Diving into Brecks Rivers – One Way or Another

Since the Brecks is one of the direst regions of the UK, its rivers are a crucial and significant feature of the landscape. For this reason, they are also a crucial and significant part of the Brecks Outdoor Festival. After all, we can’t celebrate the landscape without a focus on its rivers. Especially since you can do so much with a river, whether it’s simply walking beside it or going the whole hog and jumping right in.

All in all this August, nearly 100 of you joined us to boat or swim three different rivers in the Brecks, 58 explored the river’s wildlife with river dipping activities, 6 children learned to fish and 36 joined us on walks beside the rivers to learn about their wildlife, history and management, or perhaps just to soak in the tranquillity.

Here are some of our watery highlights from the Brecks Outdoor Festival 2025:

• We loved walking beside the river Lark from Mildenhall with OS Brecks, and we loved it even more when we were joined for a stretch by a young otter between Barton Mills and Mildenhall! The otter swam beside us for a little while, making its little peeping cry, before clambering out onto the bank on the other side and disappearing into the foliage. Wonderful!
• Our river dipping day in Thetford uncovered many weird and wonderful creatures that live in the rivers, from the gorgeous bullhead fish, to the sneaky cased caddisfly larvae, the tiny tiny pea cockle and even a leech! However, our highlight of the day had to be the little girl who caught an absolutely miniscule water mite in her spoon – slightly bigger than a full-stop, it zoomed around a tray for us to observe, before we re-released it into the river.
• Watching April Urquhart giving a dry fly fishing demonstration in the river Lark at West Stow Country Park was mesmerising. This stretch of the Lark has been painstakingly restored to its natural curves and flow by April and her husband John Urquhart, who wrote our wonderful River Keeper’s Year series, and they showed us how beneficial these changes are to the wild trout that live there.
• So many of you joined us to try outdoor swimming for the first time, across sessions tailored for adults, families and those with additional needs and their carers. Some of outdoor swimming is about overcoming fears and trying something new in a safe environment but, as the swimmers on our Thetford Swim Walk discovered, it’s mostly just about having fun. We loved to see adults rediscovering the joy of swinging out on a rope swing before dropping into the water with a splash!