Grantchester and then the Norfolk Broads

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After breakfast and packing up we moved on from Cambridge. Grantchester (of the TV show on the ABC) was just a couple of kilometres away, so we stopped in at the village before getting on the highway to go just past Norwich to our destination for the next couple of nights at Crostwick. The village was not the village of the series, but the church was. We wandered around it for a little while. It was quiet and old, and the graveyard seemed to be very haphazard. Leaving Grantchester, we next aimed for Ely. We wanted to see the cathedral there. It is very old- Norman in its earliest parts - and is not such a decorated cathedral as the gothic ones. It has a wooden ceiling- which is beautifully painted- and at the centre an octagon. The octagon was designed to repair the tower collapse, in 1322. It is beautifully painted, and certainly makes up for the disastrous tower collapse. The cathedral has faced many times of conflict, and you can see in the Mary chapel- a huge space- evidence of the time when the churches became Anglican and the statues and other catholic decoration were broken and vandalised. The cathedral was very busy with people of the community getting ready for the weekend, cleaning, arranging flowers etc, and also with visitors to the cathedral. To remind everyone that it was a functioning church, prayers are held for a few minutes each hour- we haven't come across that before! After our visit to the cathedral we needed a cup of tea. We found a local tea room and enjoyed local scones and tea. We then drove on towards Norwich. The phone gps is working well and we got through Norwich easily. Lunch was needed, but nothing seemed obvious. Then out in the middle of nowhere really we can go a huge roundabout under construction. Close to it was a farm shop, garden centre and cafe. It was a very local day, as the cafe had recently opened and seemed to be run by a committee of locals. The customers all seemed to know each other, and although the place was small, seemed quite busy. We ordered a sandwich each, they were enormous and also delicious. The rain was now pouring down, so we kept going to Crostwick. We booked in to our accomodation and had a bit of a rest. I had an appointment with an NHS doctor in Coltishall. It was an experience to see how the system worked. We walked in, saw the doctor, picked up some antibiotics and went again- all without any money changing hands. It seemed very easy for the doctor to put the prescription into his computer, send it to the dispensary and the patient picked it up as they went out the door. We ate our dinner at the hotel tonight. Much easier than going out again in the rain.

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