St Mary, Dennington

The church at Dennington sits quietly off the main road east of Woodbridge, and it's one of those Suffolk buildings that rewards a small detour without demanding hours of your day. St Mary's is a proper medieval parish church - fifteenth-century mostly - with the kind of interior details that make history types genuinely excited and everyone else at least a bit impressed.

Inside, the rood screen is the real draw. It's carved and painted with saints and still has that faded-gold look that makes you realise how much effort went into decorating these spaces centuries ago. The pews have misericords too - those little hinged seats with carved undersides that the medieval craftsmen used to hide jokes and grotesques. You could spend twenty minutes spotting faces and creatures, or five minutes and leave satisfied either way.

It's free to visit and takes as long as you want, though most people are in and out in thirty minutes. The church works well as part of a loose ramble around the Woodbridge area rather than a destination in itself. If you're staying at Savage Glamping or The Croft Campsite - both just a few miles away - it's an easy morning stop before heading elsewhere in Suffolk. The building itself is humble rather than grand, which somehow makes it feel more genuine than the showier churches further north. Worth seeing if you're passing, proper interesting if you actually care about medieval carving.