Exploring Kentwell Hall Light Trail

Dann has been talking about Kentwell Hall for as long as I have known him. He went there in school, as some sort of tudor thing, and has always mentioned it when talking about school trips or interesting things at school, though he didn’t know it was Kentwell Hall, until we went there with Claire and her partner David, as a little double date out at light trails! Claire had picked out this location as she had seen the light trail and wanted to check it out. The light trail itself was very interesting!

Kentwell Hall has a small carpark that was quite muddy and not very well lit for the nighttime event, but once we did park up, we started wondering if this was the right place. There isn’t any sort of signage or anything to tell you that you are a light trail, but you can see Kentwell Hall all lit up, so we walked over towards it. A person at the side greeted us and let us know where to go for our walk, as the trail itself is staffed to make sure people are going the right way. The path down to the house was lit with torches, showing little fires as we walked down. It felt like a really grand entrance, and then we went to the left around the grounds. There were some holiday music playing around us too.

This light trail had a lot of features that are normally there during the day; statues, large trees, sculptures, that were enhanced by the light shining on them. It’s one of those more natural light trails that don’t have a specific Christmas theme but instead are just using the area and adding colorful lights. The back of Kentwell Hall was lit up in a deep red, for example, and the path itself had big lights along the side. Some of the statues were really fun to look at with the lights on them and the trail itself felt quite low-key compared to other light trails we have been on this last year.

As we continued around, we found there was a small food cart that sold chips and pastries, along with hot drinks, all around a fire. There wasn’t a huge variety of food, but it was nice to get some warm drinks and cakes. The rest of the trail had some Christmas ornaments on them, the only nod to Christmas, and then more lit areas of the grounds. We quite liked walking along the river and seeing the sheep in the field. There was also a speaker that started talking to us about the castle of trees, which was stunning, and we got to walk in the giant, castle-looking bushes as well.

Some of the area in Kentwell Hall has steps and are a little hard to get around in the dark, but the lights themselves do a good job of showcasing the beautiful exterior of the grounds in a new way. We had a lovely stroll around the grounds at Kentwell Hall and I do look forward to going there in the daytime someday!

Check out our list of the best Wintertime Lights Trails in England