Little Cressingham to A47 east of Swaffham

The weather forecast for today was dreadful, and so we had given up hope of walking. However it wasn’t actually raining when we woke up, and the detailed weather forecast implied that it might be afternoon before the rain reached Norfolk, so we made a snap decision to take the risk and walk part of the leg from Little Cressingham to Castle Acre, going just as far as the A47. We parked one car near the ‘McDonalds’ roundabout to the east of Swaffham on the A47 (take the turning back towards Swaffham then turn left onto a stretch of old road – there is space here to park, at grid reference TF844094) and the other car back in the layby on the B1108 near Little Cressingham (at TL882998) where we finished yesterday. We set off walking around 11.15am.

We walked back to Little Cressingham and turned right onto the road towards South and North Pickenham. It is a pity that it’s a tarmacked surface, but it is a very minor road (we were only passed by a couple of cars all the way to the South Pickenham turning), complete with vegetation growing in the middle of the road, and we passed through attractive rolling countryside. There were views to the left to Great Cressingham Church and then to Pickenham Hall, and we were walking towards the North Pickenham Wind Farm, built on the site of the old North Pickenham Airfield.

After a crossroads with the South Pickenham/Ashill Road, our road became slightly busier, but the path soon left the road and followed behind the hedge, then zigzagged its way across the fields and across the infant River Wissey to North Pickenham. North Pickenham has two seats (we had lunch sitting on the one by the US Air Force Memorial), a statue of an anglo saxon warrier and some nice new Peddars Way signs – plus the wind farm and a large communication mast.

From North Pickenham we followed ‘Procession Lane’, a very attractive wooded track, complete with one of Tom Perkins’ sculptures, several of which feature on the Peddars Way as part of the Norfolk Songline Project. We were within yards of the car by the A47 when it started to rain at 2pm. What excellent timing!

Following leg of Peddars Way