I ain’t Superman, and I can’t fly!

Monday morning dawned slightly cloudier than the clear blue skies of Sunday, so sun (just), sea and the beauties of the quaint old town of Sheringham it was to be, then. The train journey north through Norfolk is an endless litany of flatness and fields crisscrossed with hedges and dotted with copses and small woods. It is pretty, in a winsome sort of way, and with a hint of autumn just beginning, offers a more varied palette of natural colors now that some of the leaves are beginning to turn. The first sign of a change in the landscape occurs on the approach to Cromer. The Cromer Ridge is an unlikely rise in the ground created by the rubble and residue left by a zillion-years-past glacial movement that had steamrolled the region and deposited the earth in front of it at this northern-most point of the county. The ridge provides welcome relief from the endless evenness behind. It also serves as a delightful backdrop to Sheringham and gives one a rare experience of going up and down hill. Covered in trees -- both evergreen and deciduous -- it really enhances the beauty of the area. You also get a magnificent view over the town and out into the endless expanse of the North Sea, blue today, but often dark green or grey depending on the weather.

I arrived in time for lunch and so stopped at the Sheringham Fish Bar hitherto unknown to me. A seaside visit in this country without fish and chips would be like a meal without wine in France or not eating kebabs in Turkey. Imagine my surprise, therefore, to find myself being served by a man who looked like the archetypal Turkish grandfather. While he was preparing my order, I took a sneaky look at the registration documents and health and hygiene certificates on the wall. Lo and behold, the owner turns out to be a certain İbrahim Denizli. As I paid for my food, I asked him if he was indeed Turkish, and got my anticipated reply in the affirmative.

İbrahim came to England 30 years ago, initially to work in London. As his young family grew up, he became increasingly fearful for their safety, security and quality of life in what used to be known as “The Big Smoke” and began to move northeastwards, developing small catering businesses. Some of his family still run things in London, of course, but he has migrated up the east coast. He remarked with pride that his 11-year-old daughter has started high school in Sheringham. While other members of the family run the other businesses, he is glad to be in peace to look after the Sheringham establishment.

He loves England and adores the fresh, clean and relatively secure environment of north Norfolk. He hopes to retire in four years' time but has just one more project in hand. He has bought a 27-bedroom hotel in Lowestoft on the east coast just over the border in Suffolk. Auctioned after some “dodgy dealers” -- as he calls them -- reneged on a million-pound loan, he has picked it up at a bargain £250,000. He has just spent £5,000 on upgrading the electrics and plans to refurbish and gradually open a floor at a time. He also has a 150-cover restaurant to keep him busy. The Victorian pile, aptly named “Cliff Hotel,” overlooks the town and the wide extent of coastline as well as the often turbulent North Sea. At a time of economic doom and gloom, with the constant chorus of Cassandras, it was so refreshing to meet such a positive, optimistic Turkish entrepreneur. What a fine example he and his family make before his mealy-mouthed British peers. I look forward to visiting his Lowestoft venture as soon as it is up and running.

Following lunch and my heartwarming chat with my new Turkish friend, I set out to walk along the seafront and then up (yes, really, up) the only part of the coastline here that offers any sense of ascent or descent, to the coastguard lookout at the highest point of the cliffs. They are not awesome, impressive or breathtaking in the way of the white cliffs of Dover (“The Seven Sisters” as they are known), nor are they craggy cathedral-high challenges like those around the west coast. Rather, they form a low undulating littoral of fragile and febrile sandstone gradually being eroded by the unforgiving sea. In places, houses that once stood a kilometer inland have tumbled into the water; in others, the land has lowered itself to the water's edge and you can step straight onto the beach.

The view from the top is gorgeous as, under Norfolk's vast skies, you can see for miles on a clear day. The coastline curves gently in a northeastward arc to the far away spit that is Blakeney Point, home to a much-visited seal colony. It is not spectacular, it is not breathtaking, but it is beautiful and a very calming influence on such a day as this, when the waves gently lap the shore in that sibilant sighing and shushing sound that is so soothing. I have been up here on windy, even stormy days, of course, and then the sights and sounds are much more stirring as wind-driven waves crash in mighty breakers on the beach and boats go out at their peril. Indeed, that is why Sheringham still has a lifeboat station; the North Sea can be an unforgiving mistress. Less angry than the Atlantic perhaps and usually more peaceful than the Pacific, she can still give you a run for your money on a stormy day. Floods in the '50s deposited boats over the sea wall and into the high street. Recent years have seen considerable expense absorbed in building fortifications along the shoreline to protect the people and property of Sheringham from a repeat of those days.

Looking out north from the coastline, there is nothing to see apart from fishing boats gathering mainly crabs and lobsters a little way out and, on the horizon, occasional larger tankers and cargo vessels plying their trade up and down. Otherwise, nothing. There are no islands to break the sightline and provide perspective in the way that I used to so enjoy while sitting on the harbor at Bostancı. It is a different kind of beauty, more eternal and, in some ways, unnerving. With a horizon so far away where the endless sky meets a seemingly eternal sea, it induces bigger thoughts perhaps, much in the way staring up into a starry sky provokes contemplation on infinity and our place in the universe, which we think is so big but in reality is miniscule. You have to realize here that the next landfall is the Arctic or Siberia. I'm not Sarah Palin, so I can't see these mysterious lands and pretend to understand them, and, as Bryan Adams sang, “I ain't Superman, and I can't fly,” so I have to use my imagination. Such vastness encourages bigger-picture thinking.