Bellringing by Canoe

22 June 2013

An unusual little outing today, combining a number of fun activities into a small-scale expedition. Bellringing makes up a fair proportion of our leisure time, particularly Stephen's, but gets little coverage here, so this also slightly addresses that imbalance.

Four of us drove to Buxton where we met Anne and Mike whose house overlooks the Bure Valley Railway. Here we are on the platform at Buxton, ready to take the train one stop along the line to Brampton.

The village sign reflects the Roman past of the village: the double-headed fish is copied from a Roman brooch found some years ago that can now be seen in the Norwich museum. The village sign gives the village its Latin name of Bramtuna to reflect its history.

A short walk brings us to the bank of the River Bure, where we dodge showers and await the arrival of the Canoe Man.

The Canoe Man has brought us two three-person canoes on a trailer, and the two Davids carry one to the river.

Lesley and David head downstream in one canoe

while David, myself and Anne take the other boat on towards Lammas

At Lammas we landed and had lunch, starting by the banks of the river but mostly in the porch of the church while it rained. After sustenance, we rang our first quarter-peal of the afternoon.

After the ringing at Lammas, we took to the boats again for the short journey back to Buxton, where we left the boats as instructed for the Canoe Man to pick up later. Anne was suffering from a minor injury and so we had a change of band for the second quarter-peal of the afternoon, and thus a change of method too. It was very hot in the ringing chamber, and Stephen was glad he'd brought fresh clothes to change into at Anne and Mike's where we had tea before returning to Suffolk.