Heading to North Norfolk is often a stunning collection of views and it’s so easy to see why Seago loved The Big Skies so much – my picture doesn’t do the countryside justice, but you can see something about what I mean!

Anyway – back to Binham and to explain why we head there quite often – and it’s not just for the old stones ! Binham was a large priory that fell in 1549 – it’s now one of the English Heritage sites, and is strange because it’s still an active church. Indeed when we arrived there was a church bell tolling calling the faithful to church – though I immediately thought of something completely different

Binham is close to Holt – and that means we are in Chelsea by the Sea territory. It’s very easy to be very disparaging about the people who have second homes on or near the north Norfolk coast , but I am actually going to be bloody rude about the lot of them. When you consider that a two bedroom apartment – note, not a bloody flat but an apartment – in Burnham Market is currently on the market for £399,000 – now that’s silly money… even more so when you see a two bedroom mid terrace cottage for £245,000 in Sheringham – and that’s out of the normal second home dwellers preferred catchment. The thing is, this means the locals cannot afford to live there – the average salary in north Norfolk is£32,700…. I also object very much to the inflated prices that people will pay – but more on this later.

/Rant over

Since we last visited – think that was in April, English Heritage have put more explanatory notices up – and they have done more conservation work – back in April I chatted with a stone mason who was repointed the porter in the flint walls – he explained that they were not allowed to use what was used when the priory was built as apparently Elf n Safety would have a fit about the lime mortar being used now… it was a fascinating chat and I may have had a bit of an anorak moment!

The priory when it fell, was sold off to a Mr Paston – close friend of Henry VIII and well known land owner in Norfolk and a part of the family that produced the Paston Letters. In time honoured fashion, he basically robbed the stone and sold it off to locals; this is where it gets a bit fascinating as you might have thought that the priory was just made of dressed stone – it certainly wasn’t – rather the walls were built with rubble mortared and shuttered into a shape, then the face was clad with dressed stone – a lot cheaper! Allegedly there are more Tudor buildings locally that have stone from fallen monasteries. Ah hour or so allowed us to have a good wander around the ruins – we could not go into the church as there was some god bothering going on…. We left the stones and then headed to the other reason for the trip

The small car park at the site allows you to walk in to The Parlour which is a bespoke – for those who wonder what bespoke means it is simple ‘KING EXPENSIVE. The food service etc are good, but oh my… the costs! When we arrived we were surrounded by some faux locals – they have a uniform of fawn trousers, country check shirt and often appear to be lacking a chin…. it’s a dead give away as old money in Norfolk is likely to be wearing grand dads tweed and our Barbours are at least 25 years old….. (Actually I have a Hunter jacket that I bought to replace my old John Partridge …..). Anyway, we were not there for food – we were their for the The Little Dairy Shop… this is where I knew we would find raw milk, if we wanted it, and Cheese… Wallace would have to be dragged away by Grommit 🙂

Most of the cheeses sold here are made by Mrs Temple of the Norfolk Cheese Company. I would quite cheerfully fight anyone for Binham Blue – of all the cheese in the world, that is one of my favourites. The other cheese of note that we always find there is Baron Bigod – simply one of the best brie type cheese anywhere…. it’s still made near Bungay and oh my……

James, youngest sulk who we all hate for his ability to eat like the hungry caterpillar and never put weight on, wanted ice cream – now the ice cream at Binham is good – but, close to Dean Towers is Dann’s Farm Shop which has a great selection of ice creams, and does even cater for vegans (or perverts as I prefer to call them). its not far from the main road, and is well worth a visit for the incredible richness of their ice creams.

So – that’s Binham – a short day, but one that my waist line appreciated!