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squiz Member Member#: 6644 Location: Registered: 27-05-2007 Diary Entries: 3071 |
22nd October 2019 Mt. Biking: Ickworth Estate Wind Direction: Wind Stength: Surf / Sea State: Air Temperature: Sea Temperature: Weather: sunny periods Max Speed: 18.44 (knots - unless stated otherwise) Distance Covered: 9.17 miles (Nautical Miles - unless stated otherwise) Tuesday 22nd October – Bike & walk ***** National Trust – Ickworth House and Gardens – sunny periods. After a few days of decorating and with a couple of days of nice weather forecast Mag and I decided to take some time off, packing the van for a night away then heading to the National Trusts Ickworth House near Bury St. Edmunds:) The wall to wall sunshine had not arrived in Suffolk as we set off on our bikes to do a circuit of the Ickworth Estate at eleven as the car park was quickly filling up! We followed the red route, The Grand Tour, 7 miles according to the map, on a really nice made up track for the most although we did find some muddy paths through the woods and got our bikes covered in mud! We followed the tiny River Linnet to Downters wood and there were impressive mushrooms everywhere. It was nice and quiet, except for a few walkers and cyclists, very pretty too. In Lownde Wood we spot the huge Monument, yet another Obelisk, popular with large country estates for some reason? We make a small detour through another field of sheep to take a closer look just as the sun makes an appearance:) We continue through Lady Katherines Wood and past the Round House to Fairy Lake where we do a great loop in the trees. We soon reached the main entrance gate house and the long drive back towards the van. We decided to continue down to the very Grand House with its large round mid-section and two wings which are in the process of being covered in scaffold to repair the roof! Its downhill now past St Marys Church, past the Walled Garden and round to Canal lake with a great view back to the gardens. It was here we spotted two Red Kites circling overhead before continuing past the small Lake causing a mini sheep stampede and back to the van. We had been out for 2hrs 20mins, covering over nine miles and were soon tucking into home made carrot and coriander soup:) Refreshed we set off on foot now to have a look in the house, we were not sure it was open because of the scaffold work but we were in luck. We were supposed to have a timed entry ticket to enter but the lady on the door let us in anyway. The round section of the house is very impressive as we headed up the stairs to look at the bedrooms, the large silver collection, the dining and living rooms learning much of the colourful history of the owners from the friendly NT volunteers:) It was then down below stairs to visit the best bit, the kitchen, servants quarters, tool rooms for the odd job men and a huge boiler room, all full of period items . We are not usually fans of the old houses and definitely prefer the grounds but this is pretty quirky and we did enjoy it :) That was enough culture for one day as we headed back outside to explore the Italianate Garden with its petrified wood section and saw loads of squirrels. With lots of time we headed down to the walled garden again before calling it a day and walking back to the van for a welcome cuppa. With the estate near to closing we set off for Suffolk Wildlife’s, Bradfield Wood to spend the night but got lost as usual, a combination of no road signs and a road closure made it a bit of a trek to find our overnight spot but we were treated to picturesque villages and a lovely sunset so it was not all bad! We reached the car park just before dark and were setting up for the night as The Suffolk Wildlife man was leaving in his 4x4, I don’t think he was overly keen on us stopping but he said to tuck ourselves away behind the hedge and we would be fine. Photo Gallery Here National Trust – Ickworth |
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