Taking a Walk: Redgrave and Lopham Fen, Norfolk

When you picture a great watershed between two rivers, a mountain ridge probably comes to mind – not a reedbound marsh barely 20 yards above sea level. But Redgrave and Lopham Fen is a miraculous, albeit low-key place.

This hidden fen is the source of both the River Waveney, which flows 59 miles east to join the sea at Great Yarmouth, and the Little Ouse, which flows 37 miles mostly west to the Great Ouse and then north into the Wash. The spring power beneath one modest marsh turns the county of Norfolk into an island.

I was seeking the magical point where the map marks ‘Source of the Little Ouse’ and ‘Source of the River Waveney’. I was abuzz with the riddles of this quest. How can this spot produce two such beautiful lowland rivers? Why does such low land dispatch spring water in utterly opposite directions? And how is Redgrave and Lopham Fen, which appears to be mostly in Norfolk and partly in Suffolk, wholly owned by Suffolk Wildlife Trust?

I also hoped to hear a cuckoo, see a hobby and watch the fen raft spider, one of the largest, most spectacular and rarest British spiders, a mahoganycoloured ambush arachnid with yellow ‘go-faster’ stripes along its body. It walks on pond water to seize its prey.

For all this excitement, my children and I reached the fenside slightly worse for wear after the Bank Holiday traffic jams. Nevertheless, the marsh defrazzled us in an instant. Its vast, calm green arena of reed beds, pools and soft peaty pathways was completely silent, insulated by groves of oak and poplar.

Like most nature reserves, Redgrave had a whiteboard where visitors could scrawl their latest sightings – ‘Water vole! Peregrine! Velociraptor!’ – which raised expectations, despite someone’s adding the downbeat ‘2 x poo-bags’.

On the children’s instruction, we took the Spider Trail, which I like to think wasn’t wholly because it was just a mile long. No one was there except for a procession of sedge warblers, which gave us intimate concerts from bramble thickets barely a yard away. ‘It’s like someone playing a computer game,’ said Esme of the haphazard, frenzied ‘tune’. It was quicker and even more half-crazed than the similarly staccato reed warbler. Both would be music to the ears of the con-woman cuckoo, seeking to drop eggs into the warblers’ nests.

Above billowing sallow, we admired our first swallow of the year, and as we gazed at a buzzard soaring high in the thermals, I saw some really large swifts.

‘Hobbies,’ said Esme, before I fumbled my binoculars for a proper look.

Correct. I’d only ever seen them singly, but here there were four, circling and then plummeting for early dragonflies. They’re the most dynamic, turbocharged scythe-winged raptors.

We walked on, admiring orange tips, brimstones and peacocks dancing through the sunshine. A short walk became a long dawdle, and we added drama to our picnic by crossing the border to eat it in a new county: Suffolk.

We mooched beside some waterways, trying to decide whether they were the first expression of the Waveney or a young Little Ouse – I think the former – but much about this watery landscape remained uncertain, and was all the better for it.

In the heart of Middle Fen, we found the ‘spider ponds’ but, despite binoculars and Esme-vision, we couldn’t find another deadly female: it was a little early.

On the north side of the fen, we followed a path of climbable oaks in their brilliant first green, ears straining for the cuckoo that had been calling before we arrived but fell silent for our three-hour amble.

By the end of our walk, we’d found just one of our nature quests – the hobby. These liminal headwaters and their inhabitants had evaded most of our scrutiny, but they bewitched us all the same.

We were wholly refreshed by the otherworldly tranquillity of this strange and special place.

Free parking (Suffolk Wildlife Trust donations welcome) at Low Common Road, IP22 2HX. Three circular marked trails and access to longer routes on the Angles Way