Bikepacking Norfolk’s Rebellion Way on a two-wheeled adventure

In the golden savannah of England’s late summer, we cycle wheel in groove through a field of stubble. The double line dirt track leads us across the empty field, its cut hay baled high in square stacks. Overhead, cirrus clouds adorn the pale blue sky in delicate sweeps like an artist’s brush stroke. This is not the Norfolk I expected. There are no fens, beaches or wide waterways. It feels like a homecoming.

I’m here to test out the Rebellion Way – a 365km new bikepacking route across Norfolk. It’s been designed by Cycling UK especially with beginners in mind. Which is a good job really, since I’ve never been bikepacking in my life and barely cycled off-road. The full route makes a six day loop, starting and finishing in Norwich, but can easily be split in half at King’s Lynn. With only a long weekend to spare, snatching a quick break between working weeks, we’ll be cycling the clockwise half.

An hour’s train ride from London and we are packing bags onto bikes outside Norwich station, ready to go. Slightly delayed by swans on the line, our plans are already becoming fluid. But that’s how cycling holidays work; on a bike, just roll with it.

We ride on quiet country lanes, lined high with hedgerow: hawthorn, blackthorn, elder, ash. Ancient oak trees stand tall above them. The landscapes we pass through blur into a Zorn palette of red bricks and terracotta tiles, ochre fields, flint-made walls and sandy tracks. Weaving through a web of back lanes and byways, we ride one minute enclosed, the next under an enormous sky. There aren’t many hills at all and any tiredness is smoothed out by the subtle boost of an e-bike. After an intense week of work, I can feel the stress falling away as I pedal.

The Rebellion Way weaves together sites of local history, but it’s subtle. You don’t feel like you’re going dot to dot, compelled to stop and admire each site of interest in turn, like an all-inclusive sightseeing bus. The cultural history forms a backdrop that you move through – splashing across a ford into full view of a Clunaic priory or casually cycling under a portcullis into the village of Castle Acre. Yet, for the curious, there are many layers to unpeel if you only step aside and notice. We pause in an abandoned church, reclaimed by oak and ivy, the empty stained glass window now forming an intricate frame for the landscape…