My plan to walk around the UK hasn’t gone quite to plan and distracted by the promise of good walks and the best cheesecake in the world, I went camping with my friends in Norfolk. We pitched our tents at Burnham Deepdale at the camp site we went to last year. It seemed posher and much more popular this year, and instead of a well-ventilated shower block, where the wind blows through the door, there is a brand new shower block with wet rooms, hairdryers and insulation from the outside air. I preferred it before, although the new showers are wonderful. With a lot of help I assembled my tent and went to the Jolly Sailors pub, and watched my friends eat fish and chips, while I tried to stick to my diet. We walked back to our tents before the heavy rain and wind started. I had a short walk in the dark in the middle of the night to the shower block wearing jeggings, a dress over a nightie, a fleece, a waterproof jacket, shoes and a Cath Kidston umbrella. My tent survived the wind and rain and the rain had stopped by morning so I could cook beans on my camping stove.
We caught a bus just before 9.30 am to Old Hunstanton, where I first started my walks in January. We got off the bus at the post office and walked towards Le Strange Arms hotel, the lifeboat station and the café on the beach, passing the beach huts and walking onto the beach. The weather was mild and I soon had my coat tied around my waist. We walked along the sandy beach flanked by dunes and a golf course on the right hand side and a sandy beach leading to the sea on the other side. I remembered the metal gabions on the beach full of flints and the time I visited the beach in January after the storm surge when I’d found a red wellington boot washed up on the beach. It was much easier to walk in this milder weather. I also remembered walking from Old Hunstanton with two other walkers and a dog in January.
Further along the beach the sand was replaced by mud and someone found samphire and sea lavender. We missed the turning towards the golf course leading to Holme Dunes Nature Reserve. I was looking for a tumbled down shed and a sign on the beach pointing inland. Instead I saw the timber frame of a new shed and a slightly worn path, but there was no sign on the beach. We walked on, the walk was very pleasant, but realised we couldn’t cross a creek and I noticed buildings inside and people near a footpath by them. We spoke to a walker going the other way who suggested we could paddle across a shallow part of the creek with a sandy base, but we weren’t keen to do that and retraced our steps, back to the path leading to the nature reserve at the bottom of the golf course.
The walk across Holme Dunes Nature Reserve is wonderful in the summer and winter, but the winter view is less obscured by trees and brambles. It is wonderful to be on slightly higher ground than usual, with a view of breaking surf beyond the marram grass. There was a group of wild Konik ponies grazing together in the sunshine. My friends found a circle of tree stumps under pine trees so we stopped for our picnic lunch. It was lovely to sit in the shade. My friend who’d organised the walk explained that we had only done 1/3 of the walk so we didn’t stop for long, but she had made a delicious tea bread which was lovely to eat. We walked on to Thornham , walking up a hill near the end of the village, looking for the footpath sign. It was very hot walking up the road and there wasn’t much shade. I was pleased I had brought 2 litres of water with me, but by this stage was trailing behind the others, and kept stopping to drink water.
When I’d done this walk in January with a handsome man and a woman with a lovely dog, we’d had problems finding the footpath, wondering if it was before or after the brow of a hill, then just when we were about to give up, the wooden Norfolk Coastal path sign appeared. It was the same today, but in very different weather. The cold in the winter had made the walk seem like a challenge but the heat of today was also challenging. When we turned off the footpath we were under the shade of the trees, and the cold was delicious. We sat down to rest and drink water. Soon we were in the open again, walking next to fields, to a large agricultural building and then turning left towards the coast again, passing the vans that looked as if they were being lived in and a row of washing hung between trees.
We reached Blakney! I remembered the sign pointing to a beach half a mile away when I had discovered a lovely sandy beach in January which I had never been to before. I remembered my handsome friend eating chocolate buttons on a bench at the end of a walk before catching the Coasthopper bus back to Old Hunstanton. However, today was different. My friend who had organised the weekend was continuing the walk back to our campsite at Burnham Deepdale. This is part of another walk I thought, last time I couldn’t have walked any further than this. We didn’t go to the sandy beach but instead followed the footpath, partly on a boardwalk, passing reeds and the site where a Roman Fort had once stood, towards. Near a yacht club something strange happened. In heat I saw an ice cream van, selling Italian ice cream. My friends were all ahead of me on the opposite side of the path to the ice cream van. I walked towards the ice cream. “Come away from the van” they all shouted, ignoring what I was saying, “go on ahead of me, I’ll catch you up, I know where I am!” They knew I was on a diet and were trying to help me! What I didn’t know was that one of them had decided to stop for an ice cream if I had one too!
We walked on, back to the camp site, and after hot showers, had a wonderful barbecue with salads and garlic bread and wine. It didn’t rain, although it was windy. My little tent withstood the wind and felt cosy and comfortable.
The following day we went to Morston and walked a short way across the marshes to a jetty where two wooden boats were moored, each like a giant rowing boat.
Each boat held almost 50 passengers. We climbed from one boat to another and sat down. I enjoyed travelling up the creek, looking at the boats and the marshes.
It was lovely to be at sea again. 
We had the mainland on one side and Blakney Point on the other. 
The skipper explained that this is a site of Special Scientific Interest and that small birds called turns nest on the beach.
It is also home to grey seals and common seals.
The boat turned around so we could take more photographs of the seals.
Other boats also went past so other people could take photographs. The skipper said that it is only possible to visit the seals for 5 hours a day because of the tides. I wondered if the seals prefer it when they don’t have visitors.
Heather's Slow Seashore Strolls 