A few months ago, a small chapel in Norfolk closed because its congregation - two 89-year-old widows - was not enough to sustain it. What is remarkable is not that the congregation was small, but that it there were even two members. Which is not to say that Norfolk is heaving with practitioners of the black arts who prefer sects and drugs and rock 'n' roll to wholesome Christianity; rather that, with all the churches around, it would be easy to believe that there is one for each person and a gathering of two is a surge.

As you drive along the narrow, overhung lanes into north Norfolk, up to Burnham Market, every corner reveals another church, round- or square-towered, built of hardy flint and stone. In this part of the world, wealth and worship were comfortable bedfellows, and the wool money of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was translated into a church for each tiny community.

People who know this county call it a big place and, certainly, looking over the Wash or towards the North Sea or across the marshy stretches that are now almost exclusively bird sanctuaries luring ornithologists from around the world, there is a breadth to it that is startling. But a more abiding impression is the closeness of the countryside, the tight roads that reduce to single tracks, hairpinning through woods and hamlets; and in front of you will be another church in another parish, perhaps with a lonely, widowed congregation.

There are six Burnhams close to or on the shoreline, each with its chapel, and it was at the inland Burnham Thorpe that Nelson was born in 1758, though he shuffled off (wholly intact) to sea when he was just 12 years old. If pottering about in little boats along the ragged coast was half as popular in Nelson's day as it is now, it is easy to see where he got his lust for sailing.

Perhaps, though, north Norfolk in the late 1700s was a bit too quiet for the action midget because, apart from one five-year spell when he was sidelined by the navy, he rarely returned there, preferring to leave bits of himself scattered around the world.

When he was around, Nelson would walk the countryside, calling in at the impressive Palladian mansion Holkham Hall, an eighteenth-century house in 3,000 walled acres and home to the Earls of Leicester. There is plenty of evidence of the Leicesters' wealth in the Rubens, Van Dyck and Gainsborough that hang in the house, and the family must certainly have added to the spiritual welfare of the community with a church or two.

All along the shore road, from Wells-next-the-Sea and Holkham beach - where Gwyneth Paltrow was filmed wading ashore at the close of Shakespeare in Love - and heading west are deep dunes and inlets and marshes, ideal nesting grounds for terns and gulls, though whether Nelson was himself a bird-watcher one can only guess at.

But he did go to Wells-next-the-Sea, which even in his day was not by the sea, though it had once been one of the great ports of eastern England. Now there is a quay about a mile from the town centre which, while it bustles with pleasure craft and has a distinct fish-and-chip air with its amusement arcades and comfort-food cafés, is still a commercially viable port.

Heading for King's Lynn and Sandringham, the waterside towns and villages - a couple of Burnhams (Overy Staithe and Deep Dale), Brancaster, Titchwell - are bustling with enthusiastic sailors in their bright yellow survival kits, pushing trailered boats down to the water.

Hunstanton (and no matter how you say it, it makes you sound either asthmatic or adenoidal) is a different basin of fish. Here on a warm summer's day there are strolling holidaymakers and parked caravans by the high Cliff Parade, on which signs warning of crumbling cliffs would only need slight rewording to refer accurately to many of the people heading for the quay and its amusements.

But the walk is refreshing and many of the houses, set back a hundred yards or so from the cliff edge, are beautiful, some Victorian. As you pass the bowling green and teashop there is a truly psychedelic memorial garden, of harsh blue and yellow and orange blooms. It is a very English place, a relief from the earnestness of the sailors with their tiny yachts.

Yet the real delights of this very pretty county lie just as much behind the coast. The villages, some stretched thinly along quiet through roads, others huddled about as if for security, have their churches, obviously, and little cafés and shops and pubs. Among the prettiest is, inevitably, a Burnham (Market), a mile or two from Nelson's birthplace. The locals, who seem to be equally divided between weekenders and full-time residents, call this area Little Chelsea - the giveaway is the towbarred Volvos and 4x4s.

Nevertheless, Burnham Market is an elongated elegance of shops and cafés, a restaurant or two, and a fine hotel, the Hoste Arms, with which Nelson was certainly familiar when it was called the Pitt Arms. Since then it has undergone several reincarnations, including a brothel for Victorian gentlemen, before being snapped up by Paul Whittome in 1989.

Paul's not uneccentric persona is reflected in the Hoste Arms's character, but no harm is done for all that, as it meanders slightly through snug sitting-room and woody bar to conservatory and comfortable restaurant, its rooms four-postered or ginghamed or both. On a warm evening, drinking a pint in the groomed gardens, you think about how Nelson would have reflected on what has changed in his part of the world - and maybe on how much, particularly the church buildings, has stayed the same.

• John Barton stayed at the Hoste Arms Hotel, the Green, Burnham Market, King's Lynn PE31 8HD (01328 738 777) . B&B for two nights is £90 per person. Dinner from £20 a head plus drinks. The Hoste Arms is a member of The Great Inns of Britain. For a brochure covering the 17 inns call 01423 770152.

Attractions

• Townhouse Museum of Lynn Life, King's Lynn: a working Victorian kitchen and 1950s living-room. (www.norfolk.gov.uk/tourism/museums/museums for information on all museums).

• Bittern Line Railway: hop on, hop off journey along the coast (www.norfolk.gov.uk/ transport/public/bittern.htm).

• Conservation walks: (www.countrywalks.org.uk).

• Sea Life Centre, King's Lynn: has talks and feeding displays at the seal hospital. Trips on a Second World War amphibian craft leave from outside the centre.

• Windmills: Great Bircham has good views. Also Denver Mill near Downham Market.

• Banham Zoo: near Diss (01891 321297) houses rare and endangered animals. Daily animal feeding sessions and keeper talks.

• Pleasurewood Hills Family Theme Park: (01502 508200), Corton, eight miles south of Great Yarmouth, boasts more than 50 rides, shows and attractions.

• Sandringham: nine miles north of King's Lynn. Norfolk residence of the Queen (01553 772 675).

• Holkham Hall, Wells-next-the-Sea (01328 710277).

Tourist centres

King's Lynn: The Custom House, Purfleet Quay, PE30 1HP: (01553 763044 kings-lynn.tic@west-norfolk.gov.uk).

Hunstanton: Town Hall, The Green, (01485 532610 hunstanton.tic@west-norfolk.gov.uk).

Downham Market: Priory Court, Priory Road, (01366 387440 downham-market.tic@west-norfolk.gov.uk).

See also: Breckland Council, UK: (www.breckland.gov.uk)

Broadland District Council: (www.broadland.gov.uk)

Norfolk District Council, South: (www.south-norfolk.gov.uk)

Borough Council of King's Lynn & West Norfolk: (www.west-norfolk.gov.uk)

Great Yarmouth Borough Council: (www.great-yarmouth.gov.uk)

Norfolk District Council, North: (www.north-norfolk.gov.uk)

Norfolk County Council: (www.norfolk.gov.uk)

April events

12 April: Five Thousand Years of Tea, King's Lynn Museum, 7.30pm (01553 775001); 14-16 April: Sandringham Craft Fair (01553 772675); 29 April: Spalding Flower Parade, 2pm. Parade starts and finishes at Springfields Gardens, the Festival Site (01775 725468).