Harvest Monday and a walk around the Roman Town at Caistor St Edmund

I've been away on a 3 day course 'building with straw bales' in beautiful Stanmer Park in Brighton, and am feeling pretty tired (in a good way), where we learnt lots of principles and actually made a small Straw bale building. So much new information has gone into my brain it's odd focussing back on this stuff that happened earlier in the week. I'll do a separate post on the course but in the meantime here's the usual....

 

The purple sprouting broccoli plant that I'd salvaged from pigeon damage has gone on to produce more tasty shoots. I've now actually moved the plant as I needed to get the space ready for red onion sets. I occassionally do this with brassica plants in spring where they're in the way but have a bit more to give.

 

So I dug a hole in the bed where my leeks were ( which isn't going to be needed for a while) loosened up the soil all around the PSB with a fork and levered the plant out, plopped it in the new hole, filled in any gaps and also piled up extra soil around the stem as an anchor, treading the soil down firmly but trying not to damage any roots and gave it a good water.

 

The pickings are more leafy than flowery but they're very sweet anyway

Nice with cauliflower and a cheese sauce

This week I've also sown my parsnips (variety 'tender and true'). I usually sow them inbetween my rows of autumn broad beans but having been battered by the wind and squashed by foxes, they've grown out at odd angles, making it hard to sow between them. So instead I sowed them all in one bed where most of the broad beans hadn't survived...if I get a few beans too that would be good but I'm not holding my breath.

 

Anyway, there was a whole load of self-sown lambs lettuce in that bed, so I harvested it all....yum. I left most of it for Jan to use up this weekend whilst I've been away on the course. She's also been left in charge of my seedlings (I'm still away, visiting my folks now), so I'll be inspecting them all on my return ;)

A walk around Caistor Roman Town (Venta Icenorum)

We're very lucky in Norfolk with so many cool places to visit, lots of which are within easy reach of the city. A little way south east of the city is the site of the Roman capital of the area, where much evidence of the town still remains. Fantastically, most of the site is open to walk where you like, plus it's next to High Ash Farm, who carry out a lot of wildlife-friendly practices and provide lots of public access (permissive paths). The farmer (Chris Skinner) even features most weeks on the local radio, chatting about wildlife.

 

So on Tuesday we got the bus down to Caistor...it only took a few minutes. Walking through part ofHigh Ash Farm to get to the Roman town we found a few geocaches - this one was actually inside a fake plastic rock (not a fake plastic tree, for any Radiohead fans out there).

The Roman town was surrounded by a flint wall for protection, and there's still some lovely stretches of it In place

Here's Jan enjoying the spring sunshine

I took photos of a few of the information panels...so if you're interested, you should be able to click on them to enlarge them and have a read. There's a new mobile phone app too, which includes an augmented reality element....you hold your phone up at various places and it's as if you're standing in the town, with the buildings all around you....rather cool.

Couldn't resist these cute sheep

We walked back to Norwich following the Boudica Way trail but wandered through High Ash Farm again first. The wildlife friendly farming makes it particularly lovely to walk around....here's a large strip of teasel, grown for insects in the summer (lots of little flowers) and birds in the winter (lots of little seeds).

 

So that was another enjoyable trip into our lovely Norfolk countryside....where to go next?

Thanks for reading this week - I'm linking in with Harvest Monday hosted by Dave at Our Happy Acres

And here's a taster from the Building with Straw Bales course...ooh

More to come soon...

 

 

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Harvest Monday and a walk from Cromer

I didn't do very well with photos of harvests or food this week so it's a bit sparse. Besides the meals below, we've had lots more corn salad still from the plot and sprouted seeds and cress from the windowsill.

Tonight Jan made us a pasta dish using a tub of roasted tomatoes from the freezer. It was so nice we ate two portions each (so no leftovers for lunch tomorrow unfortunately!). I'm feeling a tad full, I must say.

And this is a terrible photo from yesterday - I made a stew in the slow cooker for an easy meal when we got back in from a walk, which included some squash from the freezer and slow-cooked beans and curry spices.

The tomato seedlings I sowed last Wednesday started germinating the following Tuesday. No sign of the peppers yet, which I still have covered with clear plastic to help keep the moisture in.

I've set up some reflective bits around the tray to provide better light coverage which should discourage too much stretching of the seedlings towards the window (which can cause the plants to be leggy and weak)

I might sow a few more things on my day off this week, as it's meant to be rainy, so not plot visit I expect.

 

A walk from Cromer via National Trust Felbrigg Estate

But the weather was lovely yesterday so we decided to go for a walk, catching the train from Norwich to Cromer (on the north Norfolk coast). I did feel a bit guilty about not going to the allotment but I'm sure I'll catch up with stuff down the plot soon. In fact I popped there in my lunch break today and did a bit of weeding, and was kept company by two lovely robins plus some sparrows and blackbirds bathing in an upturned lid I keep down the end of the plot just for that purpose.

 

Back to yesterday....There's a circular walk from Cromer that heads inland, following the Weavers' Way trail. Neither of us had been on this bit before so it was really great to see some new countryside. There's Jan in the distance :)

Really pretty, with several buzzards flying around. They have a distinctive 'kew' or mew call that gives you the heads-up they're nearby.

Felbrigg church

Felbrigg Hall. We've both only been here once before (with Jan's folks) and the weather was stormy so we didn't get to see the grounds that time. It's very interesting inside though and they have a lovely walled garden with veg plots that some local people are allowed to use as allotments. There wasn't time to have a look yesterday but we saw the grounds instead.

We did however find time for a spot of geocaching!

This one was hidden in a tree stump. There were some really clever caches

The sun made this amazing shadow from a huge beech tree

Another shot of the hall, looking beautiful in the sun

From Felbrigg, the walk leaves the Weavers' Way and loops back round to Cromer, first following a track uphill called Lions' Mouth, cutting through some really nice woodland. It would be interesting to find out how it got the name.

Returning to Norwich on the train after a very nice day, I was very pleased to have prepared the slow cooked meal beforehand which was waiting for us when we got home, hurray.

Thanks for reading. I'm linking up with Harvest Monday hosted by Dave at Our Happy Acres

 

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Harvest Monday - bits n bobs & a walk up on the coast

There's not been too much happening veggie-wise this week but I have sown some cress in a tub on the window sill. The paper towel kept drying out so I've kept a lid on it, which has worked ok I think. I should've had a quick read on the web first to get some tips before giving it a go, I'm not sure if I sowed it thickly enough. Hopefully the leaves will bulk up soon anyway. Egg and cress sarnies anyone?

My only harvest from the plot this week has been corn salad, I love the dark green leaves. I've found that the plants which are growing closely together are the nicer ones to pick as they haven't been splashed by soil, so are quite clean (though they do seem more likely to have little slugs hiding away amongst the leaves). We made our own hummus again and had sprouted beans too - I've now got three different jars on the go at various stages of sprouting so we can have a more regular supply.

I brought a few more onions home from the allotment shed. They've lasted us pretty well this winter. On the plot I still have some leeks to harvest plus some chard and a bit of kale, a few beetroot and parsnips and actually some potatoes I didn't lift earlier. I wonder if they might have started shooting though, it's been so mild. I'll have a dig around sometime soon.

In the freezer I still have lots of fruit to keep us going quite a while longer. Here's a big tub we defrosted the other day. It doesn't look very exciting but tastes very nice! I think it's mainly apples, blackberries and raspberries, plus a bit of my old jam as a sweetener.

Usually we have it with muesli for breakfast but with this huge tub I've also just been snacking on it with yogurt.

And yes, I did then have another bowl straight afterwards, with some homemade spiced apple cake to top it off! We had our friends and their kids round yesterday to watch Labyrinth on DVD (none of them had seen it before.....can you believe it, a classic 80s film) and made lots of goodies to snack on....and well, there was still some cake left today, mmm.

I have to confess, that I did make two spiced apple cakes - we have new neighbours and were going to take one round for them as a welcome....but then our friends arrived and it seemed like we just needed a little bit more cake to enjoy with the film....so I will have to make another one soon for them instead ...oops!

 

A trip to the coast

On my non-working day this week the sun was shining and we decided we were due a trip up to the beautiful North Norfolk coast. The train journey takes about an hour from Norwich to sheringham, and there was gorgeous sun shining the whole way. Of course, when the train pulled in at sheringham the clouds steadily appeared and lingered the rest of the day, darn. But we had a lovely walk anyway (and managed a bit of bird watching and geocaching whilst we were at it)

You're pretty much guaranteed to see lots of cute turnstones at sheringham, I love those little birds.

They're quite tame too

Heading west from sheringham on the Norfolk Coast Path is one of my favourite views in the county, even on a cloudy day

Looking back to sheringham. The gorse was all in flower too.

We were doing an inland loop, picking up Sheringham Park, owned by the National Trust, which neither us had visited before. Along the way were a couple of pillboxes from the Second World War (lots of them all along the coast here). This one had a surprise inside...

Spot the painting of a soldier peeping out

This structure is called the gazebo, (though it's not what I think of as one.) it's on top of a hill, so you climb the hill then climb the gazebo, a good test for the legs and lungs! As the day had turned dull I didn't take any photos from the top but there's a fantastic view from above the gnarly oak tree canopy.

After a wander around Sheringham Park (historic parkland cross-crossed with paths) we headed back via Upper Sheringham, a small pretty village which used to be bigger than Sheringham, until the railways linked though to Sheringham itself which then grew into a popular Victorian seaside town.

In Upper Sheringham they've still got a historic reservoir at the centre of the village, which was flowing nicely

It's just in front of the impressive church, and there's still a red phone box too

We'll have to do that walk again sometime, it seemed like it would be a nice one to do at different times of the year.

 

Ok, that's me for the week, linking in with Harvest Monday, hosted this month by Michelle at From Seed to Table.

 

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