Witweg: Church Crawl

Historic Churches Crawl

After three joyful days of singing in Coventry Cathedral, but windy, dull and wet as far as the weather was concerned, a glorious day of church crawling from Cambridge. Although the area around Cambridge is rather built up, the countryside is very attractive and scattered with interesting villages. On a bright and sunny day, although very cold, it was a joy to drive around.

Our first stop was Babraham church, hidden along a country lane and not visible from the road. It belonged to Babraham Hall, a large Victorian estate, now housing an important research institute of Cambridge University. Unfortunately the church was locked, the key holder not answering her phone.

So we left without having seen the interior which according to Jenkins[1] has box pews, a remarkable memorial and a modern but striking stained glass window which was partly visible through one of the windows. It lies next to a pretty gurgling stream, now festooned with early snowdrops. Unfortunately concrete buildings have sprouted all around, spoiling what could have been a very arcadian place.

Our next stop was Duxford, a delightful English village which has two Anglican churches, St. John’s and St. Peter’s. St. John’s is now redundant and under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust. It stands high on the village green. After collecting the key at one of the nearby houses and opening the heavy door, the interior was quite a revelation. Especially the wall paintings and the massive Norman arches are impressive. The wall paintings depict saints, devils, angels and strange creatures, as well as decorative edgings. The space seems a bit unpractical for worship.

St. John's

Left: Stairs to the rood loft Right: the decorated roof beams

One of the attractive houses surrounding the church

The nearby St Peter’s is now the local church but seemed less interesting.

Above: St. Peter's Duxford

We went on to Ickleton, to St. Mary Magdalene. The church borders the village green, which is surrounded by brightly coloured houses. The spire is worth looking at, as it has an unusual outside bell, suspended from the top of the spire under its own canopy. I had never seen that before. Inside there are some treasures. To begin with glorious wall paintings, which only were discovered when cleaning the walls after a fire. Besides there are beautiful carved bench ends, and an original, brightly painted rood screen. The setting is very peaceful and I think I could easily live here, or in any of the other villages.

Carved bench ends

Ickleton village green

It was time for lunch, so we drove further south to the Fighting Cocks, where we expected to feast on good food. However, no food on Mondays and Tuesday and this of course was Tuesday. But the barman referred us to another pub, the Fleur de Lys a bit further south in Widdington. This oxblood red stucco pub was indeed very attractive and quaint, and they did have good food, all prepared with local products they claim. However, on Tuesday the landlord did the cooking and the chef had his day off, so it took over an hour of waiting before we got our food as the pub was packed mainly with groups of women and hikers. Since we still had some more churches on our list, my friend was on tenterhooks. But it didn’t really matter, as we were having a good time anyway.

After a very late and but well cooked lunch we went back north to Saffron Waldon, a most attractive market town. The church, St. Mary’s, is the largest village church in Essex and towering over the town on a hill. It is very impressive and amazingly high. It was difficult to capture the height on camera. The town was busy as it was market day and many buildings on the market square were partly hidden by market stalls. Here is a site with photo’s of Saffron Waldon which are much better than mine. It still has its historic centre and streets, and looks very attractive. Besides, it boasts of having three mazes, of which I saw only one being the floor of the bandstand. It was too late to explore Saffron Waldon further, as it was getting dark. But it is definitely worth another, longer visit.