The spireless parish church of Trimingham is called St John the Baptist’s Head. This strange dedication to John the Baptist’s head dates from the medieval period. During this time a life size alabaster head of the saint was kept at the church and pilgrims in this country came to the church to the shrine altar, rather than make the journey to Amiens Cathedral where a relic said to be the real head of John the Baptist was kept.

The alabaster head did not survive and although it is unknown exactly what happened to it, it has been suggested that it was probably destroyed by Anglican reformers as a result of the 1538 Injunction against images during the reign of Henry VIII. Another theory is that the head was destroyed as a result of a further injunction which was rigorously imposed in 1547, during the early weeks of the reign of Edward VI. Today an Alabaster head survives in the Victoria and Albert Museum and it is thought that the head at Trimingham was exactly like the head in the museum collection. To this day, the nearby village hall is called the Pilgrim Shelter as a reminder of Trimingham’s past as a site of pilgrimage.

The church has a short tower which is thought to be unfinished. It has heavy buttresses on the west elevation which suggest that a fault in the construction of the church may well have been the reasoning for the unfinished tower. The nave to the east cuts around the buttress to embrace it. This peculiarity may be partly the result of a restoration by Thomas Jekyll in the 1850s. Pevsner states in his survey book that Thomas Jekyll completely rebuilt the nave of which the most notable feature is the way that the tower buttresses on the east side project into the nave.

The church’s rood screen is very small with four figures on either side of the entrance to the chancel. The figures are St Edmund with his arrow, St Clare with her book and monstrance, St Clement with his anchor and crozier, and St James in his pilgrim’s robes. On the south side are St Petronella with her book and keys, St Cecilia with her garland of flowers, St Barbara with her tower, and St Jeron with his hawk. The east window of the church is credited to H Wilkinson and dates from 1925. The window depicts Christ in Majesty flanked by St Michael and St Gabriel, with the symbols of the four Evangelists surrounding them.

Because the main dining area was being set up for a wedding later in the day, our final breakfast in the Old Vicarage took place in a more cosy dining area.

We loaded the car then headed off for King’s Lynn where we were going to stay for the remainder of our holiday. We had programmed the SatNav to include way marker destinations along our route.  After a while it became clear that the SatNav was not leading us to our first planned location, Horsey Thatched Church. By the time we realised the error it was not really feasible to backtrack. We had also missed out the coastal road that Mr C had been keen to drive along. This was a shame but we have it all to look forward to when we are next in the area.

We carried on towards Cromer taking in a couple of churches along the way; Trimingham with its 15th century rood screen and St Botolph’s Church in Trunch with its early 16th font canopy. We parked in Cromer and walked along the seafront before heading into town in search of a crab sandwich.

Cromer was absolutely heaving with people and a stark contrast to the tranquil setting of the Old Vicarage in Crostwick. Mr C noticed a place called Hot Rocks that advertised their seafood was brought in by their own fishing boat. The menu offered crab sandwiches so we took a seat inside and when they arrived the crab sandwiches were totally delicious.

After we had lunched, we returned to the car via the seafront before heading to Wells-Next-The-Sea which was even more crowded than Cromer so we decided not to stop and headed straight to King’s Lynn where we checked into the Bank House Hotel and unloaded the car before walking into town for refreshments and a quick visit to King’s Lynn Minster. Because of flooding earlier in the week we were unable to see some of the Minster’s treasures but we enjoyed what we could see.

Now it was time to freshen up in the hotel before dinner. We dined in the hotel restaurant where the food was delicious and the staff attentive. We had a nightcap in the bar and found it a refreshing change that the bar to stayed open for its advertised hours.