View from the old Wroxham Bridge Restaurant
View from the old Wroxham Bridge Restaurant

I was up early as usual doing my chores but Diana accompanied me for this latest trip to Norfolk and delayed me with refreshment and shopping stops so that we encountered more traffic than usual and was late to see our architects in Coltishall about the future of Heronshaw. We accepted their advice that Heronshaw needed to be demolished and rebuilt. We arrived at Ropes Hill Dyke during road maintenance work but managed to get parked up after which I worked on repairing the garage as Di shampooed the carpets.  A fantastic seafood meal in the Wroxham Bridge Restaurant this evening, which left us full even after an evening walk. With everyone’s children having to go back to school, it is startling to witness just how quickly the ‘Capital of the Broads’ quietness down.

I arranged to take Diana with me on my latest trip to Norfolk, but I still got up at 7.00am and did my chores as usual. I gave the fish and doves plenty of food and the plants plenty of water as I was planning to be away overnight. I loaded up the Range Rover with a full range of tools as well as our personal things together with a host of furnishings that Diana turned out of the house for me to take to Heronshaw. Once Di had taken Della to school, we could set off but we had to soon return when she had found that she had forgotten her contact lens things. Being later than I usually go, the roads were full of cars and lorries and it was quite a slow journey and was made slower still by our stopping twice – once for ‘elevenses’ and again at the garage where Di loitered to buy some provisions and then presents for the children.

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We eventually arrived at John Sennate and Associates, our architects in Coltishall, 15 minutes late at 11:45am and met with the proprietor Mr Sennate and his assistant, Mr Bly. We talked for nearly 2 hours and decided that the only sensible decision would be to replace Heronshaw with a similar thatched building, traditional in style and design but larger and having more modern materials to be easier to maintain. It would cost almost as much money to try and restore the building as build a new one and we would end up avoiding a poor investment that will be difficult to maintain. We left them to draw up some sketch designs and will see them in a couple of weeks. When we had finished with them, we drove back to Wroxham through country lanes and stopped for lunch at the Riverside Restaurant. Di decided to hire a carpet cleaning machine from Roy’s and then we went on to Ropes Hill Dyke, finding the contractors in full swing with the road maintenance. They were laying a mixture of hoggin and sawdust onto the old road surface and then rolling it down with a power roller. Later they dressed the surface with another layer of shingle to complete the task of raising and patching the road. We managed to get past the dumper truck during one of its forays and then finally arrived at Heronshaw and sorted ourselves out.

There was quite a bit of unloading, made the more complicated by the fact that Di wanted the lounge clear to do the shampooing. She made up our beds in the twin-bedded room and then I changed into my working clothes and got on with the garage repairs. I was sawing off the bottom, rotted, portion of the frame uprights, jacking up the wall and inserting new pieces of 3” x 2” timber; securing them by means of the drilled plates that Jack had furnished for me. This was a slow and steady business, particularly as the job entailed jointing the uprights to a new floor plate, the bottom piece running the length of the garage. I worked all afternoon and early evening until it was getting dark just before 8.00pm, when I treated myself to a bath before dinner. I made good progress, but there was the need to stop and chat to Jack Edwards and Doris Vincent. Jack planned to go to Norwich the following day to see about a belt for his rupture which is a sad development because he has always been such an active fellow. Mrs Vincent is staying at Romany next door with a friend who she seems to bully around like a child which is quite strange to see. I managed to introduce her to Di, who was running in and out with washing as well as doing her carpet cleaning.

This evening I had booked us a table at the Bridge Restaurant in Wroxham and we got there for our 8:15pm booking. Until recently, the place had been very busy, and bookings were essential, but the holiday season suddenly became very quiet and there only seem to be about four tables occupied and just as many chefs and waitresses serving them. We had a super meal. My seafood hors d’oeuvre contained two types of caviar (red and black), shrimps, cockles, mussels, crab purée in a varied and expertly presented crispy fresh salad. I followed this with monkfish which tasted something like sole, particularly as it was served with the sauce and another plateful of beautiful vegetables and salad selection washed down with Liebfraumilch and then followed with one of their fruit topped meringues and a nice coffee. I was so full, that I could hardly get out of my seat after but then Di and I walked around Wroxham after dark to aid our digestion (as she had almost eaten just as much).

It was a bright and cool tonight after another nice warm day and there was nobody about. We realised that it is the end of the school holidays and that the children have to go back to school, but it is startling to witness just how quickly the ‘Capital of the Broads’ quietness down. The shopping centre was quite busy earlier and I reckon that this season brings in the anglers and also the poorer holidaymakers who take advantage of the reduced prices in September and this would account for the upmarket eating places being empty in the evening. Home in the dark but safely up the stairs to our beds. A quiet start to the night with the stars in view through the open curtains with no sounds to keep us awake.