Egg Hunt. ( Station Cafe, Reepham)

Station Cafe,

Reepham,

Everyday 10-4:00 ,

Recommended

Lockdown has obviously been a difficult time for cafes and tearooms and although I try and do my bit every week there is only so much takeaway cake you can eat and sadly some of my favourite venues have shut down. I was therefore very happy to hear that the Railway café at Reepham was still going strong after a change of management last summer, so I felt it was time for a visit.

As it was Easter Sunday I was surprised that Big George had agreed to be todays cycling guest because each year he is normally out looking for presents from the Easter bunny but he promised he would complete his search in time for our departure. Sadly he reported that for the 50th year running the Easter bunny had not left him anything but he thought it may have been because he hadn't looked hard enough and would continue his search on our return.

As I hadn't been sure that Big George would make it I had also invited Alastair as back up cycling guest and upon his arrival at Crusader Towers the three of us set off toward Reepham.

On the way to Reepham

The café is situated on the Marriotts way but we took a road based route as we enjoyed the lovely Spring sunshine and blue skies.

Lovely spring weather for todays ride

When we got there I was pleased to see there were lots of other cyclists littering the site. It was obviously a bit of a cycling Mecca but fortunately the café was very efficient so people didn't have a long to wait for their drinks. 

Lots of cyclists could be found all round the café

Social distancing and mask wearing was also being properly observed.

Outside the café ready to venture in 

The cake selection was a good one and I chose a blondie with mini eggs, in order to get into the Easter spirit. Sadly Big George had led Alistair astray and they both went for a sausage sandwich which was neither cake or very Easterie. 

A very good cake selection

We did better on the drinks front and covered all the bases of Hot Chocolate, Coffee and Tea. 

Todays drink selection

Once outside our refreshments were soon delivered and we all thought the food was excellent with my cake scoring very well. The drinks were not so good and all on the weak side. My Hot Chocolate was Cadburys or similar which, as you know, gets a standard 5 out of 10 as its not my favourite.

However we all very much enjoyed our visit to the Station Cafe and I recommend a visit, especially if you are on the Marriotts way. Me and Big George decided we would do that trip in the near future and definitely stop off here again.

As we set off back to Norwich we saw a sign to Reepham's other disused station at Whitwell. It seemed surprising that a village of this size could have ever needed two stations but a quick bit of research on Google said they were part of infrastructure improvements made in the 1930's as part of Reepham's failed Olympic games bid.

The journey home was uneventful although the promised wind behind seemed to be straight into our faces making the going surprisingly hard. Big George was keen to get back quickly so he could continue his egg hunt but as I write there has been no news of any successful finds. Maybe next year.

Scores

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
5	5	7.7	8.0	7.8	6.70

Route

Click here to download 35 mile Norwich Reepham loop gpx to your GPS

Norfolk Cafe Cycle Tour Sportive 11. (39 miles Reepham via Reepham station cafe)

Sportive 11

Reepham Railway Station,

Reepham,

Under new management

See Egg Hunt

Saturday saw the latest Cake Crusader Sportive. A bumper turnout of 5 met at race HQ for pre ride faffing about before heading North to Reepham. Today's stop was at Reepham Railway station by Kerris farmhouse pine shop.

Waiting at Race HQ for sportive to begin

With only 4 other cyclists to herd progress was going well until just after we crossed the busy A47. Here Ali punctured and we discovered it takes four men to change an inner tube. Three to do repair stuff and Dr Hans to observe in case there is a medical emergency.

Dr Hans checking that there were no medical emergencies during the fixing of the puncture

During the repair a car approached and a lady asked directions to the nearby school. Fortunately my cycle cafe adventures have not only made me a bit of an expert on cake but I also now know my way round the highways and byways of the Norfolk country side. I was therefore able to give, what we all agreed, were excellent clear instructions. After the lady had repeated back to me my suggested route she responded with ' haven't I just driven that way?' I pointed out that as I hadn't been in the car with her for her previous attempts I had no idea how this route compared with them but I suggested she gave my directions a go anyway. Hopefully she found the school as term must have started some time ago and her son was now several weeks late for registration.

With no further drama we pulled in to Reepham railway station and as it was such a nice day we decided to sit in the large outdoor bench seating area. But first we went inside to check out cakes etc.

Outside Reepham Station in the outdoor bench seating area

I had been to Reepham railway station before and knew they had infeasibly large cheese scones (see Bike security) so hoped I won't be disappointed this time. Along with the scones there was a nice selection of cakes and slices but sadly no big sponge cakes. As the cheese scones were still as infeasibly large as before I ordered one of them plus some chocolate and orange slice to go with my hot chocolate.

cake selection

As I don't drink coffee I was happy with my order but the rest of the party were not so pleased when they were told that frothy coffee machines had not made it to Reepham yet so it was standard filter coffee all round. Personally I thought this was a good thing as I have never understood the point of fancy coffee, especially people wanting to put syrup into it so that it doesn't even taste of coffee any more. However I appeared to be in a minority of one.

It was nice to be able to sit outside for the first time this year as we waited for our food and drinks to arrive.

Waiting in the sun

Despite there only being 5 of us I still found organising score gathering difficult. Ali appeared to think he was in one of Enid Blytons famous 5 books and said gosh a lot.before ordering lashings of Ginger Beer instead of a hot drink, this quickly disqualified himself from any further rating activity. Dr Hans was confused by his Bakewell Tart as he was unclear if a Tart counted as a cake. As I knew you could get Bakewell tart in the Mr Kipling cake range, this was good enough proof for me, so I agreed that Dr Hans could join in cake rating. Which he did and said his Bakewell tart was very good.

Cake and drink rating chaos

I was glad to see that, like my cheese scone, Chris's fruit scone was also infeasibly large, not only that but both scone types were very tasty too. I even added the cheese scone to the contenders list for possible cheese scone of the year 2015.

Infeasibly large scones

After calm was restored and I had totted up the scores it became clear that Reepham Railway Station had come out with almost exactly the same score as on my last visit, so good consistency. Reepham Railway station is a very good stop for cyclists, especially if you like scones, as it is on the Marriots way and has lots of space for bikes.

The trip home was very windy so half way back I agreed to take a shortcut down the Marriots way into Norwich to complete another successful Cake Crusader sportive. 

Note: I have renamed the blog to 'The Cake Crusader' in line with my twitter feed in case you are confused.

Ratings for Reepham railway station based on 2 visits.

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
6.0	5.0	5.75	8.0	7.63	6.48

Route

Click here to download 35 mile Norwich Reepham loop gpx to your GPS

More tea? (V's Cafe - Reepham)

V’s,

Reepham,

Opening times Mon-Sat 09:00-17:00,

Recommended 

Today I drove to Aylsham (with my bike in the boot) to meet Andrew, it being his turn to host our ride. He had 'planned' a loop that would take in Reepham where he was sure there was a cafe or tearoom. This was disappointing as if he had kept up to date with this blog he would have known that I went to Reepham last Friday to the old railway station. This was when I discovered there were two disused railway stations in Reepham that both have tearooms. We therefore decided to aim for the Reepham and Whitwell station, where I had not been. I got him to promise to keep up to date with the blog in future before I would agree to set off.

Andrew's idea of planning a route is setting off in the right general direction until we get to the edge of being lost. At this point he consults his map, points down the nearest road and we repeat the process until we get nearly lost again or get to our destination. Apart from spending more time in the village of Foulsham than necessary, by passing the church in all 4 directions, we found our way to Whitwell.

On arriving it was clear we would need a plan B. Despite a station full of steam trains it was very light on visitors and staff. We did find the cafe building and a man in orange overalls tinkering with his gauges. He said that if there was no one in the tearoom he would make us a cup of tea. We tried the tearoom and came across a nice lady in a little office. She explained that they were shut but would be open at the weekend. She also offered to make us a cup of tea. I decide not to explain about cafe rating and the need to have hot chocolate and home-made cake (see there must be rules) so we politely declined her kind offer. On leaving the man in orange overalls became very insistent that he wanted to make us a cup of tea and we had to go through a number of excuses before we eventually got away tea free. It is clear if the volunteers spent more time attracting visitors and less time drinking tea then the tearoom would be able to open 7 days a week.

Thanks to my previous cafe and tearoom research I knew we could go up the road to V's cafe in Reepham town centre. V's would become the first cafe that I had rated 3 times and thus become my most rated cafe. I was also confident they wouldn't be insisting that we drank tea. As you can see from the photo below V's does have an outside seating area, which can quickly fill up on a nice day. Today I spotted there were still some outdoor seats available but as it was raining we decided to sit inside.

Standing in the outdoor seating area outside V's Cafe.
Which today still had some seats & tables available.

V's is a tearoom/cafe hybrid and does a nice job catering for those wanting a full English breakfast or those wanting tea and cake. The cake selection is small (normally 3) but all 3 looked good so I awarded a mid score effective cake selection rating.

I went for hot chocolate and rocky road cake and Andrew latte and a flapjack and date slice. The hot chocolate was excellent and more chocolatey than on previous visits and Andrew (who is notoriously hard to please) also liked his coffee. The cakes were very good and all ratings were at least a point higher than previous visits (remember ratings are averaged over last 3 visits).

V's is a very pleasant stopping point for refreshments on a ride and I'm sure I will be calling in again, hopefully on a nice day when we can make use of their outdoor facilities. 

Cafe rating based on 3 visits to V's Cafe

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
6.8	6.7	5.3	6.8	6.0	6.33

Route

Click here to download 35 mile Norwich Reepham loop gpx to your GPS

Bike Security. (Old Railway Station at Kerri's Farmhouse Pine - Reepham)

Old Railway Station

Under new management 

See Egg Hunt

Reepham has two old railway stations, one to the south (Whitwell) and one to the North. It is hard to see how a town of this size would ever have needed this much transport infrastructure, unless it was planning to bid for a major sporting event, and I have no recollection of the Reepham Olympic or world cup bid. However the good news is that there is now a cafe at both disused stations and they are both on the Marriots way cycle route from Norwich. Myself, with today's guest Big George, decided that for this ride we would go to the Old Railway Station at Kerri's Farmhouse Pine just to the North of Reepham. It was too muddy to take our road bikes down the Marriots way so we did a 40 mile on-road loop instead.

Big George claimed he had been poorly this week so we had to take it easy. I did notice he kept needing to adjust his bike every time we got to the top of a hill (so he could have a breather me thinks) but we did eventually get to the venue.

Old Railway Station - Reepham

To make the day even more exciting I had my new Alamio security lock to try. The Alamio combines a bike lock with a piercing 100 decibel car type alarm. I enthusiastically wrapped it round our bikes and set the security system up safe in the knowledge we had thwarted bike crime in Reepham for the day.

We entered the Cafe (which also combines a gift shop featuring an array of jams and relishes) and found the cake counter in front of us. This was good as I could immediately decide on the effective cake selection (ECS) rating. There were a number of cakes and biscuits but only the cheese scone and chocolate cake stood out so I awarded an average ECS score. I went for my normal hot chocolate and a cheese scone. Big George went for a Cappuccino and Fruit scone.

It was too cold for the outside seating area so we sat inside through the back of the cafe overlooking the old platform. We were now some way from our bikes making me worry that we would not hear the alarm if the criminal fraternity of Reepham decided to pounce.

I could no longer concentrate on any further cafe rating and decided I would have to test the alarm effectiveness. I went back outside and started to tamper with my Alarmio. I eventually got it to go off and it did indeed have a loud 100 decibel car type alarm noise. This not only startled me but all the customers and staff at the cafe and pine shop as well. 

Acting like a criminal by testing Alarmio - nearly causing a major crime incident

There are times in life when you wish you had read the instruction before trying something new out and this incident would feature high on that list as I realised I didn't know how to switch the alarm off. I desperately fumbled with the lock but to no avail. At any moment I expected to hear screeching cars, see helicopters overhead and armed marksmen appear in the trees as the Reepham special branch descended on a potential major crime scene. Fortunately before they managed to assemble I figured out how to switch it off and the armed response unit were probably stood down ( I shall, however, be writing to the Mayor of Reepham suggesting his police force sharpen up their reaction times).

Big George confirmed he could hear the alarm at our table and we could therefore safely continue our beverages. Our drinks were both OK but nothing special and scored accordingly, however my cheese scone was infeasibly large and looked really good.

Infeasibly large cheese scone

I hoped it tasted as good as it looked as cake size is not always a good indication of cake quality however on this occasion it was and I have to say it was one of the finest cheese scones I have had. On the other hand Big Georges fruit scone was only average and had been warmed up (which I think is fine for cheese but wrong for fruit scones) so it pulled down the overall cake quality score.

I enjoyed my visit to the old station at Reepham and am keen to go there again in the future with some of my other cycling chums. I even managed to look round the large selection of jams and relishes to see if they had lemon curd (which they did and made me think that I could start a lemon curd based blog in the future).

Big George did think I looked far to comfortable around the jams and relishes so we agreed we would not speak of it again and we only talked about manly things on the ride back.

Ratings for Reepham railway station based on 2 visits.

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
6.0	5.0	5.75	8.0	7.63	6.48

Route

Click here to download 35 mile Norwich Reepham loop gpx to your GPS