Round Norfolk Walk Day 4 - Harleston to Diss

Distance: 13.5 miles
Ascent: 150m
Weather: windy, sunny spells

Bunnies and hares, oystercatcher, pheasants, kestrel, squirrels, vole

A shorter day today - although 'short' is relative, the receptionist at the hotel nodded smiling, the lady at the bakery where we bought stuff for lunch seemed horrified.

We started with a few miles of pretty wooded pasture, with lots of bunnies and cows, butterflies and crows. This led to a clearing with mown grass and a little bench and table next to the riverbank, complete with fairy lights. We wondered if we'd wandered into someone's garden but the nearest houses were about a third of a mile away.  So we had a sit and it was very pleasant.

We walked through the village of Brockdish, passing the church and then going through a big gate in a massive fence that seemed unnecessarily high to protect their small playing field, which was very overgrown,  certainly not exactly old Trafford. The reason was the busy bypass on the other side of a line of trees.

Our path was mossy tarmac, the old road   now returning to nature. Turning down around a field edge, it wasn't clear which side of the field boundary the path was on, so we plumped for the side nearest the field as there were tracks. After a short while Rob noticed that there was actually a narrow grassy lane down behind the trees, and we should probably be there instead. So we braved a nettley verge to get to the path, about twenty yards before there was a gap we could have easily walked through.

At this point a man in a van drove past and I commented he was coming to tell us off for walking on his nettles.  Ten minutes later he came back and shouted something at us.  The nettle police! But it was fine, he was just asking about the conditions down in the lower footpath and said we could walk up there if we wanted. The footpath was clear (pic below)  so we assured him we were fine.

It was a pretty path lined with big old oak trees and elderflower trees, then passing a meandering river through a buttercup meadow. Above us, skylarks, swifts and goldfinches were flying and there were lots of insects buzzing around.

We stopped for lunch at a junction of a couple of paths, watching the bees on the clover.

At Scole we had a look at a ford across the river, it was quite deep and thankfully there was a little bridge further along. A bird of prey (sparrowhawk?)  flew past with something small and brown in its talons.

We walked through Diss via the Mere, with ducks, coots, pigeons and a great crested grebe, to the Park Hotel. Rob listened to the cricket, I had a nap and we're now going to investigate dinner.