1 May 2016 Lakeside Fishing & Camping, Onehouse, near Stowmarket, Suffolk

We arrived in the UK on the 21 April after a twenty two hour trip from Auckland, a good flight given that any flight from one side of the world to the next flying cattle class is ever acceptable. This time we flew courtesy of Cathay Pacific, chosen for their luggage allowance and of course competitive price. Traveling into the northern hemisphere in mid-spring and staying through the summer until the onset of autumn is problematic, unless the country is one of unchanging temperature. 

Dining at Beyton; Mary, John, Margie, myself & Chris

On arrival at Heathrow, after suffering long delays in slow moving queues through immigration, we emerged to the cold blast of wintery temperatures and were glad we had thought to have our jackets handy. My husband’s brother and his partner met us and duly drove us north east through the Thursday late afternoon traffic on the M25 and on up into Suffolk, on past his own home town of Bury St Edmunds to a quaint pub at Beyton where we met up with Chris’s sister, a happy reunion for all three siblings. Plan A had been that we all eat at Margie’s; while we had been snaking our way up and down roped passage ways at Heathrow, I had been imagining her family-famous Yorkshire puddings deflating into the meat juice, not a good look for a champion cook of English roast dinners. She had obviously considered the possibility herself because she decided she would instead shout us all to a pub dinner, and what a treat it was!

Since we were last here in the UK, just a year ago, Margie has moved into a complex of homes reserved for the over 60s, monitored on request by a custodian. The semi-detached houses are quite charming, immaculately set out around well maintained gardens and lawns. She gave up her bed for us, and from that side of the house, we were woken both mornings we stayed, very early to a delightful English avian morning chorus.

Our first day was spent with John who had spent the previous couple of months sourcing a vehicle and caravan suitable for our needs. He collected us from his sister’s on our first full day and took us to his home in Bury (St Edmunds) to introduce us to our new car, a 2006 Kia Sorrento. From there we were guided to our campsite here beside a manmade lake, adjacent to the Rattlesden  River, about one and a half miles from Stowmarket. He left us to poke about our new home, to familiarise ourselves with everything. It was late in the afternoon that we returned to Margie’s for our last night under her roof.

The following days were spent accumulating bits and pieces for the caravan, kitchen bits that had been overlooked by family members who had generously filled the van with all the chattels one might require for such an adventure. The reality is that we all live differently; we are obviously more possession obsessed than they who had done such a fine job of outfitting our home.

The numerous trips into Stowmarket and Bury St Edmunds were also opportunities to organise telecommunication plans for both cellphones and computers, to secure a good satellite navigational device and to sort out bank accounts.

Our delightful camp beside this little lake is more popular with fishermen than campers at this time of the year, and the weekends brought dozens of such folk who arrived with great amounts of paraphernalia (khaki canvas structures, chairs and refreshments to name but a few). They pay £6 per rod per day and sit daylong fishing for perch, roach and catfish, and here’s the thing; they throw every fish caught back into the lake! This I learned when expressing concern that surely the lake would be fished out with all this activity, surely it must be restocked by the manager who diligently polices the rod holders? I am told that the fish that live in this lake would be mud flavoured and not at all appealing to the palate. I am still astounded by this revelation!

In the interests of reporting this trip in an informative manner, I will advise that we are paying £100 per week for our posse plugged into electricity.

But the fisher folk and three other campers are not the only residents of this small holding; there is a pair of white swans who spent the weekend taking off and landing or aqua-planing, a flock of ducks, blackbirds, and a host of other birds. The café situated just inside the gate does a brisk trade, apparently well regarded for its weekend brunches. Across the road is a pub, the Shepherd and Dog, a most attractive building whose customers rival the numbers entering the Lakeside Fishing and Camp.

Chris’s brother John had brought our caravan onto the site the day before we flew in, so by the time we actually moved into our caravan, three nights of “occupancy” had in fact been vacant. The days were flicking by all too quickly, so we decided to extend a further week. This gave us opportunity to catch up with more of the family and to explore the region, some already familiar, some for the first time.

Chris & Margie at the weir, Knettershall Heath

Sunday afternoon we took a drive around the childhood haunts of Chris and his siblings, similar to that done last year before we headed off on our motorhome tour. With Margie riding in the back offering a running commentary of childhood memories, it proved to be even more insightful than the previous such jaunt. We stopped by on the Knettishall Heath, a spot I would dearly have loved to linger and wander further than the weir. Here Chris and Margie reminisced swimming days in past summer times; this day we watched hardy visitors emerge all goose pimply and shivering, obviously quite insane to be swimming at this time of the year.

The Heath covers an area of four hundred acres and is part of the Suffolk Wildlife Trust. It is a popular place for nesting skylarks and nightjars from early March to late August, during which time dog walkers are discouraged from taking their dogs on the open heath.

We passed close by the remnants of American airfields used in the Second World War and in later years, places which impacted my husband and his siblings during their childhood years. Very recently memorials have been installed to remember the American airmen who lost their lives flying out of these fields. 

After passing through numerous charming villages; Bardwell, Barningham, Blo’Norton, Bressingham, Bardwell, Badwell Ash, Garboldisham, Hopton,  Market Weston, Norton, North Lopham and the town of Diss, not necessarily in this order, most in Suffolk and some just over the Little Ouse River which marks the border with Norfolk, we paused for a cup of tea at a fifties themed café at Hepworth. We then returned to Stowmarket and dined at The Willow Tree, a family restaurant packed out and nearly too busy to fit us in. Fortunately a table was found but the fish was all gone so we settled for alternatives, still all very delicious.

The weather during this first week was horrendous, just 1 degree on rising and never venturing beyond 10 degrees. We experienced sleet and hail and rain and icy winds racing down from the North Sea; fortunately the heater in the caravan is just brilliant and we did come relatively well equipped with winter clothes. In fact we have come with winter, summer, spring and autumn clothes, to cater for all temperatures and conditions, but this does not give licence to the Weather God in the sky.

After a week mostly spent  waiting for subscription and bank cards to arrive, without full success and glad that we had extended for a further week, we decided it was time to head off and see some of the regional sights which we had planned to do in that first week. So at the beginning of the second week, we set off very early in the morning toward Cambridge, about forty miles west of our camp at Onehouse (pronounced “One-us” by Margie who pronounces the local names like a long  term local, which of course she is).

Cambridge had a population of 136,275 in 2015, and there is no reason to suspect it has become a whole lot larger in the interim; somewhat larger than Bury St Edmunds which has a population of about 70,000. It is principally a university town, a much quieter and more secluded place than its academic rival, Oxford, which is larger again with a population of about 160,000. These days there is much more to Cambridge than the thirty one universities; it is the centre of a very active agricultural area and has more latterly acquired a reputation as a high-tech centre of excellence, locally labelled “Silicon Fen”. Cambridge has spawned many significant scientific research highlights and a high number of Nobel Prize winners.

Chris had suggested I prepare our cut lunch the night before so that we could be away early, however I reminded him that we had been up between 5.30 and 6.30 every morning of the past week, with our resting hours still out of kilter. I should have heeded his advice because on this particular morning, one week into our UK adventure, our waking hour reverted to something near normal and by the time we were breakfasted and organised for departure, it was near 8.30 am. However we arrived at the Newmarket Road Park and Ride at about 9.30 and caught the bus into the town soon after, or at least after consulting the council worker regarding the workings of the very sophisticated parking machine. This apparatus photographs the vehicle on entry, then matches it up when you enter your registration number into the control panel, and confirms it is happy to take your one pound coin.

After alighting from the bus, we wandered up King’s Parade admiring the grand structures between the street and the River Cam, after finding our way to the Apple Store. There we had managed to change our “region” on our iTunes account, thus allowing us to download our Vodafone UK app, all courtesy of most helpful Milly.

Punts on the River Cam

We were fascinated by the hundreds of cyclists about, whizzing to and fro, up and down, in and out and all about the pedestrians and vehicles, the latter less than found in most towns. We were constantly accosted by young men inviting us to tour upon the river, with or without a punter; we had decided before setting out that the winter-like weather was not at all conducive to punting upon the River Cam. However we were finally seduced by delightful Student Jack, who wooed us with his convincing argument that a trip on the river was the only true way to explore Cambridge and learn about the wonders of the town’s academic history. Jack is a psychology student at Gonville College, one far out on the edge of the university, a fact that does not please him however he apparently had little choice in the matter of which university would best suit his convenience. We asked why he was not currently engaged in sitting examinations as most students were; this we had discovered from the signs at the porters gates which explained that the universities were closed today for that reason. 

Jack’s exams will not take place until June or July, this another lamentable fact of his life; poor Jack was a little like Eeyore, but still charming enough to give us a fifty percent reduction in the advertised tour fee (this was no doubt a ruse to make us feel special).

Peeping through the gates of one College

We adjourned to the nearest MacDonald’s for coffee and a comfort stop, before joining Jack and four other suckers and proceeding to the river. There we found Max organising our punt for comfort, thin squabs along the low benches covered by rugs, and rather unready for his first passengers of the day. But soon we were off along the river, southwards and upriver between The Backs and the rear of several very fine colleges; Clare College, King’s College, Queen’s College, then back the other way past the Trinity College and St John’s College. The expansive grassed parks of The Backs were colourful with blooming tulips and the last of the daffodils. Max had dozens of stories to regale of the history and horror of the colleges, some perhaps not to be challenged by a Google search, but no less entertaining. We returned safely to dock without having been upturned, glad we had taken the earliest tour and that the season was still not busy; while we were happy to have spent £20 this day, we may not have been happy to do so had the river been packed with all the punts we saw moored further up the river in readiness for the onslaught of the summer tourist season.

We crossed one of the pedestrian bridges and walked through the parklands until we found a bench in the warm sunshine to lunch, then proceeded to the Fitzwilliam Museum along Trumpington Street, a southern extension of King’s Parade. This Museum which has just celebrated its 200^th anniversary holds the city’s finest art collection, is housed in a very grand Neo-classical structure, built to house the hoard bequeathed by Viscount Fitzwilliam. Many other gifts have been made since and so the collection is amazingly eclectic but well curated. We spent nearly three hours admiring the assortment of objets d’art; Egyptian sarcophagi and mummies,  fifth century BC Greek vases, early European and Asian ceramics, armour, glass and pewter ware, European paintings and sculptures from the eighteenth century through to the last. Most famous artists are represented including William Blake, Hogarth, Titian, Gainsborough, Manet, Degas, Picasso, Lucien Freud, Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, and so many more.

The day was getting away and my legs were feeling every step between the galleries, so we left and wandered further about the shopping streets, across Christ’s Pieces (a park with beautiful beds of spring blooms) and back to the bus stop to join those heading home from work. Our trip back on the A14 was somewhat slower than the reverse in the morning.

Our car and caravan at Lakeside, Onehouse

The next day was spent in much the same way as most have been since arrival: travelling into either Bury St Edmunds or Stowmarket to sort out our bank accounts and telecommunications, one reliant on the other and both feeding off the delays of the other. This particular day saw us receive our Debit Cards in the post, care of my brother-in-law, but the PIN numbers were to follow by separate post, and the weekend was to be a long holiday one, and we were scheduled to head off just days hence. Everyday leads us to various retailers to buy more and more fixtures and fittings and accumulating possessions for our months ahead; camp chairs, water carriers, extra cups, wine glasses, salad bowls and servers, plastic storage containers, car wash brushes, coat hangers, reference books and on and on. Fortunately a six month tour around the UK is a very different cup of tea to three years around Australia, hence the expenditure is much less, but no less well considered.

This particular day we travelled through the twelve rural miles to the Big Smoke,  past a dead badger on the road side, pheasants and a random deer in the fields and a squirrel in a tree; perhaps not as exotic as kangaroos, koalas and snakes, but none the less appropriate and exciting for this location on the other side of the world.

The Ancient House, Ipswich

It was also the day to fill the fuel tank on our new Kia for the second time, here paying about £1.09  per litre compared to the 75 cents (or about 0.38p we have been paying in New Zealand). Chris pulled out his calculator and worked out that the vehicle has been doing 33 miles a gallon. This will no doubt change once we set out on the road next week with our caravan in tow.

Here I will take the opportunity to write of the caravan; we are absolutely delighted with the layout and the “liveability” although being parked up in the one spot for almost two weeks on power beside this idyllically picturesque spot is hardly a fair measure. Chris’s siblings had equipped it with all they thought we would need but we then found that the wheels on the grey waste trolley did not rotate, hence we had to call on John to find a rasp drill to drill the plastic centre of the wheels further. Unlike the motorhome, we fill the water canister daily and empty the grey water as regularly; this is quite a trek across the park for someone who is not as young as they used to be. In Australia we acquired an “old-lady-shopping-trolley” and modified this as a tank carrier. When we asked John where we might source such an object, he produced an already modified item and thus saved us the $30 or more we would have had to pay had we purchased such in the market. There was only one gas bottle and we have been wary of using the gas more than necessary because we do not wish to run out with no immediate replacement. John again very kindly produced a smaller spare for our use, but Chris was unable to detach the fitting from the first for the second. Again John produced an appropriate wrench, et voila! (Needless to say John’s garage / workshop is an Aladdin’s cave full of almost forty five year’s accumulated tools and like treasure.)

We were surprised to learn that our caravan has the same registration plate as our car, this always matching the tow vehicle to that being towed; it makes sense but is so contrary to how things are in both Australia and New Zealand.

Thomas Wolsey & I

And whilst on the subject of differences, we have been delighted about the price of food, just as we were last year when we did our brief three week motorhome tour here in England. Vegetables are just a fraction of what they are in New Zealand and meat no dearer. Bread, milk, yoghurt, cheese and the like are a little cheaper, and so apart from the cost of fuel and camp ground tariffs, our spending should be less here than it is back home.

Still with days to go before our planned departure, and the Bank Holiday in full swing, we decided to escape the ten other campers who had arrived to share our lakeside posse and head to Ipswich for the day. This city of over 130,000 inhabitants lies only about twenty miles to the south east at the head of the Orwell Estuary. Way back in the Middle Ages, Ipswich was a rich trading port, and like most commercial centres, the centuries and decades have brought fluctuations of activity and wealth. Today it would not normally be considered to be a tourist “must-visit”, but for all its reputation as a more industrial town rather than a resort, it is worth calling into. We spent a whole day there, and enjoyed every minute.

The Grandmother by Giles

On arrival at the Park & Ride, we were pleased to find the parking free and the fare to town for us as a “group”, albeit very small, a mere £4 return. Once in the city we spent an hour walking about the quaintest streets, a maze of shops and buildings so very very old. One such now houses a kitchenware shop, a Grade 1 listed Ancient House in the Buttermarket and dates back into the 15^th century. But quite frankly there were dozens of other buildings that I managed to ooh and aagh over just as eloquently.

We walked up the hill beyond the crowded market place to Christchurch Park and watched the end of a race with fat unfit folk crawling across the finish line. Dog walkers and house bound parents of young children were also about in abundance. This parkland covers an area of sixty five acres; a delightful area of trees and ponds. The centre piece of the park is Christchurch Mansion, a many times restored Tudor building sporting seventeenth century Dutch-style gables. We set off about the house under our own steam immediately after it opened at 10 am, then after almost an hour joined a free guided tour which added to our experience enormously. 

Lunching out of the wind at Christchurch Mansion

Alas, like so many stately houses in England, no matter who holds the purse strings, this one is forever short of funds for maintenance, and this was very obvious as we made our way around the building. Interestingly there is a wealth of artworks housed here and the sale of these would certainly raise enough money to upgrade and maintain the property for a very long time, however the artworks are an intrinsic part of the property and not likely to leave anytime soon. These works include a large collection of paintings by East Suffolk’s own John Constable,  Thomas Gainsborough, Alfred Munnings and Leonard Squirrel as well as a Picasso, a Matisse,  and many other fabulous gems. 

After enjoying our sandwiches in the sunshine, out of the cold wind, we walked back through the town and down to the waterfront, an area now transformed into modern bars, restaurants and apartments. We walked along one way to the extent of the redevelopment, then back along the other way, before heading up again through the town to find the Ipswich Museum. 

On the way we stopped by a couple of statues worth photographing and bothering to read the description; the first of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, son of an Ipswich butcher and leading trader,   who passed his boyhood  here in Ipswich and the rest of his life, dominating the country for the first half of Henry VIII’s reign, showing an interest in developing his home town right up until his fall from power. The other, the Grandma Statue, is based on the character created by Carl Giles who again was a son of this city. Here I recalled the many Giles cartoon books my grandfather had when we used to visit in the 1960s.

Ipswich's waterfront

The museum, opened in 1847 and the first publicly funded museum in England, like all the other attractions visited, offered free entry. We headed for the Ipswich Story and filled in the gaps of our knowledge of the town’s history, then gave the rest of the institution little more than a cursory call. We did pop into the Art Gallery right next door, but found nothing at all that appealed and soon found ourselves heading back down into the town to the bus stop and so heading homeward. 

Today we headed off into Bury St Edmunds in yet another attempt to purchase and set up our mobile data, that for the laptop, and were at last successful. The frustration has related to the fact that we have gone on a plan, which in turn needs to be paid from a bank account monthly and the appropriate links between bank account set up, registration of address, et cetera just wasn’t happening at the speed we required. But at last we are all go, hence the ability to post this very lengthy diatribe on this blog.

Ipswich town centre

After three quarters of an hour at the Vodafone shop, all spent being attended to rather than the usual queuing one does in such establishments, we headed off to Nowton Park, a mile or two south east of the city. Chris had no memory of the park, and this was soon explained when we discovered it came into the hands of the St Edmundsbury Borough Council only in 1985, more than a decade and a half  after he left his home county.

The park boasts almost 200 acres of countryside, grounds landscaped in typical Victorian style over one hundred years ago. Once part of the Oakes family estate, the park is comprised of beautiful wild flower meadows, mixed woodland, wildlife ponds and an arboretum featuring trees from around the world. The Lime Avenue in spring is apparently a sight for sore eyes, with a host of 100,000 daffodils; alas we were too late for the treat, the flowers were already brown and dry, well past their best. However we did enjoy the bluebells and cowslips peeping through the great swathes of nettles and the budding of the pussy willows. 

Nowton Court

Well hidden behind screens of well-established trees are several old buildings; the hall itself and several others as for instance, the gardener’s “cottage”, the gatehouse and others, still all occupied by previous residents. Nowton Court was built in 1857 and remained in the family for many years. For some years it was run as a boarding prep school until it closed and the pupils were moved to Old Buckenham Hall in Brettenham. One famous name that passed beneath this scholarly establishment was the actor, Nigel Havers. The Court is now a retirement home called “Nowton Court Village.”

Chris beyond the cowslips

Today the park was host to many families, many with the family dog, all walking about enjoying the place as we did. Apart from the other folk, we spotted a robin, a murder of raucous crows, a rabbit, a badger set, plenty of mole hills and a grey squirrel. We walked circuits of just under five kilometres and ate our lunch under the trees, the sun hiding behind the clouds but the temperatures high enough to go without a woolly hat. 

The rest of the afternoon was spent on a short tikki tour about the area calling at some of Chris’s old haunts, then out for a traditional home cooked roast of beef and rice pudding at Chris’s sister’s place in Stowmarket.

So here we are now, armed with the last of our cards, membership and bank, with two days up our sleeves, and best of all internet to deal with the thirty four emails waiting for attention and family and friends requiring more than our rather scant messages conveyed since we have been here on the other side of the world.