A Sandringham Circular. 3/2/19.
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- Опубліковано 13 жов 2024
- This was a very decent 7.6 mile walk, on a glorious Winter's day, around parts of the Royal Estate at Sandringham, Norfolk.
Starting from the bus stop at the appropriately named Edinburgh Plantation, close to where Prince Phillip was involved in a recent car smash, the walker is soon heading for Wolferton, via Dersingham Bog. This section of the walk is the most interesting, with sightings of Marsh Harrier and the uncommon (now!) Lapwing. There's also the lovely, former Royal rail station at Wolferton, where lunch is had, and the village church.
Thereafter, it's back through woodland to the busy main road before entering Sandringham Country Park. Most of the walking here is along quiet (today, at least!) Estate roads and woods.
A bus is then taken back to Kings Lynn rail station.
A very nice area that is still within the Network Card zone (Kings Lynn), taking just under two hours.
That station was in better nick than some of the working ones! Nice little walk!
Indeed! A reflection of when the railway staff had pride in their work. Mind you, this is a Royal station, remember? People live there now;-)
British Rail actually wanted to keep the King's Lynn to Hunstanton line open, but it was a decision made by Norfolk County Council to force BR into a diffcult corner. As a result of an extremely bad choice carried out in the mid 1960s Norfolk County Council has overloaded the main King's Lynn to Hunstanton A149 with far too much road traffic. There has been many petitions come and go to bring back this former branch line but parts of the trackbed has been built over with new housing, and the addition of the Dersingham to Snettisham bypass with follows exactly along part of the former trackbed. North Wootton station, just north as King's Lynn I believe has vanished, but North Wootton station master's house is now fully restored as a private house. Dersingham Railway Station and its boarded up signal box both still exist but is now used as a trade builder's yard. Not sure about if Snettisham station has survived 1969 rail closure, but Heacham station still exists almost complete and has a restored BR MK1 carriage (alongside platform 1) converted into holiday accommodation.
No chance of the railway coming back as Network Rail basically don't want to know as it would cost millions. There is no longer a viable path for a possible new railway out of KIng's Lynn and northwards to Sunny Hunny, as Lynn Sport and various housing estates block the route through North Lynn. King's Lynn no longer has carriage stabling facilities nor its diesel refuelling depot, so unless the line to hunstanton did ever come back it would probably have to be electrified, running into the millions. The site of Hunstanton station is now the town's main car park, with the former carriage stabling sidings and steam shed now a car park overflow. All that remains of the station is the coal shed, station restaurant (fully restored as a new cafe and restaurant and a old LNER signal.
Note. The A148 trunk road runs from King's Lynn to Fakenham. The A149 (King's Lynn to Hunstanton, Wells-Next-The Sea, Cromer, etc) is the Norfolk coast road starting at The Hardwick A10/A47 interchange and thus, this road runs all the way to just outside Great Yarmouth.
Thanks for the extensive, local input; much appreciated! The format that I heard mooted was a Light Railway; a bit like the DLR in London, which encountered similar obstacles, and runs on a third rail, I believe. Fingers crossed! ;-)
👽,ONLY ME,✌️
What's happened to KIM?
@@amib I'm still here,🤗.