A Week by the Norfolk Broads - My Top Tips

I think as most of you know if you’ve followed me for a while, North Norfolk is my absolute happy place.  We’ve been going as a family for the past fifteen years and we find it never disappoints whatever the season.  (If you’re asking, which of course you are, Autumn is one of our favourite times of year to go)

Whilst usually we stay in North Norfolk, this Easter we decided to stay closer to the broads so we could visit some new areas but also take a boat out for a day to fulfil all our Arthur Ransome dreams!

Below are my top tips if you’re staying over that side - everything was paid for, nothing gifted so purely my recommendations!

The Best Beach:

We absolutely fell in love with Waxham Beach - so much so we visited it three times.  And each time we stayed for hours. 

There are several marvellous things about it - the best one being its proximity to The Dunes Cafe at Waxham Barn.  Each time we would literally do a smash and grab there of the most delish sandwiches, cakes, hot drinks and the best pasty Mr Rhubarb & I think we’ve ever had (I Know - a bold statement but it was the perfect balance of good meat, veg and pastry, its not easy to achieve but they did it!)  Then with arms full of goodies we could head to the beach.

You can park easily on the lane by the Old Hall ( am sure this is probably rammed in summer but delightfully empty for us this Easter) and the walk up the hill to the beach itself is just like something out of an Enid Blyton novel.  The beach itself may not be the prettiest Norfolk has to offer with a run of concrete holding up the dunes, but it's so wide and deep and even at Easter, it was mainly empty, so the children could dig holes, run around and the dog was off lead having the best time and we mostly had the beach entirely to ourselves.  It was utter bliss.  Give me an empty beach, happy children, a tired dog, a yummy hot choc and cake and it’s frankly my happy place.

The Best Fish & Chips:

Just up from Waxham is Sea Palling where we had really yummy fish and chips which was perfect after our first day on the beach.  There’s nothing like eating salty chips by the seaside is there?!  There was also a doughnut and milkshake shack opposite which we were keen to try but sadly never made it back there.

The Best Pub:

We stayed at a beautiful cottage on the Gunton estate in a tiny village from which you could walk to the sister pub of The Gunton Arms, The Suffield Arms.  Initially I’d booked us into the tapas restaurant there before realising their pizzas are only available in the bar area but the tapas menu is still served in the bar so over a pretty raucous game of Go Fish!  the children tucked into delish pizzas whilst Mr Rhubarb & I could have some lovely tapas. Everyone was happy!  

Total side note  - we didn’t visit The Gunton Arms because we had a gorgeous night away there last year just the two of us and didn’t feel its really somewhere our littles would enjoy hence the trip to The Suffield Arms!

The Norfolk Broads:

For ease on our first trip we took out a motor boat on the broads.  We did it for four hours which gave us just enough time to get from Wroxham to Ranworth.  The plan was to stop at a pub along the way but we made good time and by the time we'd docked none of the pubs were open as it was only 11am but we did have a hamper full of goodies to keep us going until the cafe at Ranworth.  We all had a go at steering and were rather taken with it - even Le Pup, though he isn’t fond of swans who liked to swim behind us taunting him.  We saw so much beautiful wildlife and alot of dreamy wooden white-sail boats.  We'd be tempted to go back and do a longer trip, sleeping on a boat etc but for a little day trip it was absolutely perfect.