Boat trips to Blakeney Point are all the more fun for seal spotting. Set out from nearby Morston Quay and the more inquisitive will sometimes treat you to a swim around the boat.
Take the road north from The Harper and you’ll be in the village of Morston in no time. It’s delightfully low-key, but no less scenic for it – the kind of place that has you contemplating a second home. Quieter than better-known Blakeney just along the coast road, it also has an improbably picturesque pub at its heart. When you’re not propping up the bar at The Harper, you’ll quite possibly be doing the same at The Anchor Inn Morston. You can also pick up tickets here for boat trips to see the seals in Norfolk’s wildest reaches at remote Blakeney Point (the proprietors also run Temples Seal Trips on Morston Quay). The red and white boats ply Blakeney Harbour, giving you great views of the seals basking on banks of sand. If you’re the hardy sort, it’s a year-round activity – while common seals seem to like an easy life, lazing in the sun between June and September, grey seals have their pups in the weeks before Christmas. There’s nothing quite like a bracing December boat trip around Blakeney Harbour.
Morston is also something of a water sports hub. At the end of Quay Lane you’ll find Norfolk Etc, the place for North Norfolk paddle board hire, power boat trips and sailing programmes, with a great range of activities for kids. While the village sits within the National Trust’s Blakeney National Nature Reserve, Blakeney itself doesn’t. It’s always worth a wander, though, for its yachty charms – all clinking boat masts, salty creeks and – up the hill from the quay to the church, a commanding view over the marshes. North Norfolk to a tee.
Image courtesy of visitnorfolk.co.uk
