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0850 Rather a muggy day after some overnight rain greets me as I sally once more to a different part of the country for a few days, this time East Anglia. Tonight's destination is Snape where I hope to be entertained at the Maltings concert hall - a place I've long wanted to visit and home of the Aldeburgh music festival. Not that my concert is part of that but at least I can say I’ve sat in the seats - one day maybe I will have a chance to go to the festival proper. Firstly though, Sutton Hoo. Apart from having a great name it’s the site of one of the most important Anglo Saxon ship burials: I have seen the finds in the British Museum but never the place itself, so it is up to London, cycle across to Liverpool St and another train to Ipswich.
0949 Sitting by an old lady who is quietly doing the newspaper crossword. Cloudy skies but with the sun threatening to break through.
1106 In the wrought iron cavern of Liverpool St station concourse sipping a coffee and waiting for my train to Ipswich having just about survived the mad dash through the City’s busy streets. It’s true that cycling is the quickest way to travel in London but at times a bit scary. Outside the station there is a bronze statue of Jewish refugee children and the area is renamed 'Hope Square' commemorating the ‘Kindertransport’ in 1938/9, an interesting and heart-warming episode, according to it’s Wikipedia entry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kindertransport)
1130 On time, the angular-looking locomotive pulls out of L st through the suburbs of East London passing the Olympic Park with the recognisable ‘coronet’ stadium and the weird sculpture. The Park is taking shape but is still just a massive building site.
1214 Overcast now as we pass through the dormitory estuary towns of Essex. The rail line is elevated for much of the way affording good views over the surrounding countryside.
1220 Train has halted with the reasonable excuse that a passenger in the train ahead of us being taken ill. The fields around here are lying fallow with the occasional late summer butterfly searching in vain for flowers in the margins. Summer is definitely leaving without ever having really arrived.
1246 On the move again. I notice that Maningtree station still has ‘Ladies’ and ‘General’ waiting rooms!
0850 Rather a muggy day after some overnight rain greets me as I sally once more to a different part of the country for a few days, this time East Anglia. Tonight's destination is Snape where I hope to be entertained at the Maltings concert hall - a place I've long wanted to visit and home of the Aldeburgh music festival. Not that my concert is part of that but at least I can say I’ve sat in the seats - one day maybe I will have a chance to go to the festival proper. Firstly though, Sutton Hoo. Apart from having a great name it’s the site of one of the most important Anglo Saxon ship burials: I have seen the finds in the British Museum but never the place itself, so it is up to London, cycle across to Liverpool St and another train to Ipswich.
0949 Sitting by an old lady who is quietly doing the newspaper crossword. Cloudy skies but with the sun threatening to break through.
1106 In the wrought iron cavern of Liverpool St station concourse sipping a coffee and waiting for my train to Ipswich having just about survived the mad dash through the City’s busy streets. It’s true that cycling is the quickest way to travel in London but at times a bit scary. Outside the station there is a bronze statue of Jewish refugee children and the area is renamed 'Hope Square' commemorating the ‘Kindertransport’ in 1938/9, an interesting and heart-warming episode, according to it’s Wikipedia entry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kindertransport)
1130 On time, the angular-looking locomotive pulls out of L st through the suburbs of East London passing the Olympic Park with the recognisable ‘coronet’ stadium and the weird sculpture. The Park is taking shape but is still just a massive building site.
1214 Overcast now as we pass through the dormitory estuary towns of Essex. The rail line is elevated for much of the way affording good views over the surrounding countryside.
1220 Train has halted with the reasonable excuse that a passenger in the train ahead of us being taken ill. The fields around here are lying fallow with the occasional late summer butterfly searching in vain for flowers in the margins. Summer is definitely leaving without ever having really arrived.
1246 On the move again. I notice that Maningtree station still has ‘Ladies’ and ‘General’ waiting rooms!
1315 Change at Ipswich with two of the slowest lifts in the world taking an age to elevate and lower me in a stately fashion from platform 3 to 1. My new train is the National Express to Lowestoft which feels like it needs good clean - the word ‘express’ flatters it as we proceed at a sedate speed through Suffolk. A man in a donkey jacket reads a paper and a student manipulates his mobile phone frantically. Disembark at Melton to ride the three or so miles or so to Sutton Hoo.
1400 I like Sutton Hoo! They give me a discount because I cycled - I didn’t tell them I’d only cycled from the station. They even provide lockers where you can stow a rucksack. I must admit they present the story well, with a decent visitor centre that includes a film, audio clips, the reconstructed burial and replicas of some of the finds. In many ways, the tale of the Sutton Hoo discovery by Basil Brown, the owner Mrs Pretty and the tensions with the British Museum is as fascinating and dramatic as the archaeology itself with it being played out on the eve of WW2. During the war, the area was used as a tank training ground and sappers dug anti-glider trenches right across this archaeological site!
You can walk over to the burial mounds and even go into Tranmer House, Mrs Pretty’s home, and sit at the dining room table wondering what made her decide to dig up her back garden, while watching the House Martins swooping and clicking.
1700 Sutton Hoo closes and I brave the roads of rural Suffolk, through the village of Eyke (another great name), to cycle the ten or so miles to Snape. Rush hour in Suffolk consists of a couple of tractors and a 4x4 so I’m alright. I like this part of the country, I would definitely come again, it’s peaceful and feels different somehow. The last time I holidayed here was in the ‘60’s when my family joined Aunt Dulcie and Uncle Brian and family at a boarding school – great times, but another story.
1700 Sutton Hoo closes and I brave the roads of rural Suffolk, through the village of Eyke (another great name), to cycle the ten or so miles to Snape. Rush hour in Suffolk consists of a couple of tractors and a 4x4 so I’m alright. I like this part of the country, I would definitely come again, it’s peaceful and feels different somehow. The last time I holidayed here was in the ‘60’s when my family joined Aunt Dulcie and Uncle Brian and family at a boarding school – great times, but another story.
1800 Make it to Snape in good time, the b and b is a basic but comfy garrett room. I struggle with the shower as it’s a mixer one that is either too hot or too cold – where is Goldilocks when you need her? – Or is it baby bear?
1830 Sausages and mash in The Crown pub with plenty of gravy – delicious! I stroll down the hill to the Maltings admiring the sunset which frames an owl hunting over the margins of the River Alde. Can it get much better than this?
1900 Snape Maltings is the main, though not the original, centre for the Aldeburgh music festival but happily for me they put on concerts at other times of year too. All the locals curse the festival for the traffic but I suspect that they are rather pleased about the money it brings and raises the price of B and B as I found to my cost. The venue definitely majors on the ‘Shabby Chic’ look with bare brick walls, exposed beams and original malting fixtures and fittings still in evidence. But what a setting! The best view of the wooden clad concert hall with it's characteristic steeply-pitched roof is from across the river, looking through the surrounding reedbeds which stand erect - thickly crowding the banks like prommers at the Albert Hall. Worth a visit just for that view.
2145 Emerging from the concert, the muggy day has turned into a mild night. I wend my way across the bridge and up the hill from the riverside to let myself in. Without question this has been one of the best days so far. Not even the just-too-audible sound of another guest loudly snoring in the next room can spoil it. Bring on the next one!
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