Walsham le Willows

"Dad, I don't have anyone to play with." Yes, it's the school holidays, but Little W is still at nursery for one more week, Big Miss had gone to town with one of her mates and missus Michaelangelo was busy painting the outdoors woodwork.

So we did some word search grids for a bit and, when the painting was finished for the day, we took a trip to Walsham-le-Willows for a short walk. It is a sizeable village, but away from main roads so is quite quiet and peaceful. We had driven past signs to it many times, but I had never been. Just what we needed for a short afternoon walk.

We drove up the A143 from Bury St Edmunds past Ixworth and turned right at the roundabout where the A1088 goes left towards Thetford. We parked at the village hall and did a clockwise walk around the village, along Church St, down Townhouse and Palmer St, and then back up the Causeway.

The village website has an excellent Historic Trail with map and description of the buildings along the way (we didn't do all of it, but saw most of the sights).

We went into Wattisfield Wines, where it was nice and cool, but Little Miss was less interested than we were with the tantalising array of bottles, so, alas, we had to decline offer of a tasting.

We noticed that even the most modest of houses had lovely garden displays.

This was opposite the deserted chlidren's playpark, where Little Miss enjoyed a swing and a slide for a few minutes.

We rather liked the pargeting on this cottage, Hunt's End.



The village name is derived from the Old English Walesam and means Walh's home in the willow trees. Yes there are still willows about - these are by the river along Grove Rd.
Leaning over the bridge on the Causeway, Little Miss spotted some freshwater crayfish in the river. Just like the ones we saw on Sunday being caught in the River Lark.

The church is impressive.

I look forward to an update from Simon Knott in hisSuffolk Churches series.

An interesting village, well worth the trip. So off we went home for a well-deserved ice lolly for Little Miss.