Escape to the Fens!

11th February 2018

Wicken Fen and Ely, Cambridgeshire 

A rotting tree stump

With the start of Half Term and a cold house, it was easy to agree an outing after we saw our builders for a progress meeting. Things are still in progress, if a little slowly because we have a kitchen arriving midMarch, it kind of makes sense that the builders have prioritised things so we don’t lose the cooking facilities... So we had a look for National Trust places locally and decided on Wicken Fen which is near Ely, Cambridgeshire, and we had a pleasant walk on the boardwalk and stopped in the wildlife hides. It really was glorious sunshine, if a little nippy, and the kind of scenery I enjoy, much like we see in the Broads. A really pleasant and stable walk with no hills (its fenland after all) makes for a healthy number of steps. I am keeping to roughly 10,000 on average and with the halfterm I am glad we had this outing before telly and vegetation in front of step up over the holiday! 

There was a rather pretty if semi-derelict windmill and a shiny wind pump which was moving water around to stop the fens from drying out.

This evening Countryfile showed an article on Red Fen which was close by and how the reinstatement of fenland is helping to keep natural wildlife like the bittern from dying out. It was certainly a real escape from our normal habitat, and understandable why we must do all we can to try and keep up our areas of outstanding natural beauty for the wildlife.

We dropped into Ely and wandered through the cathedral which is starting to feel like one of our popular family visits.