Pilgrimage to Norwich Cathedral

(I’m a bit late writing this post so although it’s being published in November the actual pilgrimage occurred in October)

I’m not a very religious person, I’d probably say I’m more spiritual. I am also a huge lover of architecture and history which intersects and has been influenced deeply by religion over the centuries. I happen to think that churches and religious buildings are some of the most interesting and beautiful spaces created, and obviously always have interesting stories that live alongside them.

The British Pilgrimage Trust is a company that I was introduced to a few years ago by my godmother who asked if I’d like to attend their one day pilgrimage across London as a birthday present. As I’m always up to try new things I jumped at the chance and we had the most fabulous day, walking with a lovely group of people from the Tower of London to Westminster Abbey, stopping at many religious sites across London along the way. We had two brilliant guides, one a choral scholar who recounted and sung the religious history of the spaces as well as a history scholar who was able to give the wider social history context.

The best thing about the BPT pilgrimages are that you are encouraged to bring your own faith, whatever that may be and to embrace the spirit of a pilgrim, connecting with nature, those around you and to share stories and experiences.

Since the London experience my godmother has done a couple of other trips with BPT but most recently booked for us to do their one day pilgrimage to Norwich Cathedral.

I jumped at the chance as I’d never been to Norwich before. After a very full summer and the sadness of losing my grandad in August, a day to connect with nature and spirituality seemed like the perfect remedy.

My lovely godmother organised it all and collected me Friday afternoon. What should have been a 2.5hr trip actually took 5hrs due to traffic but we made it to our guest house and on the recommendation of the owner went out to the most amazing Turkish restaurant. An early night was had and before long we were up having a hearty breakfast and heading off to the train station to meet our guide and other pilgrims.

5 of us met at the train station and we found our lovely guide Dawn who organised a taxi for us to travel out of the city to our starting point and to join the rest of our group.

We started in a village called Surlingham and opened the walk in the site of a derelict chapel being reclaimed by nature. We were each given a hazelnut (as they hold religious symbolism in this part of the country) and asked to privately set our intention for this walk. You could be asking a question, asking forgiveness, asking for guidance, walking in remembrance or just simply walking for joy.

From the outset I could tell Dawn was a fantastic guide as her knowledge of the area, the buildings and the history was brilliant, but she also had so much knowledge about nature and was able to point out types of birds we were seeing and identify plants and trees and their uses. She also had a fabulous singing voice and gifted us with pieces of music related to the places and nature around us. There were about 15 of us waking in total. Mostly women spanning different age ranges and all of us coming from different areas of the country.

We trekked across the country side sticking to the public footpaths and only being mildly drizzled on throughout the day which was lucky. Our walk was about 10miles in total over the course of about 6 and a half hours (this included stopping for lunch and at various churches).

I found it really interesting that at the beginning of the pilgrimage when were in the rural countryside I didn’t feel the need to talk much, but preferred to be silent and listen to the sounds of the nature around me, however as we entered the city I had the urge to, and enjoyed hearing and telling stories with the other pilgrims. It felt so great to turn off my phone for the day and just be completely immersed in our own journey and thoughts.

We stopped at several churches walking into Norwich and had lunch at a beautiful country park. As we entered the city it was amazing to see and feel the landscape change so suddenly from agricultural to industrial. I loved the Tudor and medieval buildings that have been preserved. We visited the Julian Shrine, a beautiful little chapel, as well as the St Peter Parmentergate Church, a 15th C. church now turned into an indoor skate park!

Finally we ended up at Norwich Cathedral just in time for the evensong service which was a lovely end to our day of walking. What a beautiful cathedral it is and they have done a magnificent job of restoring historic parts as well as expanding and merging new architecture with old.

Fully exhausted after a lovely day, my godmother and I headed over to the Jarrolds department store in search of a famous cheese she wanted to buy, and found ourselves toasting the day in their restaurant with some wine and lots of cheese! We made it back to our guest house where we promptly lounged in our pyjamas and enjoyed some Strictly Come Dancing!

What a fabulous weekend away and I’ll definitely be looking forward to my next pilgrimage.