Next up on our holiday was a lunch date with my Aunt and Uncle who live on the Suffolk/Norfolk border, so on the way up from Ipswich we decided to visit Southwold. We thought we’d beat the queues for the car parks by arriving at 10am but despite it being a weekday in term time we couldn’t find a space for anywhere longer than 20 minutes! This just gave us time to visit Southwold Books, which is owned by Waterstones but branded as though independent. The store is in an attractive building (The Olde Banke House), the former site of the local Tourist Information office, and is small but very sweet!
The woman and man pictured in one of the photos were complaining about a chain shop that was going to be moving into Southwold (presumably White Stuff as they were opening the following day) and how chains would ruin the character of the town. Kind of ironic really, when you consider who owns this shop!
After our visit we hopped back into the car and headed to the Pier for a cup of coffee. The pier was built in 1900.
There is a large mural on part of the pier by graffiti artist Pure Evil and dedicated to George Orwell (one of my most-read authors) who lived in the High Street from 1929 to 1935 and wrote one of my favourite of his works of fiction here, A Clergyman’s Daughter.
Trinity Lighthouse
The sandy beach is very popular with tourists in the summer months, but was fairly quiet when we visited. Southwold is very pretty and definitely worth a visit if you’re ever in the East of the country… just get there early!
Still reading – The New Woman by Charity Norman and listening to Knots and Crosses on Ian Rankin on Audio Book
Janet's Adventures in Waterstones 