I know I was going to tell you about Antigua again this week, but sorry. This year, the summer months have been crammed with events, excursions and much good stuff. I have experienced cycling and sailing, which, when added to the many and varied parkruns, makes me a busy boy.

We have at least five hitherto untried parkrun events already tucked away in our diaries, as well as short breaks in Yorkshire and Devon on the horizon. Perhaps we can return to sunny Antigua when the darker nights descend, trapping us in that all‑pervasive gloom.

This week, I am taking you to a hidden gem on the border between where the South Folk and North Folk reside, The Angles Way. We were blown away by its delights, and I would urge you, if you get a moment, to visit at your earliest convenience.

I need to sometimes remember that I am not the only blind person in my world. Let me tell you about a family we were very close to when we were children. The Chamleys of Pebmarsh were the ones in question, and Mrs Chamley had been a Young Farmers’ friend of my mother.

Mr Chamley and my father also happened to get along very well. Both sets of parents didn’t have any problem in making children; I was one of three and Mark, the main feature of this week’s excursion, was one of four.

It is quite a coincidence, if you believe in such things. My Home Security Team characters are always told that there is no such thing. There is, though, and unbeknown to the pair of us, there is a strong possibility that we may have a shared ancestor somewhere back in our mothers’ conjoined lines.

We are both from farming stock and only lived a few kilometres from one another. That is too hard to contemplate in my mind and, for that matter, far too time‑consuming to go down the heritage route. I mean, where on earth would we start?

Let’s say we go back 200 years, eight generations as a guide; that leaves us looking at far too many grandmothers. I do know, however, that my own line goes back as far as an American lady who migrated to the UK after that rebel sort, George Washington, chucked us out from the land of the free.

It always seemed like you were entitled to freedom with conditions; you needed to agree with the United States hierarchy, Trumpian before its time. Mark, who is currently President of Diss and District Rotary Club, had undertaken to walk The Angles Way.

This route connects the Broads to the Brecks, Great Yarmouth to Thetford, 93 miles in total. I am not sure of the actual distance, as Mark, who was guided by his wife, Bernadette, was only claiming 78 miles on their pre‑walk briefing.

Talking with them afterwards, they believed they had walked in excess of 87. If I were them, I think I would put 93 on my CV. He was raising money for three vision charities, two of which are very close to my own heart, the third less well known to me: Vision Norfolk, Retina UK and Global Sight Solutions. Check out the links and support them if you can!

Given that they had already completed the trek the day before we went to meet them, just to make sure no‑one could accuse them of short‑changing the sponsors, they only went and took the relatively short stroll back from Knettishall Heath to Thelnetham Windmill.

This was another nearly seven miles. Both looked very spry given what they had achieved; after all, they are no longer spring chickens. Honestly, if you are offended by that, none was intended. I merely wanted to highlight the size of their completed task.

As mentioned, Mark is as good as totally blind, and it was most interesting to observe how Bernadette was guiding him, making notes for when it eventually catches up with me. They were connected by a walking stick, perhaps a metre long.

Mark held onto one end and Bernadette the other. This serves two purposes: one, of course, it means Mark can follow safely without suddenly veering off into a river or some such. It is quite often that I lose track of Jane and end up going off course.

The second reason is that, thanks to the length of the stick, it stops him from raking the toe end of his boots down Berni’s heels, something I am always doing to Jane. Sorry, didn’t mean to call her Berni; fortunately her mother wasn’t around.

She was given the name Bernadette and that is what she shall be called. Quite right. Given that I had not seen Mark for what we think was over fifty years, I felt a little emotional meeting up after all that time.

Then, when he pulled me in for a man hug, I could sense a welling up deep inside. Most men who attempt to wrap their arms around me are in serious danger of ending up on the floor gasping for breath, but there are exceptions to the rule.

A Walk Through Nature and Memory

With the promise of tea and cake ringing in our ears, we embarked on a sensory guided tour of the local nature, to celebrate and commemorate the success of the Chamleys’ combined effort. Thing is, you need to realise that whilst it is usually the blindee who is centre and front of these attainments, a bicycle cannot complete a journey without handlebars.

Mark is, most definitely, the freewheeling type whilst Bernadette is the controlling hand on the tiller. Anyway, back to the walk. This was conducted by the Little Ouse Headwaters Project, a charity set up to manage the environment around the source of the River Little Ouse.

We strolled across the lane from the windmill and along to the car park. Here we met our extremely knowledgeable guide, Ellie Beach. For those listening to a talking newspaper version of this item or via a screen‑reader, especially with an Australian accent, she is not to be confused with the Queensland port, Airlie Beach.

She is the Project’s only full‑time paid employee. My word, what a job. Where were these posts when I visited the careers master’s office at school? Young people, with the right guidance, seem to have many more opportunities available to them than we did.

The above reminded me of a moment in Sydney when I was there in the early eighties. Sometimes we, the English and Australians, much like the Americans, can be friends divided by the same language. I popped into a barber’s shop one day for a haircut.

A woman welcomed me, saying, “Take a seat, love. A vet will do your hair when she’s free.” I was aghast. “You mean someone who, earlier on, had her hand up a cow’s arse, is going to cut my hair?” She turned from cutting her client’s hair with a look of scorn.

“No, mate. Evette will be cutting your hair in a minute.” I could have sworn I heard the words idiot, Pommie and bloke all in the same sentence as I took my seat in the waiting area. We were embarking on the longer walk, starting by following the river from the Suffolk side.

The Little Ouse forms part of the border between Norfolk and Suffolk, the other two rivers being the Waveney and the Yare. We were to rejoin those taking on the shorter walk, guided by Bernadette. We encountered many landmarks and were regaled with many tales along the circular trail.

I will, however, endeavour to pick out the more pertinent facts for your delectation. Fact number one, and I am certainly not going to enumerate each one, is that the lovely village of Thelnetham is only just in Suffolk, but the windmill can be viewed from well inside its neighbouring county.

Even though Jane and I had moved from Suffolk to Norfolk nine years ago, there seemed something quite daring about stepping out on the southern side of the border without a passport in sight. Ellie, LOHP Conservation Manager, had been joined by volunteers Reg and Becky.

They showed us where one of the many cameras had picked up some unfamiliar movement over the winter months. Rubbing their eyes in disbelief and rewinding the tape time and time again, they were convinced it was a beaver.

Closer inspection of the riverbank unveiled the telltale signs of gnawed branches along with scat deposits—beaver waste—which served to confirm the presence of these amphibians only recently reintroduced to the Norfolk countryside.

Well, there are three words you don’t often hear in the same sentence these days: bank, branch and deposit. I asked what I thought was the obvious question. “Where do you think it had come from?” The answer was that no‑one knew.

“Do you think it could have come from Wild Ken Hill?” was my supplementary. Both Reg and Becky dismissed my theory as fanciful. I continued with my grilling and soon established that it was unlikely that Billy Beaver had made his way over land.

They are normally borne by water. Is it so fanciful then? Not in my mind at any rate. Ken Hill, we’ll drop the Wild bit for now, is positioned near the Great Ouse estuary where it empties into The Wash.

Surely it is not beyond the realms of possibility that our little furry friend might have journeyed along the Great Ouse, through King’s Lynn, ignoring the confluence with the Nar, making his way to where the Great Ouse joined the Little.

According to Mr Google, it is 52.3 miles by road, perhaps the same by river, so our fellow with all the time in the world could have done it, couldn’t he? I daresay the experts are right, but I, for one, would like to believe that the journey is possible.

The next mention goes to the wonderful chainsaw carvings that adorn the riverbank. One in particular, which I shall call the totem pole of life—I will look up its correct title by the end of this paragraph—was inspiringly simple yet brilliant at the same time.

It depicts the food chain from the base upwards. Right at the bottom we have the tadpoles, and when we reach the top, we find ourselves staring into the beady eyes of a heron, head honcho of this habitat.

I am afraid that, despite its aesthetic brilliance, it is in need of a bit of TLC. By the way, I wasn’t a million miles out in recalling the name of the work. It is, in actual fact, the “Tree of Life,” and it appears that it was carved in situ from a dead oak.

Shall we say it is a treemendous effort. Then there are the bridges linking the two most northerly counties of East Anglia. When infiltrating Suffolk from the north, like us, it is always worth making a note of all the accessible escape routes back across the Little Ouse.

Mind you, if you were fit enough, it might well be possible to leap from one side of the boundary to the other. One of the oldest is Swallow Bridge, which was dropped into position by helicopter back in 2005.

Once made safe and secure, the leaders from each side performed a ceremonial handshake in the middle to mark the joining of the two lands and, who knows, it might well lead to everlasting peace between the tribes.

Senses, Wildlife and the Joy of the Outdoors

Finally, we met up with the shorter walk group. They were given something slightly different. Bernadette gave them a fully immersive stroll through the meadows and fens closer to the windmill.

It was, however, fully immersive except for sight. Participants were given blindfolds and trusted in guides to negotiate their way through the landscape.

Hearing: birds singing, of course, but also listen out for skittering in the undergrowth or plopping sounds from the river.

Touch: feel the sun on your head or back, feel the different ground under your feet, feel the varying tree barks. Smell: the scents of summer flowers really are intense at this time of year—cut grass, a fellow walker’s scent and, sorry about this one, another fellow walker’s body odour.

Taste: not sure that anyone got the chance to try out what the countryside had to offer, but it is a possibility. Cake tasting was certainly on offer at the end, although by this time the fetters of the blindfolds had been removed.

I didn’t opt for the smaller walk as it is akin to what I experience every day. What a great idea, though; you should give it a go one day if you are fully sighted. You will soon realise how much more of a role your other senses would take on.

People often say to me that my hearing must be good because I can’t see. That is nonsense; my hearing is no better than the next person, except those with hearing impairments. I simply use it differently.

Because we cannot see is no reason not to enjoy the great outdoors, or life for that matter. It has become apparent that some people without brains still seem to get enjoyment out of life, so why shouldn’t I? Some of them even enter politics.

Flora and fauna—that’s really what this conservation area is all about. I’m not good at identifying birdsong, although I am getting better. I still need spotters to tell me what I am listening to.

I heard others talk of snipe, red kites and many others, too numerous to mention. Plants, there’s another thing. I am useless; I even get names muddled up. Ragged robin sounds like Batman’s mate after a night on the town.

There was one called death rattle, I think, then wild mint and what about lousewort and, of course, gorse. I am not 100% sure that I have remembered these names accurately; all too much to take in for an older brain.

Whorl, or pinhead, snails are prevalent but are so tiny—no more than 2.5mm high—you wouldn’t even know it if you stood on an entire rout. Demoiselles, sounding like a Gallic damselfly, are highly recognisable to the sighted for their vibrant appearance.

Dragonflies are also present in good numbers. There we are, damsels and dragons but, to the best of my knowledge, no St George‑fly. It rather tarnishes the bravery of our present patron saint. Given where we were, I call for the reinstatement of St Edmund, brave but stupid, as we learned a few weeks ago.

Find Out More
Little Ouse Headwaters Project
Thelnetham Windmill
Vision Norfolk
Retina UK
The Angles Way

White Cane Ratings ©
LOHP Circular Walks: good, need a companion - 🦯 🦯 🦯 (3)
Windmill: not open, can’t judge