Loddon: The Swan to become a hotel.

MORE details have emerged on plans for the important Swan site in the middle of Loddon. The new owner Justin Fenwick has submitted plans to build 2 three- or four- bedroomed houses between the pub and the bowling green as a way of funding what his architect calls “the rejuvenation of the hotel”. The Swan,  I should add,is always referred to as a hotel rather than the pub we’ve been used to in recent years. The extensive outbuildings will remain and might be converted into four hotel rooms in time. Crucially the pub, sorry hotel, will become a free house, a move which will raise a cheer from most CAMRA-types. Those in the know argue that it’s often the pub group charging too much for both rent and beer that leads to pub closures. The letter submitted to South Norfolk council also makes clear that the Bowling Club can continue as normal and the alleyway through to Sale Court will survive. More details  - including plans here:

* Earlier story here

Rockland: Business booms at Oxnead House

AMID all the economic gloom, some cause for optimism on the Wherryman’s Way. Pia and Iain Saunders (pictured) launched their new holiday cottage business in Rockland St Mary in August. The three separate cottages within the grounds of Oxnead House seem to me, to be just what the WW needed in this part of the world. From the flat-screen tellies to the exposed wooden beams, the style is sleek and modern. And the good news is that the couple have been rushed off their feet since their new website went live. “We’ve had inquiries from all over the world,” said Pia. “We’re already really busy.” The Lodge, The Stable and The Barn occupy a large plot which looks down upon Rockland Broad from the corner of New Inn Hill and Green Lane. Green Lane is the way Wherryman’s Way walkers arrive in Rockland, having cut across fields from Wheatfen Broad in Surlingham. If you want to do the entire Wherryman’s Way in one stretch over a relaxing three days, you could do worse than make Oxnead House your first-night stop.

*Just to be clear Oxnead House is nowhere near the lost Broads village of Oxnead which lies close to Aylsham on the Bure. This one is very much Yare Valley. 

Rockland New Inn: The Walkers look to stroll it

STOP me if you’ve heard this one before, but welcome to the new guys at The New Inn at Rockland St Mary. Yes, yes I know there have been a few, but Mick and Paula Walker are pukka leaseholders and so should bring this Wherryman’s Way pub some much needed stability after a stop-start year. It’s a point not lost on Mick who thrusts a leaflet into my hand which says “we want to build on the hard work of the temporary managers and continue to put The New Inn back at the heart of the neighbourhood”. And who would want to take over a seasonal pub at the end of the season? Well this couple certainly make a virtue of it, explaining that it will give them time to talk to the locals, before they start dealing with the very different needs of summer tourists. In fact their first priority is to ask local people for their suggestions. (So email mick@newinnrockland.co.uk with your thoughts.) 

Former management consultant Mick and nurse Paula both look very much at home behind the bar, so it’s something of a surprise to learn that they are first-timers, although they did spend five years in Ireland running a backpackers hostel/guesthouse. They first opened these doors on Thursday and will start serving food on Tuesday – Head Chef Robert is an integral part of their plans. A proper espresso machine for decent coffee and that new necessity wi-fi, should follow very soon. And it will certainly be a pub-full because three children will live here plus Spike the Yorkie and Milo the cat.

I was sorry to see the Walkers’ predecessors Alix and John go, and you can understand a certain amount of “here-we-go-again” cynicism from the average Rockland drinker, but Mick and Paula certainly talk a very good – and friendly - game. If we can help them through their first winter, they might just hang around for an awful lot longer. And that has to be good for the village, the tourists and those Wherryman’s Way walkers.

See Mick and Paula’s website here:

Sails and Sails: the Yare Navigation Race from Hardley Mill

IT’S THE Yare Navigation Race on Saturday, the one day of the year when you can guarantee that sail rules the river. The event, organised by Coldham Hall Sailing Club, is open to river cruisers who race down to Breydon and back – the precise destination depends on time and tide. So where’s the best place to be a spectator? Ideally of course you would want to be between Coldham Hall and Breydon with a good high vantage point. …Somewhere perhaps like Hardley Mill says Mill chairman Richard Rockley:

“Our last event of this season takes advantage of our specially design viewing platform (also known as known as the mill) and the fantastic views it offers of the yachts,” he emails.

“Hopefully there will be a brisk wind. There was a sailing event from Cantley last weekend, watching some of the yachts tackling the wind on the bends close to the mill was at times both hair-raising and hilarious.  As far as we could tell looking from the bank, there was no serious damage and no one was hurt but there were several close calls!”

Hardley Mill will be open between 10am and 4pm. Beers will be provided by the mighty Humpty Dumpty Brewery and there’s a barbecue between 1pm and 4pm. The folk quartet Rum Kelter will provide the soundtrack.

Remember though that there’s no public access by road. The best bet is to walk the mile or so from Hardley Staithe. Either that or design an entire Wherryman’s Way 35-miler around this annual classic. With the weather set fine, you could do a lot worse.

* Thanks to Richard for the photo, taken from you-know-where.

* New Big Sky Productions video of Hardley Mill here

Coldham Hall wins pub of the year award

CONGRATULATIONS to the Coldham Hall Tavern at Surlingham for scooping a community pub of the year award from the local council. I well remember peering through the windows of this beautiful riverside building when it was closed, shabby and generally down at heel back in 2009. Stuck to the window was an A4 sheet of paper telling anyone who cared that the pub had been "repossessed by the landlord following forfeiture of the lease by peaceable re-entry". It seems a world away from the vibrant pub you walk into today. Natalie and George Linder (pictured) are the people who have transformed it. And now they’re celebrating both the award and a £1,000 cheque to help them organise a community bash. The judges said they were impressed by their use of “local food, local people and local ales”. That middle category is probably the key.

*Read about their opening day back in March 2010 here.

*Read the EDP article about this award here.

A poke around Polkey’s

A QUICK shout from mills expert Alison Yardy. She and her colleague Amanda will be opening up Polkey’s Mill tomorrow between 1pm and 4pm. The old steam engine house next door will also be open for visitors. The mills form part of the unique Reedham Marshes Mill group which together comprise a complete history of Broads drainage mills. Basic windmill, more modern windmill, steam, diesel and electricity, they’re all here. Alison adds that she now opens them up twice a year, but are always open to requests for group visits on other occasions. Polkey’s Mill is – famously – in the middle of nowhere to the east of Reedham on the Wherryman’s Way. It obeys the first law of the WW too – the more out of the way the attraction, the better it is.

Wherryman’s Way–The Podcast

YOU’VE walked the walk and with a bit of luck I’ve persuaded you to buy the book, so what’s next for Wherryman’s Way fans? Future Radio might just have provided the answer. All week they’ve run a special series of programmes looking at the Way. And they’re now available as downloadable podcasts. ..But if the word podcasts scares you just click here. And congratulations to Terry Lee, the man behind the project.

New holiday cottages for Rockland St Mary

WHEN the Wherryman’s Way was created back in 2005, it was meant to create a brand for our part of the Broads. Wroxham and Horning could cater for the stag-do boys in their day boats, we’d look after the walkers and the cyclists, the birdwatchers and the canoeists.  And it’s worked well. Hardley Mill got hundreds of thousands of pounds from Europe, at least partly because it could say it was on the WW. The medieval Langley Abbey was opened up to the public for the first time in centuries and a decent cafe graces the riverside at Reedham. There’s still room for more I’d say, but it’s been a cracking start.

So if we’ve got our new tourist attractions where are all those new tourists going to stay? Well, as of this week there’s a new kid on the block. Three holiday cottages have opened up at Oxnead House at Rockland St Mary. I haven’t looked round yet but I have met owners Ian and Pia Saunders. Certainly they “get” the whole Wherryman’s Way thing and certainly they’ve produced a very impressive website. (This photo of one of the three cottages is pinched from there.) It’s early days, but with a staithe and a pub, a broad and holiday cottages, Rockland is looking like the new unofficial capital of the Wherryman’s Way.

Rockland New Inn: the cover story

CONGRATULATIONS to Alix and John at the New Inn in Rockland St Mary who have already celebrated their 1,000th cover, achieving this milestone in three weeks flat. They’re still managers rather than leaseholders, so we can’t get too excited, but fingers crossed. According to Alix, it’s mostly local bums on seats, which bodes well for the leaner winter months too. The sandwich board saying “no credit cards accepted” has been turned around to read “all major credit cards accepted”. Oh and my pint of Adnams tasted good. These are small but important signs of progress. A perfect Bank Holiday weekend venue I would have thought. These guys are definitely worth supporting.

* More on Alix and John here.

The Loddon Swan - a return to the glory days?

BIG NEWS on the future of The Swan – the magnificent old coaching inn in the centre of Loddon . It has been bought by Justin Fenwick of Geldeston Hall who plans to keep it as a pub, but take it upmarket. I haven’t spoken to Mr Fenwick but his wife Marcia told me tonight that the plan is to give it a wine bar feel – and there will be food too. “The sort of place,”she told me, “where ladies will want to come for a cup of coffee”. It’s great news for a building which has looked increasingly down at heel since it closed back in September 2010.  And it should be a boost for Loddon too – given that empty buildings drag the whole town down.  Mrs Fenwick was keen to stress that it’s early days and the timescale is as yet uncertain. Two other quick facts: the bowling club are safe – they will be allowed to continue playing on the green behind the pub as they have done since time immemorial.  And there are longer term plans to build single-storey accommodation for elderly people between the pub and the bowling green. More info when I get it.

* More on the recent history of this building here.

The Wherryman’s Way ..on Future

LISTEN out for a new series on The Wherryman’s Way next month – on Future Radio. The station is doing a five-part look at the entire walk running from Monday September 5th till Friday September 9th. I was interviewed by their top man Terry Lee and I have to say he knew his stuff. He loves the WW and I’m sure that will be reflected in the series which will go out at noon every day. I’ve listened to the trailer ..which includes a short excerpt from me where I appear to have said that Billy Bluelight was “the puppet man of his day”. Is that allowed? Will the puppet man mind? We’ll see.

So who are Future Radio? They’re a community station based in West Norwich. I’m no expert, but the impression I got from visiting their studios was of an eclectic bunch playing eclectic music. Loads of volunteers, a wide variety of interests and boundless enthusiasm all round. You can find them at 107.8fm. 

Rockland New Inn: Welcome to Alix and John

THE on-off drama at The New Inn in Rockland St Mary continues. Now it’s good news again with a husband and wife team having taken over on July 17th. Alix and John Freeman come to Norfolk after a stint in Nottinghamshire. “We’ve been all over the place looking for the perfect pub and when we came down the hill here for the first time, I  just looked at it and said ‘Wow’” said Alix. “And that was before I’d even seen the boats on the dyke.” But once again there’s a “but”. Once again it all depends on a deal being done with the pub’s owners Punch. “At the moment we’re managers,” added Alix. “We hope to become tenants, but we’re still negotiating.” In other words everything is all rather temporary. Getting a B&B service going for fishermen is the first priority – Alix is looking to charge roughly £35 a night with a cooked breakfast thrown in. And as I chatted to them this afternoon a Dutch couple on bikes were preparing to put up their tent in the garden. T&B I guess they call that.

Nothing is ever certain with this pub, but I’ve got a good feeling about these guys. Fingers crossed.

For Sale: a smugglers’ haunt

THE COCKATRICE, yours for half a million quid. A five-bedroomed former pub situated, as estate agents Durrants put it, “in a superb riverside location on the River Yare [with] wonderful views over marshland and the river.” The blurb is very good on the hectares of land outside and the bedroom measurements inside, but they’re missing the big picture. Because this building, wind-whippingly isolated on the road from Heckingham to Reedham Ferry, was notorious as a smugglers’ pub. Market it that way chaps, and see your viewings double. Durrants reckons it stopped being a pub in 1922. My understanding is that it hung on till 1931. Certainly when the Broads writer Arthur Patterson passed by in 1930 there was:

“one wherry at its staithe, where a score or more were at one time keen to moor when thirsty. The day hath long passed when smugglers crept to and landed at the staithe at night and “Breydon Pirate” is all but extinct.”

There’s much more where that came from in my Wherryman’s Way book. Perhaps the estate agents would like a copy?

Wanted: young legs for old mill

IF you listened closely at the annual get-together of the Friends of Hardley Mill last week, you might have heard a quiet creak or two in the background. It wasn’t the sails going round on this recently restored windpump, it was ancient bones complaining after years of tramping up and down the mill’s internal staircase. The latest project has been to take away a temporary gallery (pictured here a year or so ago) which ran around the building’s cap, and replace it with something more solid. The project, Peter Grix explained at the mill’s AGM, had been more complicated than expected. And whilst it would be completed within weeks, it had taken its toll amongst the volunteers. Because one of the many amazing things about Hardley Mill is the age of the men who have carried out most of the hard graft. The majority of them are in their 70s and 80s. “Running a windmill like this is high maintenance and to be honest, we’re crumbling a little I think,” Peter told the meeting. The answer? Younger volunteers of course. I can’t find contact details on the mill’s website at the moment, but if you want to volunteer or just find out more, email me at steveanddebbie.silk@virgin.net and I’ll pass the message on.

Langley Abbey: Anyone for polo?

I KNEW that Langley had hosted its first polo festival earlier this month. But until today I didn’t realise quite how large “the sport of kings” was looming down at the abbey. Indeed the very sign saying Langley Abbey has been taken down to be replaced by “Norfolk Polo Club”  across the door. The abbey, with its wonderful medieval history does of course remain open to visitors, but the friendly shop full of upmarket foods and souvenirs has been elbowed into the cafe next door. In its place is what looks like a posh gentlemen’s outfitters with pukka chukka shirts on rails and long leather boots selling at £125 a pair. Funnily enough I resisted the urge. I guess it’s all exciting, innovative and entrepreneurial but I can’t help wondering what the dozens of generations of farm labourers who have worked here over the centuries, would make of the place now.

What next for the New Inn at Rockland

WELL that didn’t last long. The New Inn at Rockland St Mary has shut its doors again – barely two months after its last closure. The picture shows the removal van outside today as Jim Ravenwolf and Sandy Jarvis (below) packed up for the last time. They say the pub might open again in a fortnight – but that would be with more temporary managers  via yet another holding company. So the recent history for this pub goes; closed November, opens mid-April, closes mid-June.

Clearly this is no way to run a pub. The regulars have presumably defected  to other boozers – or the supermarket.  Wherryman’s Way walkers don’t have that option. One well-place source in the village today told  me that this size of pub is being crippled by a combination of high rates, high rents from the pub chain and a hefty increase in overheads like electricity. I used to think that location, location, location would mean that the  New Inn would always survive. Now I’m not so sure. What’s happening this summer feels like  the beginning of an unstoppable decline. It’s very sad.

Big camera + small canoe = great film

SO how on earth did they film that beautiful Youtube number on the tranquil upper reaches of the Bure which I mentioned on Saturday then? I’ve just found out, by stumbling across the Big Sky Production’s blog. It also reveals that Mr Big Sky isn’t a big fan of the water …not that you can tell. The film is here and the blog here. The photo – also from the blog – shows Buxton Mill.

Go find the Hedge Finders

IF YOU like your nature, you might want to follow the Hedge Finders blog set up by a Somerset artist called Duncan Cameron and Norfolk musician Adam Clark. They call it “a collection of writing, images and sounds inspired by natural history” which sums up their posts nicely.  A recent entry includes Swallows from “Poems on the Underground” which was new to me. Adam wrote: “The first time I saw this poem was on the tube at commuter time when the sight of swallows over fields in early summer seemed an impossible, bucolic dream. Now swallows attend my morning cycle to work, the world of the tube seems the unreal one. I still like the poem though.” 

“The swallows are italic again ….” what a great line that is from Owen Sheers.

* You can find Hedge Finders here.

Humpty Dumpty have cracked it.

CONGRATULATIONS to the Wherryman’s Web’s favourite brewery which celebrated a real ale milestone earlier this month. Reedham-based Humpty Dumpty brew cracking ales like Reedcutter and Little Sharpie. (They also do a mean Wherryman’s Way IPA which was launched at the same time as my book last summer.) Anyway they have now sold their 1,000,000 pint – it’s hiding somewhere within a firkin of Reedcutter which was delivered to the Blue Lion at North Pickenham recently (see picture). The brewery is run by four partners -  Craig & Mary Anne Fermoy and Stephen & Lesley George – who took over the business in September 2006. Head Brewer Craig said: “it’s been an amazing 5 years, and it’s great to see our beers being so well received and so much in demand.” Business Manager Lesley said: “it’s been exciting to see the sales grow. We have wonderful customers and have built a great team of staff to support the business.” Well done to the whole team. And don’t forget to do the Humpty Dumpty detour when you’re walking the Wherryman’s Way through Reedham.

* Picture shows Mick Lee, the landlord of the Blue Lion at North Pickenham receiving the Reedcutter cask from Humpty Dumpty driver driver, Jason Clark. 

The upper Bure by canoe

PLANS to preserve the history and natural history of a picturesque stretch of the River Bure continue apace. You’ll remember that a group of people want to use the 100th anniversary of the end of the Aylsham Navigation as an excuse to “raise the profile of our beautiful river”. The navigation, dating back back to 1779, meant that Coltishall, Horstead, Hautbois, Oxnead, Burgh and Aylsham were all connected by river to Great Yarmouth. It was one of many man-made projects destroyed by the devastating floods of 1912 – hence the looming 100th anniversary. Now a charity has been formed and the new Bure Navigation Conservation Trust plans to work towards setting a riverside footpath – perhaps with signs and info boards along the lines of the Wherryman’s Way. (My original article is here, while there’s much more on this website as well as this blog. ) Anyway as well as charity status, there is now a video. What Stu Wilson calls a “five minute taster” of a trip between Coltishall and Buxton. It’s not a stretch of river I know, but this film certainly encapsulates the unique tranquillity of canoeing along the upper stretches of our Broads rivers. …Or what Surlingham naturalist Ted Ellis called the “utter peace of Broadland”.