffolk coast inspired the vision of Benjamin Britten.
The region's rivers, most notably the Stour, give purpose and meaning to the draining of water from within the lanscape.
Lack of sharp contours does not mean lack of interest. A church can pop out unexpectedly from over a little hill.
A valley-basin - like the little Box in the banner photograph - lends distance, a sense of a place to be traversed;
precisely what the intelligent traveller looks for. The churches often show the wealth of centuries long gone, as at Lavenham
or Long Melford, quasi-cathedrals celebrating the centrality of the region in England's mediaeval prosperity.
The churches mark too where you are going, villages perhaps deserted, perhaps now populous, but often inheriting their street-pattern
unchanged across the years.
One might not spend idle days wondering which ridge to which summit, but in eastern England, if you have a discerning eye,
it will be rewarded.
Trails available
Essex Coast
England's forgotten coastline. On London's doorstep, but essentially undiscovered.
Fewer caravan sites per mile than Cornwall, all but no industry, even the occasional cliff. In progress, now at Maldon.
Harcamlow Way
A figure-of-eight walk linking Cambridge and Harlow.
Icknield Way Path
Prehistoric trackway from the centre of East Anglia to the Chilterns, along a low chalk ridge.
Peddar's Way and Norfolk Coast Path
East Anglia's national trail, linking a Roman path and the historic and varied northern coast of Norfolk.
Stour Valley Path
Inspiration to the great landscapes of John Constable, still one of the great unspoilt areas of England.
In archive and to follow sometime I have the Essex Way, Forest Way, St Edmund Way, St Peter's Way and Suffolk Coast and Heaths Path.
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