Years ago, it was popular to have a print of John Constable’s famous painting “The Haywain” above the fireplace, and I always thought it was awful, and he must be a rubbish painter. However, about 25 years ago I went to the National Gallery in London, and saw the original, which is beautiful, and ever since then I have wanted to visit this area. It is lovely – the countryside makes you feel as though you are walking through Constable’s paintings. There are lot of medieval villages with half timbered houses and sagging roofs. Imagine a cross between a Constable landscape and Downton Abbey plus roads and traffic!

Apparently it’s impossible to recreate this scene as Constable saw it, as Suffolk has sunk 30cm into the North Sea over the last 200 years, so the water table is higher.

Our nearest village, Nayland. When I see a scene like this, I always think they should ban cars. However I daresay that in the olden days the place was filthy, with a midden in the middle of the street, so maybe cars aren’t so bad.

Our camp site was idyllic, on the banks of the River Stour, although we had no electricity, internet or mobile phone connection, at least it was idyllic until the weekend when thousands of families with millions of kids descended. They had a great time, boating, jumping in the river, and there were a couple of really loud Americans that I assumed were teenagers, until I saw them – bald middle aged men. If we had had kids with us it would have been lovely, but being old and grumpy we were just glad when they all left to go back to work/school:-)

I hadn’t realised that Ipswich was such a nice town – I imagined it as something like a new town with docks, but apparently it is one of England’s oldest towns. The name probably comes from the Saxon name Gippeswic, and there was a Roman settlement here. I’d like to live in an apartment overlooking the water somewhere, some day! When I get tired of travelling around.

The lovely old village of Lavenham, England’s best preserved Medieval town.

I wonder if the vicar does the topiary?

They only play Classic Bingo in Lavenham, none of your modern rubbish. And shouldn’t the prize be 50 groats? (No groat symbol on this keyboard).

Even Lavenham is not immune to the curse of the plastic wheelie bin.

Still we had to move on, we are now at Great Yarmouth – not been here in 50 years! We plan to look at the Norfolk Broads and Norwich.