Earsham Airfield Memorial

The concrete runways at Earsham are long gone now, but walk the quiet lanes east of Halesworth and you'll find the scattered remains of what was once a thriving American airbase during the Second World War. A memorial marks the spot where hundreds of young men took off on bombing runs, many of whom never came back. It's a sobering place - the kind that makes you stand still for longer than you expected.

There's not much to 'do' here in the conventional sense. This isn't a museum with exhibits or a visitor centre with tea and cakes. What you get instead is the real thing: open fields, the actual ground where history happened, and a chance to understand what the American presence meant to Norfolk during those years. The memorial itself is respectful and clear. You can walk the perimeter and try to imagine the scale of the base when it was operational.

Walkers will find this worthwhile as a detour on a longer route. It works best as part of a broader exploration of Norfolk's wartime legacy rather than as a standalone destination - allow an hour if you're walking from Halesworth. Historians and anyone interested in WWII will get more from it than casual visitors might. If you're camping at Wardley Hill or Green Haven, both less than five miles away, it's perfectly feasible to spend a morning here before exploring the wider area.

Go when the weather's decent. There's no shelter, and standing about reading a memorial in drizzle loses some of its weight.