A round trip

Some days just go past and you wonder just what you were doing. And then there the other kind. By 11 o'clock this morning I had circumnavigated Norfolk taking in Fakenham, Norwich, Acle, North Walsham, Gunton, Melton Constable and Walsingham.  Not on foot you understand but 'en voiture' and all for the best possible reason - making sure the invitations for our next exhibition make it to Burghley Horse Trials this weekend.

Starting with a leisurely amble through the apparently still-sleeping Creakes, taking care to avoid the ducks who regard the road as theirs at this hour, to Fakenham to join the by-pass taking equal care to avoid the HGV's who like the ducks regard the road as theirs. Curiously, once past Fakenham, these same HGV's then proceed at a very stately and law-abiding 40mph to Great Witchingham where they all disappear.

Onwards to Norwich and then dual-carriageway all the way to Acle.  It's so fast compared to the rest of the county but... a sign of how quickly we could end up looking like everywhere else. Printing collected from the miraculous Richard Clover, it's off on another agriculturally paced spiral up through Potter Heigham and Stalham, over the top at Wayford Bridge and a quick sprint - old railway lines make fast roads in this corner of Norfolk - to North Walsham, pleasingly busy and buzzy on this Wednesday morning.

With pleasing synchronicity, I meet the talent behind our next exhibition, Eleanor-rose Stamp at the cattle grid. Invitations are exchanged and my mission is accomplished. Should you be going to Burghley you might just see one!

And then the return to Burnham - one of my favourite routes in Norfolk. 30 miles of rural bliss not using any main roads, through Matlaske to Corpusty and onwards to Melton and Walsingham. Beyond Walsingham we're back into what I think of as high Norfolk with rolling countryside so different to the flat lands little more than 30 miles to the east. Across the Dry Road and round the back of Holkham. Then it's downhill through Burnham Thorpe and back to open the doors for the hordes just before 11.