Why England?  Well I suppose because we have been away from our home country for fifteen years and there is a kind of pull that lures us back.  Coming back to England as a ‘tourist’ I find there are a vast amount of attractions that get lost when you live in a country controlled by the media.  England is still the most beautiful country and as Suffolk is the county in which I grew up it is a great pleasure to start a walk there.  We hope to have two walks here and will be starting research next year on how to link Woodbridge with Aldeburgh and Southwold.  This would mean great fish, diverse and famous bitters and Benjamin Britten music.

The Great House

For this week we will start the week in The Great House at Lavenham.  This is a wonderfully charming place to stay in what has been called England’s finest medieval town.  The Great House was built in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries by an important weaving family and converted into a restaurant in 1985.  The bent on gastronomy is reflected in the choice of Régis and Martine Crépy to call this a restaurant with rooms and not an hotel.  There is a fabulous wine list with great French wine including the delicious Saussignac of  Gerard Cuisset from Château Miaudoux which many of you would have drunk here with us in France and then as far as quintessential English gastronomy goes: what better way to start the day than with the classic English breakfast?

Suffolk thatch

The churches of Suffolk are innumerable and these will be the focal points of our walks.  The county is relatively flat and arable which therefore lends itself very easily to comfortable walking!  Steeples can be seen from afar, rising above fields of English green, boosting a possibly tired moral and of course the donkeys will be there, as ever, carrying all those essentials that we need to have with us like alcohol, water, bags and Diana’s delicious homemade biscuits.   With the mention of alcohol we will be drinking the best of English wine from vineyards such as Wyken Hall, Nyetimber and New Hall and also of course a chance of the best of English ale.  How could we not have some time for such heritage?  The drink that has been the great drink of England for centuries past and which will be for centuries to come.

Kersey ford

We will have the chance of staying in the pretty village of Bildeston at ‘The Crown’: a pub of great local repute, newly restored with wonderful character and charm and a great English chef.  Some of the beer there is from a micro brewery.  These micro breweries are becoming ever more fashionable.  Delicious New World wine to accompany our dinners, wine that has sadly pushed French sophistication aside but wine which has much roundness and is simply quite delicious.

Nayland

Art history will also be on the agenda as two great English artists were born in Suffolk: Thomas Gainsborough and John Constable.  We will finish the week in Dedham a village of great fame as it was a part of the world favoured by Constable and some of his greatest paintings came from this area.  We will have a light hearted talk with Peter Maxwell Devis about Constable’s life in his native Suffolk and visit Will Lott’s house now a National Trust house and scene of ‘The Haywain’.  Dedham is also the place where Sir Alfred Munnings lived and worked and we will visit his home before another English gastronomic treat in the tea rooms at Dedham: freshly baked scones, fine English jam and clotted cream.

Cream tea?

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