WW pub crisis: now The Woods End closes down

YOU might recall my theory a couple of weeks ago that one Wherryman’s Way pub was always in crisis. The Loddon Swan was in the limelight then because its management company had gone into administration. Well right theory, wrong pub. Last Sunday – the very day that Coldham Hall re-opened – The Woods End at Bramerton closed its doors. Another classic riverside pub falls victim to the economic slowdown.Landlord Martin Wormell was holding a clearout bonfire in the back garden this lunchtime. He blames a combination of two wet summers and one cold winter for failing to make ends meet. He has also noticed a big reduction in the number of hire cruisers making it this far up the Yare. So what will the pub’s owners do next? “Well it’s too important a pub to leave closed for the summer,” he told me. “They’ll get someone in, but I’m walking away with nothing.” Perhaps the next landlord has got to go down the Coldham Hall route; modernise and aim at the locals. Oh and they might want to glance at my “Boots as well as Boats” post too. The pub market is changing, fast.

What next for the Loddon Swan?

“THERE’S A rule about the Premiership,” wrote one clever sports reporter a few weeks ago, “that as far as the media is concerned, one football club should always be in crisis.” I feel much the same about Wherryman’s Way pubs. Last year we feared for Coldham Hall after the bailiffs moved in. (It should re-open within weeks. See previous posts.) Then the Woods End at Bramerton was put up for sale – again more here. Now the future of The Swan at Loddon is in doubt after management company GRS Inns went into administration. Amazingly The Swan is one of four pubs which survive in Loddon/Chedgrave – but for how much longer? The White Horse does the restaurant/upmarket thing; the King’s Head looks after the footie lads, while The Angel does a good line in cosy chintz. And The Swan? Goodness knows I wouldn’t have the bottle or the business nous to run a boozer in these troubled economic times, but I can’t see who this pub is aiming at. Which is of course a crying shame. It started life as the grand coaching inn - some of the stable buildings still survive to the rear. And in the days when each town had its own court, the local magistrates met there too. But that’s all ancient history. These days it doesn’t feel so grand ..and this latest news means it doesn’t feel very well-loved either.

Cardboard ice explained

THE BIG freeze continues and now even the Chet has copped it. A thick layer of ice covers just about all of the river ..in the Loddon area at least. Cardboard ice is back on the dykes and the mystery of its different layers has been explained to me (see previous post). It is due to the tide, which - I've learnt - affects even these tiny tributaries. The water freezes at high tide, then the running water beneath retreats. Sometimes this leaves a high tide layer hanging half way up the reeds. On other occasions you break a high tide layer to find a low tide layer beneath. Elementary to old Broads hands, but not alas, to me!

Loddon's new Ice Age

SNOW descended on Loddon almost a week ago now. But since then a continuous deep freeze has led to a steady ice invasion too. Head down to the marshy meadows next to the Chet and you start to understand how the eskimoes could have so many words for something as simple as frozen water. The River Chet remains overwhelmingly liquid of course. But for the field-draining dykes it's a different story. There's transparent thin ice. There's thick frosty stuff tesselated into irregular triangles, (pictured). But my eye is constantly drawn to a gravity-defying layer of what my kids call "cardboard ice" because of its thickness and the way that it bends undulatingly across and through the reeds. It often exists half-way up a reed - with fresh air both above and below. There is no doubt a simple scientific explanation - enlighten me someone please. For cardboard ice pictures and more visit this set on flickr.

The Yule Blog: Happy Christmas

OVERNIGHT snow has left at least the Loddon section of the Wherryman's Way under three inches of beautiful powdery snow this morning. The meadows next to the River Chet (pictured) are covered with a mixture of white stuff and frozen floodwater. Birds are noisily everywhere, no doubt desperately hunting for sustenance and Loddon's resident harnser* was on patrol as ever. Meanwhile I've just had an early Christmas present from the publishers Halsgrove. It's official! My book on the Wherryman's Way will be published in May - the truly keen can see the schedule here.All in all it seems the right time to say Happy Christmas to you select band of readers out there - whoever and wherever. Thanks for collectively racking up more than 3000 hits since the blog kicked off in March. I'll be back posting in 2010.
* harnser - the Norfolk word for a heron

Hathor on tour

ROLL UP for the Hathor farewell tour, about to enter its second week on the Yare.
The restored pleasure wherry has been doing the rounds of the Broads this summer prior to an extensive re-fit which will see her confined to quarters for some years. She spends this weekend at Yarmouth before sailing down to Loddon and then returning via Reedham and Berney Arms. (Full itinerary below.) This picture shows a wherryman engaged in the back-breaking work of quanting at Loddon Staithe during a previous visit in 2006. It is amazing that such a huge vessel can make it down such a narrow and winding river like the Chet. Wherrymen - ancient and modern - earned their keep.

Monday 7th YARMOUTH YACHT STATION 10am - 6pm
Tuesday 8th LODDON 1pm - 6pm
Wednesday 9th LODDON 10am - 6pm
Thursday 10th REEDHAM FERRY 11am - 7.30pm
Friday 11th REEDHAM QUAY 11.30am - 6pm
Saturday 12th BERNEY ARMS 11am - 5pm
Sunday 13th BERNEY ARMS 11am - 5.30pm

After the storm

A FURIOUS summer storm swept through Norfolk tonight. It was the kind that leaves a pack of Brownies screaming as the electricity fails - step forward my eldest and two dozen of her excitable mates.
But as the rain rumbled eastwards the setting sun reappeared in the west, leaving the countryside around Loddon bathed in a warm evening night. I headed up to Langley and then chased the sunset through the back roads of Claxton and Carleton St Peter - familiar enough territory for those who have done the Wherryman's Way circular walks. For a while it seemed impossible to take a bad photo - everything was in super-focus and rainbows kept appearing behind me. Reaching back twenty-five years into my A-level English Lit course I seem to remember poet Gerard Manley Hopkins calling it "blade light". That felt about right tonight. The other difference was an almost complete absence of birdsong. Perhaps they get scared - much like the Loddon Brownies.

Wherryman's Way: what's your favourite stretch?

HUMPTY Dumpty brewery partner Stephen George has been in touch. It turns out he and his family have become big fans of the Wherryman's Way over the last few years. For him the best bit is the stretch between Loddon and Reedham. "I love walking over those country lanes coming down to the ferry," he writes.
Which got me thinking. What's your favourite spot? Breydon Water, Wheatfen or maybe the newly-restored Hardley Mill? For me, the best places also happen to be the most inaccessible. All those windmills in the middle of nowhere between Reedham and the Berney Arms for example. Or The Slaughters, hidden until Rockland Broad until low tide. But having toyed with the ruins of St Saviour's Church and all that history bound up in Reedham Ferry, I'm plumping for Hardley Flood (pictured). It's stunningly beautiful, especially at dusk, and yet there's never anyone else there.