North to Thorpe on the Hill,Lincolnshire

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At least there doesn’t appear to be any rain in the forecast for today but the temperature with the wind chill factor still means that it won’t get any warmer than 12C today. However this will be OK for some walking and we plan to stop along the way as we cross Norfolk and head into Lincolnshire to do this.

We took the A146 to Lodden, a market town where the Holy Trinity Church built in the 15^th century dominates the town and its history. The church grounds were full of graves and headstones laid out in some parts in neat rows but in other parts all over the place.

A woman inside the church was very informative about the history of the town and allowed us access to the Vicar’s room which was up a winding, very narrow staircase. In the room was a detailed pictorial history of the town highlighting names of businesses and what had happened to them over the years which was fascinating.

Our walk took us through the village past houses with names like Farthings Green and Loddon House, which in 1716 when it was built was a ‘lunatic asylum’. While the extensive house still had a grand appearance it looked like it was now split into flats and was undergoing some renovation.

Looking out of place amongst all the brick buildings was the very well preserved all timber Loddon Mill which used water initially as the power to operate the mill but converted to steam in 1888 and was now used as a cafe.

Just across and down from the mill is an area of waterway with access to the Broads, with a number of launches tied up.

We had parked the car there when we started our walk and there was a guy fishing and when we came back and hour and a half later he was still in the same position and still happily fishing although he hadn’t appeared to have caught anything!

From Loddon we took a road that bypassed most of Norwich and then got ourselves onto the A47 heading west with the idea to stop for lunch beside an inlet of water from The Wash at Kings Lynn.

This didn’t turn out to be successful because like so many small to medium size towns the parking in the centre or busier parts of town fill up quickly with workers and shoppers and then it is a matter of luck in finding a spare space.

In the end, after driving around streets on or close to the water we gave up and stopped along the A17 at a lay-by for lunch.

We are looking forward to a rise in temperature so we can get back to having a boot lunch again. Today with the temperature at 13C a boot lunch was out of the question.

With some light misty rain falling we drove on towards Lincoln on the A17 and then onto the A15 passing through farmland where all the crops had now been harvested although what was missing in this area was corn or maize.

We lost count of the number of RAF airfields that we either passed or were signposted on a road off the main road we were driving on although it wasn’t obvious whether they were all operational or not.

Our Travelodge hotel was located on a junction of two main roads a few kilometres outside of the city of Lincoln.

After unpacking we took a drive into the city and Gretchen managed to get an appointment with the Toni & Guy salon for a much needed haircut while I got the most reading of my Kindle achieved in some time while I waited.

We will be back to the city to check out the sights before we head north to Pudsey, near Bradford and Leeds where we have our much awaited catch up with cousin’s Rhona and Jean as well as Iain who is coming from nearby Long Preston for a meal on Friday night.

Back at Thorpe on the Hill where the hotel was located we tried the Railway Inn in the village for dinner but they only served meals from Wednesday to Sunday so we will have to try again tomorrow night. Instead we ended up with a meal in the Little Chef which is a chain of family type restaurants (not dissimilar to Cobb & Co in NZ) attached to some Travelodge hotels.

We will see what the weather is like tomorrow morning before we decide if we include Lincoln in a day’s sightseeing or go there on Thursday before the short trip to Pudsey.

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