{"id":5994,"date":"2016-12-04T19:02:57","date_gmt":"2016-12-04T19:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/martinblack.com\/?p=5994"},"modified":"2016-12-05T16:17:18","modified_gmt":"2016-12-05T16:17:18","slug":"happisburgh-to-winterton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/2016\/12\/happisburgh-to-winterton\/","title":{"rendered":"Happisburgh to Winterton"},"content":{"rendered":"

I walked this, the 19th and final stage of the Grand Norfolk hike<\/a>, sometime in mid November.<\/p>\n

The dog and I left left the house at 8am, took the train to Norwich and another\u00a0one to North Walsham. \u00a0Outside the station we were met by a\u00a0very chatty taxi driver (“I’m a bit crazy sometimes” he said with a wide grin) who\u00a0took us Happisburgh, arriving on the seafront for 10:00am.<\/p>\n

I last saw Happisburgh (pronounced ‘haze-borough<\/a>‘) after wild camping on a nearby\u00a0beach back in August 2012, \u00a0it had taken me four years to return, far too long.<\/p>\n

We followed the Norfolk Coast Path for a short while before heading off down to the beach.<\/p>\n


\n\"norfolk-path\"<\/figure>\n

And what a beautiful sight it was!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"happisburgh-beach\"<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

I let Smithy dog off the lead and we alternated our walking (or running in Smithy’s case) between the beach and the ridge of the sand dunes.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"dunes\"<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

After a few miles we spotted a seal bobbing up and down on the waves, ten or so metres from the shore.<\/p>\n

It looked at us in a disinterested fashion, I gaped back while Smithy gave a tentative bark.<\/p>\n

And then…more seals…and more…and more…an entire colony of them!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"seal-colony\"<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

I put Smithy back on the lead (“you don’t want to mess with this bunch” I warned him) and we watched the goings on from the top of the dunes.<\/p>\n

At one point the beach was cordoned off with a ‘Seal Colony – do not disturb’ sign. \u00a0A local volunteer group, the ‘Friends of Horsey Seals<\/a>‘ were on hand to keep the unwise away from the pregnant\u00a0mothers, newly born pups and grumpy dads.<\/p>\n

The volunteers were a friendly\u00a0and knowledgeable bunch, I spent some time chatting to one of them\u00a0and learnt all about the seals and pups.<\/p>\n

On that day there were nearly\u00a0400 adults seals and 200 pups on the beach, apparently this number doubles by mid-winter!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"mum-and-pup\"<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

Smithy was perplexed by the whole thing.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"smithy\"<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

By 3:30pm we had arrived at Winterton-on-Sea, just in time to order tea and cake from the beach cafe.<\/p>\n

And with that,\u00a0the Grand Norfolk hike is completed!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Smithy dog and seals on the 19th, and final stage, of the Grand Norfolk hike<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6013,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[10,12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5994"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5994"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6109,"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5994\/revisions\/6109"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martinblack.com\/oldsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}