Long Medford, Sudbury, Kersey

8/24/2013 Sat:  Rain.  Spent longer than we meant to at breakfast, talking to a couple of teachers from London – he (not J) the head of a Modern Orthodox boys’ school.

S insisted that I drive to Long Medford, which I did, v timidly and clipped a curb on a mini-roundabout.  Parked in the first place I could find & refused to budge.  Mistook where the church was (at the N end) and schlepped and schlepped past fairly unremarkable shops & restaurants.  The church, once we found it, had a bunch of medieval stained glass & some good bronzes (a family – daughter holding a skull, indicating that she’d died early.  Two babies who died before their mother was churched.

Volunteer in the church said she only came once every 2 weeks. There was a good roster of volunteers.

Lunch at the Bull – ok – then S navigated us into Sudbury, to the house where Gainsborough was born, now a small museum.  (Sudbury v hard to navigate in – took S two circles to find it).  I didn’t see the signs forbidding photos & took some before the docent told me not to.  A v nice, early, primitive showing mother & daughter w/ a ewe and lamb.  S liked the landscapts best – for me, they were too dark.

I was ready to call it a day, even not having seen Kersey, which KB said was the prettiest of the Suffolk villages, but S persevered, navigated us out of Sudbury & into Kersey, which was just adorable.  V. old church (St Mary’s?) up on the hill – of flint.  I was thinking I could barely haul myself up the hill & they hauled up all the building materials for the church.

Oldest part from the 12^th century – one nave & one aisle only.  A v. old maybe once reredos (?) just sitting on the floor, some good carving on the font, some carvings in the chancel.  Then my camera gave out.

On the way out of Kersey, S wanted to go on a country road, and I didn’t discern from the map we were on the wrong road (road went E, not N, but no sun & hard to tell), until a road came in from the right that shouldn’t have been there.  S somewhat cross – I should have reported the first moment the road diverged from the (now detailed) map.  I devensive, of course.  But we got back to the A1141 eventually.

S has a headache.