Horsey Gap to Winterton-on-Sea on circuit from Horsey Windpump

This was a delightful walk, and amazingly varied. We only ventured about 4 miles along the coast and were never much more than a mile from it ( and most of the time we were within several hundred metres) but yet, in addition to the continuous sandy beach, we walked across dunes, scrubby heath, and a corner of the Norfolk Broads. Throw in a seal colony, a rustic church with a hexagonal tower and a thatched roof, and a windpump which we climbed to the top of after our walk, and you'll have to agree there was much to enjoy. It was a pleasant day with sunshine most of the time. It was also windy, so we dressed in fleeces, waterproofs, hats a gloves. I think we slightly overdressed, but when I took my hat off, my hair was all over the place!

We actually parked at the windpump, Horsey Windpump and, because we're National Trust members, it was free. Sometimes I feel a bit bad when admitting to taking advantage of free parking, but it's a big car park which was almost empty when we arrived at around 9am, and Horsey Windpump actively encourage you to explore the area, with three walking routes given on their website. We used one of these, the Horsey beach and village circular route, as our route to and from the coast. After our walk we stopped for refreshments and to go up the windpump; but I'm getting ahead of myself.

I should probably admit to the fact that all of our photographs of the windpump were taken at the end of the walk because as we set off towards Horsey Gap via the village, the direction of the Sun made the pump impossible to photograph. After a short walk along the road we headed left towards the pretty 12th or 13th Century Church, which the Norfolk Churches website (rightly in my opinion) describe as a jewel. The outside was so attractive that we thought the inside would be a disappointment but it wasn't; the light was shining through one of the Victorian stained-glass windows but otherwise it was very simple, with high exposed beams. We continued on a track alongside the church and past some houses, then across open land, all the while heading towards the coast.

We reached the approach road to the Horsey Gap car park. I had expected it to be rather busy with lots of cars arriving to see the seals, but it was still distinctly quiet. The Norfolk Coast Path lies behind an extensive dune system at this point, but before following this route we went to check on the seals from the vantage point immediately above the beach. Surprise the first: although there were some seals, there were many fewer than last time we were here. Surprise the second, we'd expected it to be close to low tide, but it wasn't. We are persistently having problems with interpreting the tide timetable in this section of coast which is making me nervous for the next leg, where I think we need to walk on the beach. For now, we could probably have walked along the top of the "cliff" above the beach, but it is not the official route, would be degrading the dunes, and would be slow progress. So we returned to the track behind the dunes, passing a couple who appeared to be combining dog walking and bird watching.

As we walked along the track we had the dune system to the left (with regular paths leading towards the coast) and we passed what looked like a wartime pill box. To the right, behind a fence with numbered posts, there was flat broadland. It wasn't the most exciting of landscapes, but after about a mile we reached the path on the right (signposted to the "Nelson Head") which would form our route back to Horsey Windpump. Soon afterwards, at Bramble Hill, we followed a path up into the dunes to a seal viewing platform. There was a nice view from here, though there were still not a huge number of seals. Back on our track, we were passed by a "twitcher on a bicycle", confirming our guess that this area is pretty good for bird watching.

We reached the Winterton Dunes Nature Reserve at the point marked as Winterton Ness on the map. It's an interesting area of heathland, with footpaths heading in various directions, but we took the one heading towards the beach. Well, maybe. Where the map shows the path as appearing to follow along the middle of a beach that is several hundred metres wide, we were actually firmly in the dunes, though with a nice view down to the sea, a long way away. There were dog walkers close to the sea, but what we thought to be two seals actually turned out to be pieces of wood. All the while we were getting closer to the church, the lighthouse (actually a holiday let) and brightly coloured round huts (ditto) at Winterton-on-Sea. We reached the group of fisherman's huts on the Common and shortly afterwards we reached the car park. This was as far as we'd intended to go, so we returned to the Common where we had spotted a bench, and we stopped for an early lunch.

Over lunch, we decided to take a more inland route back to Winterton Ness i.e. to follow the track that is shown on the OS map at the point where the land meets the sand. It is actually a track across the heath (famous for its natterjack toads). There was a scrubby wood beyond a fence to our left and if it had been later in the year, we'd also have had heather for company. All too soon we were back at the entrance to the Winterton Dunes Nature Reserve and from here to the turning towards the Nelson Head in Horsey, we retraced our steps.

On a whim, before returning to Horsey Windpump, we took the path to the beach, up a sandy slope and down the other side. The tide was now lower than it had been this morning (the complete opposite of what I had expected) and there were loads of seals, including a pup. There were more seals in the sea than we had noticed previously and some of them appeared to enjoy "surfing" back onto the beach. We stood and watched their antics for a while, then took the path back to Horsey. It took us a little while to work out the correct route around Crinkle Hill but we found it, and the path was better than we'd expected and obviously quite well walked. The only muddy bit was on the final approach back to Horsey Windpump.

We completed a most enjoyable day by stopping for a cup of tea and then climbed to the top of the Windpump after learning more about its history from two knowledgeable and friendly guides. There has been a wind pump on this site since 1798 but the current structure is one of the last wind-powered pumps to be built, in 1912. Since then it has had a dramatic history, surviving flooding and a lightning strike but in recent years it has faired rather better than Denver Mill, on the opposite side of the county and very close to where we live. Both structures have seen their sails and cap removed and returned several times, but at least Horsey didn't have the sails fall on a group of visiting schoolchildren (as happened at Denver)- and since 2018 it has had sails (and re-opened to the public the following year). Restoration of these wind-powered machines is eye-wateringly expense, so at Horsey you see tangible benefits of National Trust ownership. Restoration work is ongoing and they hope to get the sails turning again soon, though they are unlikely to be able to pump water because (i) the centrifugal pump is missing and (ii) the Broads drainage is now tightly controlled and done by electric pumps.

The view from the top was spectacular, and before driving home we walked the short distance to Horsey Mere, a peaceful and atmospheric landscape.

Following leg