Aldeburgh and Snape Maltings

Monday October 11th

Today we got an early start and Mike and Kathy took us down to Aldeburgh. This was always a favourite place to visit and never fails to impress. the photo of us is taken in front of the Moot Hall which dates from the 16th century. the town council hasmet here for over 400 years and still does. Aldeburgh is one of those villages that seems frozen in time and has resisted modernization and the big global brands like McD’s. It is delightful to walk through with its cottages and boutique shops.
This tiny little house which is probably someone's holiday cottage is standing in the middle of a carpark!

It was quite breezy on the seafront and the sea was quite rough but it wasn’t unpleasant as the sun was shining and the temperature was still close to 20°. We then drove back in the direction of Snape Maltings. The Maltings is a set of buildings, mostly dating from the 19th century, built on the banks of the river Ore near Snape. Its original purpose was the malting of barley for the brewing of beer; local barley, once malted, was sent from here to London and exported to mainland Europe. The Maltings closed in 1960. The buildings have since been partially restored and rebuilt and converted into shops, galleries, and the concert hall, where part of the world-famous Aldeburgh music festival is held, initiated by Benjamin Britten and run by Aldeburgh Music.


The photos here show the beautiful autumn colours that are around at the moment around the Maltings There are lots of lovely boutique shops there but they are all fairly high end and although lovely to look at I was not tempted to buy. Space and weight are rapidly becoming a problem so purchasing has almost ceased. We had lunch in the small cafe rather than the upmarket restaurant and then returned home as mike had another appointment in the afternoon.

In the evening we took Mike and Kathy over the local pub “The Douglas Bader” for dinner. Named after the famous pilot, Douglas Bader actually did fly planes in and out of Martlesham Heath airfield and he has been honoured by having the local named after him.