Clare Teal: Discovering timeless charm of Britten’s best bit of Britain

Aldeburgh is a bit like stepping back into the 1950s (I would imagine) a sleepy little Suffolk coastal town with a very clean shingle beach. All along the beach there are tiny huts where you can buy freshly-caught fish from real-life actual fishermen! You can then take your lobster, crab or whatever across to “Eliza’s Barbecue” and have it marinated or dressed and cooked to your exact specification. Perfect.

Granted, the funfair in the car park next to our hotel was slightly irksome but thankfully by the second morning the entire shebang had packed up and moved on to their next port of call. There are lots of lovely galleries and arty crafty shops and lots of good restaurants, but the thing we both thought lovely was strolling around the town after dinner seeing houses full of people eating together, front doors thrown open and kids of nine and ten playing on their bikes in the street, just like we used to. It was so nice to be a part of such a secure and warm community.

We love coastal walking and on the first afternoon headed north to the bizarre village of Thorpeness, originally a small fishing hamlet, which was bought by Scottish barrister and railway designer Glencairn Stuart Ogilvie in 1910 and transformed into a private holiday village with a country club, tennis courts and swimming pool. Most of the homes are built in Jacobean or Tudor style.

From virtually everywhere in the village you can see what appears to be a conventional red brick cottage sitting on top of a black five-storey tower. Not unlike something you’d expect to see after the tornado hits Kansas in The Wizard of Oz, “The House in the Clouds” was originally a water tower, the house hid the water tank, and was supplied by the Vegas-style windmill next to it. Look out for the 19th Century Martello Towers and a stunning Maggi Hambling sculpture called Scallop – a four-metre-high stainless steel construction of two interlocking scallop shells, dedicated to Benjamin Britten. Aldeburgh and surrounding areas, Snape, Dunwich and Southwold have a lot to offer and we’ll be back for further investigations.