Bury St Edmunds via Dullingham

DULLINGHAM is quite remote and therefore suited to two-car families. It has become very popular because of its proximity to Cambridge and its pretty thatch-and-clunch cottages, old farm and stables and village green. A two-bedroom cottage with an outbuilding will cost £260,000. Newmarket is the place to live if you are a fancier of horseflesh – it is home to 4,200 horses and there are more swimming pools here for horses than for humans. The town lives and breathes racing. The chalk downland is peppered with stud farms, shelter belts and exercise areas, with the National Stud at Newmarket Heath. Strings of horses can be seen each day trailing through the town to the horsewalks on to the gallops. There are two racecourses – the Rowley Mile and the July. A large house with stabling and acreage could cost more than £3m. Kennett again is rather remote – a quiet Fenside village that feels a little stranded between Cambridge and Suffolk. It shares its post office and village hall with neighbouring Kentford. There is a primary school and secondary-age children take the bus to Soham Village College, eight miles away. The single street has some period houses, flint and half-timbering. At the end of it is the grave of a gypsy boy who was hanged 200 years ago for stealing sheep. The grave always has flowers on it – rumour has it that the flowers laid on Derby Day foretell the colours of the winner. A family-sized house here could be bought for £290,000. For Bury St Edmunds, see Liverpool Street to Norwich line.