Staithe, broad and marsh
Rockland St Mary
A waterside Norfolk village where a public staithe opens towards Rockland Broad and walks lead through marsh and fen.
- Best for
- Waterside walking and wetland wildlife
- Give it
- A short reserve outing or a seven-mile circuit
- Don't miss
- Rockland Staithe and the broad
The Fox verdict
Come for the staithe and stay for the walking
Rockland St Mary brings together broad, marsh, village supplies and a medieval church.
The public staithe is the starting point for the seven-mile Wherryman's Way circuit, with Rockland Broad beyond; Rockland Marshes offers a shorter surfaced path. St Mary's Church adds a historic stop, while the Post Office and Store and Applebee Orchard and Apiary provide the in-village food-shopping options.
Where to go
Places in Rockland St Mary
Every place below is checked against a published source, listed with what it is and how long to give it.
Local signatures
3 placesRockland St Mary Post Office and Store
An independent convenience store and Post Office that also acts as an Amazon collection-and-returns hub; a community advert lists bread, groceries and takeaway food and drink as a 2025 snapshot.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 20 minutes
- Locality
- 41 The Street
Applebee Orchard and Apiary
A family apiary and small farm shop selling its own Norfolk honey, beeswax, fruit, vegetables and jam, as well as bees, hives, equipment and practical beginners' courses.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 30 minutes
- Locality
- Bramerton Lane
Green Lane Playing Field
A parish-council-owned playing field where new play equipment was installed in 2020 after the old equipment was removed.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 45 minutes
- Locality
- towards New Inn Hill
Walks & outdoors
4 placesRockland Staithe
A public car park and Broads Authority mooring basin with electric charging points sit where Boat Dyke reaches towards Rockland Broad.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 30 minutes
- Locality
- at the eastern end of the village
- Access
- There is a public car park at the staithe; nearby Rockland Short Dyke has free 24-hour moorings.
RSPB Rockland Marshes
A reserve of reedbed, grazing marsh, wet woodland, pools and ponds, with broad and river views and chances to see great crested grebes, kingfishers and barn owls.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 75 minutes
- Locality
- Rockland Marshes
- Access
- The wide, level surfaced path is uneven and potholed in places and has latched gates; there are no toilets, and dogs must be kept on leads.
Wherryman's Way: Rockland St Mary circular
A circuit past Surlingham church and Church Marsh to ruined St Saviour's, the graves of Ted and Phyllis Ellis, Coldham Hall and Wheatfen, returning with views over Rockland Broad.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 3 hours 30 minutes
- Locality
- starting at the staithe car park
- Access
- A spur leads by an easy-access track to the Rockland Broad hide.
Wheatfen Nature Reserve
A 52-hectare Ted Ellis Trust reserve of open fen, reedbeds, sallow carr and two small broads, with a two-mile circular trail across marsh and wet woodland.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 90 minutes
- Locality
- Surlingham
- Access
- Dogs are not permitted.
History & heritage
1 placeSt Mary's Church
A mostly 14th-century flint church with a tapering unbuttressed west tower, bells dating to 1599 and a 15th-century octagonal font carved with angels and painted saints.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 45 minutes
- Locality
- Rockland St Mary
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Three ways to explore Rockland St Mary
Signature outings
Rockland Staithe
Pause at the public staithe and Broads Authority mooring basin where Boat Dyke reaches towards Rockland Broad.
Medieval St Mary's
See the tapering west tower and the church's 15th-century font carved with shield-bearing angels and painted saints.
Broad and river wildlife
Take the surfaced reserve path for reedbed, grazing marsh, wet woodland, broad and river views.
The village story
Rockland St Mary Village Guide
From the staithe and broad to village provisions, marsh paths and medieval church fabric.
The staithe and the shuttered inn
At the foot of New Inn Hill, The Street runs down to Rockland Staithe, where Boat Dyke opens onto Rockland Broad. There is a public car park here, a Broads Authority mooring basin with electric charging points, and free twenty-four-hour moorings a little further along Short Dyke. The broad itself is a wide sheet of lily-covered water fringed with reed, made not by nature alone but by medieval peat digging that later flooded.
Opposite the water stands the New Inn, the village's only pub. It closed in November 2023 and is now registered as an Asset of Community Value, with renovation and a reopening as a community hub reported as the plan. For the moment the prominent building by the staithe is shut, so it is worth arriving with your own supplies rather than a table booked.
Village provisions and walking country
Those supplies are easy to find. The Post Office and Store at 41 The Street advertises its own bread, fruit and vegetables, groceries, an off-licence, ice cream and hot and cold food to take away, and doubles as an Amazon collection and returns point. Karen, Alan and Emma Tranter run it. Out on Bramerton Lane, Applebee Orchard and Apiary has been kept by Ruth and John Everett for more than forty-five years, selling its own Norfolk honey, beeswax, fruit, jam and vegetables, along with bees, hives and beginners' beekeeping courses.
The walking is the reason most people come. The Wherryman's Way makes a seven-mile circuit from the staithe car park, out past Surlingham church and the RSPB's Church Marsh, on to the ruin of St Saviour's and the graves of the naturalists Ted and Phyllis Ellis, then round by Coldham Hall and Wheatfen before returning with the broad in view. A shorter spur follows an easy-access track to the Rockland Broad hide. If you want something level, the RSPB's Rockland Marshes has a wide surfaced path from the car park towards the river — uneven and potholed in places, with latched gates and no toilets, but manageable with a pushchair or wheelchair. Keep dogs on the lead; the reward is great crested grebes, kingfishers and, on a good morning, a barn owl working the marsh.
Wherries, churches and old Rockland
Out on the broad, a line of low tree-covered islands marks the Slaughters: old wherries deliberately sunk in 1931 to improve the flow of water, now grown over. The broad once carried working traffic — coal in by wherry for the village brickworks, bricks and bundles of thatching reed out the same way, market-garden produce to Norwich by horse and cart. Among the men who worked it was Jimmy "Scientific" Fuller, who shot and collected birds on the water for fifty years.
St Mary's stands back from the water, mostly fourteenth-century, its flint walls dressed with ashlar and heavily restored in the 1890s. The square west tower is unbuttressed and tapers towards a crenellated parapet; the bells inside date to 1599. The font is fifteenth-century, octagonal, carved with shield-bearing angels and brightly painted saints. Four metres east of the chancel lie a few flint fragments of St Margaret's, a second medieval church that once shared the churchyard. It had no tower and a thatched roof, and fell into decay after the two parishes were joined. The Domesday clerks recorded the place as Rokelunda, understood locally as Old Norse for a grove of rooks.
Getting here and the still water
Getting here is easiest by car: Run Lane meets the A146 at Hellington Corner, and Norwich lies about six miles to the northwest. Brundall is the practical railhead, with regular trains to Norwich, Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft, and the number 85 bus links the village to the city Monday to Saturday.
In the early twentieth century the guidebook writer W. A. Dutt called it "an isolated hamlet with a small staithe at which the wherries moor." The wherries have gone, but the staithe is still there, and on a still evening the water holds the sky and very little else.
Stay around Norfolk Broads
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A guide with a point of view
Written from research. Edited for real journeys.
Use the Official site links for live practical details, then use this guide for context, ideas and room to explore.
Sources
Every place on this page is checked against a published source. Each entry links the record we used and names who publishes it.
- Rockland Staithe — broads-authority.gov.uk statutory register or public authority
- RSPB Rockland Marshes — rspb.org.uk national body or asset manager
- St Mary's Church — historicengland.org.uk statutory register or public authority record not machine-readable; publisher restricts automated access
- Rockland St Mary Post Office and Store — postoffice.co.uk operator, sector body or destination organisation record not machine-readable; publisher restricts automated access
- Applebee Orchard and Apiary — applebeeorchard.co.uk operator, sector body or destination organisation
- Wherryman's Way: Rockland St Mary circular — watermillsandmarshes.org.uk other published source
- Green Lane Playing Field — rocklandstmarywithhellington-pc.gov.uk statutory register or public authority
- Wheatfen Nature Reserve — wheatfen.org operator, sector body or destination organisation