There is a huge monument standing on the side of the A11 among the twisted pines. It was built to commemorate the local First World War dead. For my family, this is “Grandma’s Monument.” My grandmother, who had gone on a journey from our native Norfolk many years ago, was relieved to see the pillar and dug her net into the nettles.
The only reason I mention this is because most people’s experience of this Norfolk/Suffolk hinterland is similarly brief. Without stopping to look around, we fly past what used to be the old Roman road between London and Norwich. I’ve done this many times myself: I measured the monument’s clock, noticed that its surroundings looked oddly like the African savannah, and kept going on and on to find out why.
Not this time. I had actually come to visit the Brecks, this ‘broken land’ of sandy soil, dry heathland, acid grasslands, glacial ponds, rolling bogs, lush archeology and Britain’s largest lowland pine forest. This is not a designated National Landscape. But Nick Dickson, director of the National Lottery-funded Brecks Fen Edge & Rivers Landscape Partnership Programme, explained that it was “at the top of the list of underachievers”. 40 per cent of the Brecks is protected and contains 28 per cent of the UK’s rare species. “It was considered very special,” Nick added.
So instead of going through Brecks, I went in. The Lark Valley Way runs from Bury St Edmunds to Mildenhall on the southern reaches of Brecks. The Lark, a rare chalk river, once provided an important trade route for goods to the North Sea; The Romans canalized parts of this area and until the 1910s pleasure boats ran as far as Bury. Now it can only be visited by canoe, the waters are empty but for otters and kingfishers.
I wandered through old locks, village churches, a cast-iron bridge and snowdrop forests, and after eight peaceful miles I arrived at West Stow Country Park’s Anglo-Saxon Village. Basil ‘Sutton Hoo’ Brown had first excavated at West Stow; Although evidence shows that this area was used from the Mesolithic to the late Middle Ages, its main interest is Anglo-Saxon. Remains of 69 submerged feature buildings (SFB) were found.
“We think this place was settled in AD 420,” heritage officer Stephanie Paull said as she showed me around. “When the excavation is over [the archaeologists] They had new ideas about how these buildings might have been constructed. They wanted to see if their theory would work, so they built one. Then the rest was done using different techniques. The whole point is that we are one big archaeological experiment.”
Stephanie took me to the reconstructed SFBs; some with wood smoke, some without a stove, some with windows, some without windows, some with floors and sleeping platforms, some bare. The houses here are best guesses and therefore even more interesting. “The questions keep you up at night,” Stephanie said. “But I liked the idea that you could get in a time machine and realize everything was wrong. “This site is very important, very fluid.”
You can’t stay in the village but you can sleep down the road. Located in a wooded area on the edge of the King’s Forest, West Stow Pods offer hints of wild Breck life, albeit with kitchenettes and proper beds. The owner, Jan Lengyel, took me for the night to my Anglo-Saxon cottage “Wulfrun” and told me how many old things were lying around here. “A mile away is Beech Pit, where there is evidence of the earliest use of fire in Britain, dating back 450,000 years,” Jan told me. “The whole area is amazing.” I was beginning to agree.
The next morning I met Nick Dickson, who took me onto the back roads of Breck, through vast forest and significant heathland to learn more about the restoration of the area’s waters, including pingos. A feature of the Breck Mountains, mostly in the Arctic, pingos (Inuit meaning “little hill”) are shallow ponds formed by glaciers at the end of the last Ice Age and fed by underground aquifers. “There’s a lot of independent hydrology being done,” explained John Preston of the Norfolk Wildlife Trust. “There may be two side by side; One is full, one is empty. It surprises you.”
We met John at Thompson Common, at the start of the Pingo Trail, a seven-mile hike through Louisiana Bay-like landscapes. There are 400 pingos here, “some intact”, John said, “others dark, damp and scary – but there are rare species that like them that way.”
He told me about reviving plow-damaged “ghost pingos” to create more habitat for species such as pond frogs, Britain’s rarest amphibians, which like to serenade here on summer evenings. As he spoke eight red deer leapt from the trees and the hedgerows trembled with yellowhammers and finches.
A large part of Brecks’ Fen Edge & Rivers project promotes health and wellbeing and connects local people and visitors alike with nature. One branch of this has been the Healing Waters open swimming project, which offers opportunities for people to try wild swimming in a safe environment. This explains how, one February afternoon, I waded into the full and cold River Little Ouse, along with curious swans and a handful of swimmers.
One was Ellen Kirkby; She attended an introductory session 18 months ago, found it extremely beneficial and now runs her own swimming group. “I’ve lived on the edge of the Brecks all my life,” he told me, “but I’d never explored it until I started swimming.”
As the water changes direction, the Brecks’ most iconic features are the pine stripes: rows of twisted Scots and Corsican pines forming a striking silhouette against the grand East Anglian sky. Why are they here? Nobody knows. The best theory is that in the 19th century, an enterprising nursery had a lot of trees to sell and managed to convince landowners that they could make good fences. These pines were subjected to excessive pruning, causing them to become tortured and twisted. “Now when new pine trees are planted, the same haircut is given to encourage the curvy shape,” Nick told me.
They are weird. But it’s the same for Brecks. Here, the sounds of stellar species like sandpiper and midnight mingle with gunfire from the Stanford military reservation, a huge area that is curiously useful for conservation. The seemingly barren areas are full of rare species such as Spanish flies and swiftlets. Archeology extends from ancient times to the present day; tanks and trench warfare were tested here and traces of them can still be found among the trees.
Yes, Brecks is weird. But it’s definitely worth a stop.
Fundamentals
Sarah Baxter was a guest of West Stow Pods (01284 728136; weststowpods.co.uk), which has Mega Pods from £84pn for two adults; Pod Hollow, a faithful recreation of a Hobbit hole, costs £210pn for two adults (separate rooms available).
Admission to West Stow Anglo-Saxon Village costs £7/£4 adult/child (01284 728718; weststow.org).
For more information see brecks.org/bfer, discoversuffolk.org.uk and imogensriverswims.co.uk.
Serving stations including Great Anglia, Bury St Edmunds, Thetford and Brandon (greateranglia.co.uk).