West Runton and Beeston Regis Heath

West Runton and Beeston Regis Heath covers the woods and heaths of the Cromer Ridge, left by the Anglian ice sheet around 430,000 years ago. Beside the car park, Beacon Hill rises to about 100 metres, one of the highest points in Norfolk; its earthworks, known as Roman Camp, mark a coastal signal station working by 1804 during the Napoleonic Wars, though no evidence of Roman occupation has been found. Shallow pits across the site were dug for iron ore in late Saxon times, and smelting slag is built into a cairn just west of the car park. Beech, oak, hazel and birch shelter nightjars, buzzards and white admiral butterflies, while Stone Hill looks over Sheringham to the sea. Reviewers single out the sea views from the benches, though some found the waymarking hard to follow. Dogs are welcome throughout, on a lead from March to July. The West Runton circular walk takes in Beacon and Stone hills in two and a half miles.