Bluebell the motorhome is parked on a lovely spacious pitch overlooking Woodland within Sandringham Country Park. We are nestled upon the Caravan Club club site- a first for us, but there were no CLs close enough for us to park up on Friday and not drive again til today, so here we are.
We are lucky in that Sandringham is only an hours drive from home, so we arrived on Friday bang on the check in time of 12:00 ready to explore. On arrival we were told about SCD (Seasonal Canine Disorder) from the cautious warden and advised not to take the dog out into the Country Park. Panicking, we didnt know what to do for the best, as the country park goes for miles and we were smack bang in the middle. We decided to walk Jazz as normal, but not let him off lead ( well we dont do that anyway) and be extra vigilant for signs of illness.
The weather was fantastic, blue skies, no clouds, so we decided to set out on a 6.5 8 mile walk to Wolfreton and back through the park and past the visitor centre. The walk was glorious, taking in the wonderful Royal Wolfreton Station, once the main station where Royals would disembark on their way to Sandringham, but now a residential property which has been wonderfully restored privately. You can access the station, and visit the museum and it’s all free. Remarkable.
The walk took us over Dersingham bog (on the boardwalk of course!) with views of the wash and then back through the country park. We haven’t walked that length in a while (it turned out to be 8 miles as we added 3/4 mile each way getting from the campsite to join the AA Route. 
We had a great sleep on Friday night, the site is very quiet, and we were treated to hearing the Owls in the woods. They sounded very close to us! Always a lovely sound.
Saturday dawned another sunny day, so we got the bikes off the rack and set out on a 15.5 23 mile cycle, a route we found on the Caravan Club website. The route took us through West Newton, Amner (and past Amner Hall where Kate and Wills live- not that you could see it!) Great Bircham and its impressive windmill (sadly now closed until Easter- we’ve been up previously and it’s fantastic).
We then carried on through Fring, Snettisham – where we stopped at the picturesque Rose and Crown, winner of Pub of the Year 2015, and we can see why, it’s very pretty and our sandwiches were delicious. It was then the home stretch through Dersingham and back to Sandringham campsite via the visitor centre.
We passed several shops selling local produce, and took advantage of the fact stopping to get cheese at each, and chutney atSandringham visitors centre, building ourselves a nice little local cheese board for later that night! Not sure why the cycle ended up being 7.5 miles longer than the route suggested, we don’t think we went wrong! Anyway, we were glad to get back as it was just about our limit and actually there were a surprising amount of hills- but it was a lovely day nonetheless.
Saturday night was spent chilling and watching Strictly. Here’s a strange story- I went to enquire about a TV arial lead at reception as Friday night our TV signal off the status arial was ok but sometimes broke up, and we noticed everyone else on site had Arial leads. I was shocked that they were not available to hire, you had to buy them and they were £15! I’m not sure if we are out of touch with these larger commercial sites or what, but I was surprised to hear that, especially in an area where TV signal isn’t so good, you would think that they perhaps would let you have them for free to hire with a deposit or something? Especially when we are paying £20 a night? Suffice to say, I didn’t buy one, and in the end we had no problems off status arial so that was satisfying!
Sunday dawned and we were up early ready to pack away and the short drove to Sandringham House. It’s 1.5 miles from the campsite, so we could have walked t you can’t take dogs in so we wanted to reduce the time that Jazz needed to stay on his own in the van.
It cost £13.50 each to get into Sandringham, this included the stunning gardens, downstairs of the house, and also a large museum. We felt it to be very good value. The gardens were spectacular, the leaves just starting to change colour.
The first view of the house was exciting, it’s a stunning property you can see The Queen chooses to spend Christmas here.
We weren’t allowed to take piccies inside, but we got to see the lounge/saloon, drawing room, dining room (where they have their Turkey!) and ballroom. It was better value (IMO) than Ballmoral.
Inside the museum were loads of old Royal vehicles and a wealth of history and information. Also, a very large Pumpkin!
The west lawns were our favourite
Finally, after going to pick Jazz up, via the shop may I add, we went for a quick look around the church where The Royal Family worship on Christmas Day. What a pretty spot, the inside is lovely. We will watch the news with a vested interest on Xmas Morning
Jazz licking his lips on the above signalled time for home- we’d had a lovely break, and are now looking forward to doing Leicestershire over half term!
Until next time
Lx
Lovely lovely photos. Especially the red maple leaves.