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Fakenham Pensthorpe Natural Park and King's Lynn Purfleet Quay Captain Vancouver statue: Wensum column




Wensum by Jim Harding

Having just strolled around Pensthorpe Natural Park for the first time in ages, I was forming in my mind some sentences to share with you about this wonderful bird reserve.

But then I heard that one of my favourite travel writers, Jonathan Raban, had died and the impact which his gritty books have had on me over many a long year just had to take precedence.

Purfleet Quay - Capt Vancouver statue.
Purfleet Quay - Capt Vancouver statue.

Also the fact that his early years were spent growing up as a Norfolk boy in this part of the county where he was much influenced in his eventual writing career by the River Wensum.

The hours he spent as a somewhat lonely child playing both by and in the river, though it may be hard to imagine now, set him on course much later to navigate himself along such a mighty waterway as the Mississippi. And to follow – roughly – the route of the British ship Discovery, captained by George Vancouver, along the so-called Inside Passage from Puget Sound to Alaska on America’s north-west Pacific coast.

The original expedition spanned the years 1791-1795. It amused me when I started to read this fabulous tale that Jonathan Raban set out alone on his own boat from Seattle on April Fool’s Day 1996.

Timmy Mallet and George Vancouver. Photo - timmy.mallett.co.uk / mallettspallette.co.uk
Timmy Mallet and George Vancouver. Photo - timmy.mallett.co.uk / mallettspallette.co.uk

I’ve always wondered whether this was a conscious decision datewise. Like all the other tales of his ‘journeys’, for want of a more appropriate word, it’s a roller-coaster ride which includes loads of stuff you would probably never expect to read. Take it from me, the book which evolved from all this, which he called Passage to Juneau, is riveting.

In looking for clues about J.R’s early life , one of his other books makes mention of the White House in Hempton on the outskirts of Fakenham where he first grew up.

There’s a passage where he describes walking across the common with his mum to meet his estranged father at Fakenham West railway station, when dad returns from the war. Their subsequent relationship is best described, I think, as ‘strained’. This would have been when Fakenham West station was still active – now just its platform is preserved for anyone interested to see it.

When I first came to live in Fakenham I used to lodge a couple of doors down from the White House and have often passed it on my bike these days when I cycle out to Shereford.

Somehow all these little connections contributed to my enthusiasm for reading every new book written by Jonathan Raban. There have been quite a few and I’ve never been disappointed.

Now that he’s gone – we were born in the same year in the middle of the war, another connection for me – I do hope his work becomes more celebrated and more widely read.

And this Wensum can hardly conclude without the fact, known to many of you I expect, that Captain George Vancouver was born in Lynn and has a statue in honour of him in the town.



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