Churches To Visit

[Davydine]

Hi All,

 

pretty much every time we visit the broads, we have visited Ranworth and taken a trip up the church tower to see the view from the top. It is unique as far as I know in that you are allowed up the tower.

Are there any other churches on the broads that allow access to the tower or are particularly worth a visit?

thanks

David

[Ray]

A little off Broads but worth the trip is the church at Winterton, it claims the second highest tower in Norfolk. It is only open Saturday afternoons in the summer unfortunately but the view is great.

When I find out this year's opening times I can post them here if there's interest.

[Mouldy]

I think the tower at Beccles has reopened for visitors.  I’m not sure of details or opening times etc., but I’m sure someone will know.  Irstead church is worth a visit.  No tower to climb, but the church itself is thatched.  There’s also one near the moorings at Thurne.  I’ve been there before, but I can’t remember much about it.  @YnysMon has probably visited a great many churches around The Broads and will surely be able to help you.

[Chelsea14Ian]

I've  posted some churches. Our church  at Martham  is lovely.Ludham,just  past the Kings head.

[Bluebell]

11 minutes ago, Chelsea14Ian said:

I've  posted some churches. Our church  at Martham  is lovely.Ludham,just  past the Kings head.

St Catherine’s is the one at Ludham - well worth a visit…😎

[YnysMon]

33 minutes ago, Bluebell said:

St Catherine’s is the one at Ludham - well worth a visit…😎

It is too! I’ve heard the church at Ludham has recently opened a tea room. (Hmm…must watch out for predictive text this afternoon…it just tried to correct tea room to tea rum!) Haven’t visited it yet, but I’m hoping it will be a compensation for losing Alfresco’s Tea-rooms . By the way, I was very sad to hear that the lady who used to run Alfresco’s with her husband had passed away.

1 hour ago, Mouldy said:

@YnysMon has probably visited a great many churches around

In my opinion, every church is worth visiting, but Norfolk is very lucky as most of the churches are not locked during daytime and were built in a period in which the county was very wealthy.

As well as Ludham, my favourites include Irstead, Belaugh, Beccles, Loddon, Thurne, Potter Heigham (quite a walk to this one as it’s located in the main village on the other side of the Stalham road), Acle, Catfield (walkable from Wood End Staithe, off Barton Broad) and Barton Turf (half way between Neatishead and Barton Turf). Somerlayton is also interesting, but again a bit of a walk from the moorings (see my Water Rail holiday tale from September).

I have so far failed to visit Geldeston and Coltishall churches as both were locked when I tried to visit.

Other’s on my ‘to-do list’ include Smallburgh (walkable from Dilham), Stalham, Sutton, Fishley (near Acle) and Stokesby. There’s also that church with the weird looking ziggurat tower that you can see in the trees behind Waveney River Centre. Apparently that was built by a member of the Boycott family (another member of whom was responsible for the origin of the word ‘boycott’).

Another shout out for the church at Winterton on Sea too. I haven’t been up the tower, but the memorials to the lifeboat rescues were very interesting.

There’s an excellent website on Norfolk churches…

http://www.norfolkchurches.co.uk/mainpage.htm
 

[MauriceMynah]

God requests that if you are visiting a church just to have a looksee about, could you please avoid Sundays as thats his busy day.

[YnysMon]

5 hours ago, MauriceMynah said:

God requests that if you are visiting a church just to have a looksee about, could you please avoid Sundays as thats his busy day.

Don’t think so…you could always join in! If you prefer not to, Sunday afternoon is pretty safe. 

[socrates]

Loddon Holy Trinity, and Chedgrave are also worth a visit. We were very fortunate to be resident for a short time there last summer when Madam Reverend worked in the Chet Valley Team. Hopefully, her boss in the sky will find her a job in a Norfolk church one day. 

[YnysMon]

6 minutes ago, socrates said:

Loddon Holy Trinity, and Chedgrave are also worth a visit. We were very fortunate to be resident for a short time there last summer when Madam Reverend worked in the Chet Valley Team. Hopefully, her boss in the sky will find her a job in a Norfolk church one day. 

I knew I’d forgotten one…Chedgrave is also on my ‘to-do’ list. Last time we went past was a Sunday morning, so I didn’t like to barge in, possibly in the middle of a service.

There’s an interesting display of local history in Loddon church, in a couple of rooms reached via a spiral stair near the entrance door.

[Davydine]

This is why I love this forum, such a wealth of information!

Thank you everyone!

[Vaughan]

 

19 hours ago, YnysMon said:

Don’t think so…you could always join in! If you prefer not to, Sunday afternoon is pretty safe. 

Especially as the Sunday joint was put in the oven before the 11AM service of Morning Prayer, which should not last more than an hour, allowing time for a couple of sherries in the village pub before getting home for lunch.

So if the vicar's sermon lasted more than a dreary 15 minutes, the joint would be cooked dry and the roast potatoes would be like pebbles.

Rural village life is not what it used to be.

[YnysMon]

3 hours ago, Vaughan said:

 

Especially as the Sunday joint was put in the oven before the 11AM service of Morning Prayer, which should not last more than an hour, allowing time for a couple of sherries in the village pub before getting home for lunch.

So if the vicar's sermon lasted more than a dreary 15 minutes, the joint would be cooked dry and the roast potatoes would be like pebbles.

Rural village life is not what it used to be.

I haven’t a chance to put a roast in the oven a couple of Sundays each month. The second and fourth Sundays I play the organ at two morning services, and normally get rewarded by hearing the same sermon twice! 

[Ray]

5 minutes ago, YnysMon said:

I play the organ at two morning services

It must be wonderful to play the organ, a magnificent instrument. Some years ago the one at the Royal Albert Hall was renovated and we had tickets to it's inaugural concert. Outstanding event, a really unforgettable experience 👍

[YnysMon]

The organs I play aren’t quite in that league ().

Willen Church is small, but then the village it served was tiny too, until it got swallowed up in Milton Keynes. It does have the distinction of having been designed by Robert Hooke, who worked with Wren to restore London after the great fire  and who discovered all sorts of things…a true polymath. It was completed in 1680, replacing a run down medieval church.  The build was paid for by Richard Busby who was headmaster of Westminster School and who has a large memorial in Westminster Abbey. 

Willen has a tiny organ, one manual (keyboard) and no pedals. We have Victorian pews, clear glass windows, pink walls (yes, really!) and cherubs on the ceiling. 

 

The other church I play in is the Cross and Stable in Downs Barn, built as part of the development of Milton Keynes in the early 1980s. The organ is electronic, two manuals and pedals. Even though it’s a modern church/community centre, it also has a peal of bells and a team of bell ringers. The bell ‘tower’ is on a mezzanine level open to the main body of the church. 

A study in contrasts. 

I love both churches. 

 

 

[Ray]

I imagine you can virtually trace the history of the UK through church architecture!

[kpnut]

Very diverse ‘workplaces’ for you  Helen. The first one looks quite ‘high church’. 

I think I wrote once on the forum about learning to play the organ and I think a typo made it read when I was 20. I was actually 10 when I had lessons, on a massive 3 manual organ with foot pedals. When I went to practice, I suppose about three times a week after school, I used to have to collect the church key from the newsagents, and then lock myself in this dark, large, echoey building. I was always grateful to get the organ switched on so I had some sound to accompany me. I was so small that I used to slip off the bench quite often when having to use the foot pedals a lot. It was a big stretch. It was ok when I was just practicing my feet as I could cling onto the manual!  
I was so disappointed to recently go back to ‘my’ church (where I also sang in the choir as a child and got married incidentally) for a carol service this Christmas to see they were using an electric organ instead. Just didn’t have the same umph at all, and to me, the service therefore lost something magical. 

[unclemike]

Oone noone seems to mention is beeston st lawrence between stalham and wroxham, passed it many times, looks unusual with round tower

[Smoggy]

Round towers are quite normal for Norfolk I believe, it stops the yokels peeing in the corner. 

[grendel]

when i was a youngster we used to go to a small village church that was actually half a mile from the village, this church was about 4 miles from home and we either walked or rode our bicycles there, passing at least 4 other churches, i believe there was only a service once a month as the vicar had 3 other churches in his parish he visited each other week to take service.

the church was a proper country church, whitewashed walls flaking and crumbling, ancient pews, and the tower was not safe to peal the bells, as they could not be taken up and over so there was just a single bell rung for service. 

the organ there was a small thing no bigger than a piano, that wheezed its way through the music - or decided it wasnt going to work at all some days.

[RumPunch]

8 hours ago, unclemike said:

Oone noone seems to mention is beeston st lawrence between stalham and wroxham, passed it many times, looks unusual with round tower

No longer in use as a regular church sadly

[floydraser]

I'm not sure if I've posted this before but maybe I should start a thread, "Church places you can't visit". 

Anyone fancy a guess? Because it's in Broads Chat I must add it's in Norfolk but not close to the Broads.

The clock is circa 1650 and there's only one more like it in the Science Museum, and only one older in Salisbury Cathedral.

[YnysMon]

14 hours ago, kpnut said:

When I went to practice, I suppose about three times a week after school, I used to have to collect the church key from the newsagents, and then lock myself in this dark, large, echoey building.

I used to have organ lessons Friday evenings from the ago of 16. I remember it being quite scary letting oneself into a huge dark church during the winter months, locating the organ key in the church tower and starting some pre-lesson practise whilst waiting for my teacher to arrive. Obviously, as I was waiting for him to arrive I couldn’t lock myself in. Even after he arrived I thought the two of us were vulnerable. He was a very old and extremely doddery. The fact that he was known to overindulge at the pub most evenings probably didn’t help with the doddery’ness. Despite that he was a true gent. One evening on his way back home he somehow managed to fall down a deep hole in the road that the water board had dug. Luckily he wasn’t badly hurt, but he probably got his leg pulled quite a lot. 

[YnysMon]

48 minutes ago, floydraser said:

I'm not sure if I've posted this before but maybe I should start a thread, "Church places you can't visit". 

Anyone fancy a guess? Because it's in Broads Chat I must add it's in Norfolk but not close to the Broads.

The clock is circa 1650 and there's only one more like it in the Science Museum, and only one older in Salisbury Cathedral.

That’s a good idea!

[grendel]

here are some unusual sights from Canterbury cathedral, please excuse the quality, but digital cameras really werent up to much in 2002 (576x 432 pixels)so we have the donky treadmill, the bell strike mechanism, the bells, View from the organ pipe loft and the pipes and then some views from the roof spaces above the ornate ceilings.this was one of two very famouse buildings I had to draw up plans for to plot the electrical services, the other - well let it suffice to say I never went there, but our electrical teams were specially vetted and only allowed in when the royal standard wasnt flying.