PARADISE LOST ?

I took this picture some months ago when the weather was kind and the living was easy.  Fish were jumping and the cotton was high.  It shows a stretch of the Pilgrims Way in this part of Kent en route between Winchester and Canterbury.   Most weekends we take our retriever, Dudley, for a decent walkies in what Kent County Council have declared `The Kent Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.`  

And it sure is - it takes a while to find the Pilgrims Way itself but it is really well worth the effort.   As the seasons come and go, we notice the changes that take place as nature treads its steady path and we notice too the changes in the way the Way is treated by its visitors.  And it is as curious as it is predictable.  All through the months of good weather we often have the place to ourselves, maybe because there are other places to explore, but when winter arrives this area seems to attract more and more people and more `activity.`

And what is predictable is the way in which the footpath is used;  we just walk it but today we came across a handful of other walkers, some with doggy companions, some not.  But we also came across cyclists - gangs of them all togged up in their cycling gear - a selection of runners, two of them with dogs on leads dutifully running along with them; but perhaps most dispiriting were motor cyclists, trail bikes I imagine, not only making too much noise for the `area of outstanding natural beauty` but also making sure the path, which was muddy to begin with, became something of a quagmire. It all felt a bit like rush hour on the Pilgrims Way but without the pilgrims.

We trudged our way round for a couple of hours but it was not the happiest walkies we have had.  Now I shouldn`t complain about people getting out in the countryside, exercising, enjoying the scenery - well, it`s what we do ourselves -  but we might just have to find somewhere else where the paradise of summer is not lost in the mud bath of winter.

A SIMPLE AND ELEGANT SOLUTION ?

Our parish here in deepest Kent is divided into two really - there`s one side of the By-pass and the other side.  The side we live in has been well established for many years - the church, pub, shop and the relatively `new` housing development which has been here for getting on for 50 years now.   You might say that this side is the heart of the village.  The other side is  currently the subject of a large housing development on the site of what used to be a `hospital.`

A respected historical website tells us that "The hospital was built as a colony for mental defective persons by Kent County Council in 1936 utilising an existing estate and the manor house.  It housed up to 1200 patients, but it was wound down due to Care in the Community and closed in 1996.  It laid dormant until the land and buildings were sold to developers."  (The development gave rise to speculation about the names for the new streets which might `commemorate` the history of the site - various suggestions were made including The Nutters, Bonkers Close, Mental Avenue - but all were rejected in favour of a more `marketable` description.)

The reason for explaining all this is to report that the football pitches on the new development have just recently been invaded by our travelling friends, complete with their caravans, trucks and assorted vehicles and the varied amounts of rubbish and mayhem which accompanies their visits.   Swift action is being taken, however, to make their stay as short as possible but in a way it makes a change for us on this side of the parish, as we have had numerous invasions over here over many years until last year when finally sufficient `barriers` were erected to keep our open spaces free from such incursions.

As a county, Kent has a history of invasions - from the Roman legions to the present day incursion of migrants making the perilous journey crossing the channel to get to the promised land.  In recent days their numbers have increased even more alarmingly - over 4,000 have arrived so far this year alone.   The Government`s reaction to growing public concern is, predictably, to hold an inquiry.  At the moment our Members of Parliament are on their summer break and so any inquiry won`t even begin until September at the earliest, so goodness knows how long it will take for them to form their recommendations, get them agreed and implemented, if ever.



But maybe that inquiry could come up with a simple and elegant solution to the `traveller` problem at the same time.   Surely it makes sense to treat the travellers the same way as the migrants to our shores.  Offer them free housing, free health care, cash to spend each and every week and then maybe they might stop travelling?    Seems simple and elegant to me, although I also recall H.L. Mencken suggesting that for every complex problem there is a simple solution that doesn`t work.  

HARVEST TIME....

Rather than have a rant about something today (there is so much to rant about I`m spoilt for choice) I thought I might share a few photos I took on our early morning walkies today around the Kent village of Trotiscliffe (pron. `Trosley`.)  The village is just a ten minute drive from home and at this time of the year the crops in the fields look just about ready to be harvested.  Seemed a nice way to welcome in August. (Please click on the photos for better images).......

This young alpaca is a new kid on the block...

 The village peek-a-boo church....

  

Ready for the harvester?...

 Towards the North Downs...

 ....and all under a clear blue sky...

NOT TODAY, THANK YOU..

I`m told that today is the day when most schools have broken up for the Summer holidays and so families are off on holiday themselves, heading - despite the vagaries of Covid 19 - for various destinations here in the UK and abroad.  Many years ago we used to head off too when our sons were at school - in the time when motorways were scarce commodities, when A roads got a bit busy, when cars were a lot more unreliable.

But we used to join the exodus and almost automatically head south west to Devon or Cornwall.  We used to leave very early in the morning to avoid the worst of the traffic and our aim was always to reach  Mere in Somerset for breakfast at 7.00am and on one memorable occasion we left home in the evening en route to Newquay and spending the night in the car on Exmouth seafront. 

Although those journeys were sometimes difficult, they seem to pale in comparison with what goes on on the major routes these days.  I see that this morning there have been traffic reports of serious hold ups at places like the M25 in Surrey, the inevitable A303 at Stonehenge, the A38 at Saltash, the A30 at various locations such as Boxheater Junction, Carminnow Cross and Stowford. All a bit of a scramble, a nightmare journey.

And when you arrive at somewhere like Padstow, what do you find?  Well, here`s a snap from the webcam outside the Whistlefish Art Gallery by Padstow harbour which I captured late this morning.......

A bit busy is an understatement - people crowding round the harbour, round the narrow streets, car parks full - I`m not sure I see the fun in that any more and I`m pretty sure it may not be worth the hassle of the nightmare journey to get there.   So, for me, not today thank you.  Now I love Padstow, but I`ll leave it until a quieter time of the year, despite my hankering to be there on May Day.

Perhaps our morning was better spent, as it was today, walking the woods, the downland, the quiet beauty of the Kent Downs and the Pilgrims Way.  Here`s what that was like...

Maybe I`m getting older, maybe I prefer peace, quiet and a little solitude away from the madness of the world.  Well, I`ll be 81 tomorrow, so why not?   Have a nice day.

CLOSE TO HOME...

We enjoyed a lovely walk this morning by driving about two miles, parking alongside the road and wandering up through the fields to the Pilgrims Way and back through farmland, where the poppies were  blooming nicely amongst the growing crops.   So, rather than digging out photos from places where I wish I might have been today, it occurred to me that, perhaps after all, there is much to be said for the Kent countryside at this time of the year and on a day as beautiful as today .  Here`s a small selection of what we saw on this Bank Holiday morning.   Spot the crowds......

As ever, the photos get better when you click on them.

FOR THE FALLEN...

This is the Pilgrims Way, the long distance and very ancient footpath that leads from Winchester to Canterbury.   It passes through my bit of Kent and I took the photo above where the path hugs the lea of the North Downs in this part of Kent.  A little further in to our walk, the Pilgrims Way is crossed by another footpath and so we turned left and started to make our way up the slope of the North Downs.....

We came to a field and followed the path until it came to a gateway which led to the higher ground......

And just beyond the gateway something caught my eye......

And I wondered what it could possibly be in this remote spot a long way off the beaten track.   So we investigated by tramping through part of the hillside that is covered with wild thyme and brambles and it became apparent that what we were seeing was some kind of memorial.   It turned out to be something rather special and so I took this close up photo which revealed the story.......

And a little research when we got home showed that Tommy Pinkham was the Squadron Leader of the Royal Air Force No. 19 Fighter Squadron and the youngest Squadron Leader in the RAF at the age of just 25.   According to the Fighter Command Combat Report dated 5th September 1940, eleven members of the No. 19 Fighter Squadron, lead by Squadron Leader Pinkham, took off from RAF Duxford at 09.47 hours to patrol Hornchurch, an area east of London near the Thames Estuary.   Forty Luftwaffe Dornier 215 bombers escorted by 40 Messerschmitt 109 fighters were spotted approaching from the west.   At 10.15 hours Tommy and five others attacked the bombers with the other five aircraft in the squadron attacking the Luftwaffe fighters.  Squadron Leader Pinkham was last seen engaging three Dornier bombers but became a casualty, crashing on this spot on this Kentish hillside, where the memorial is maintained to remember his selfless heroism.

It seemed especially poignant to come across this memorial during this year which marks the 75th anniversary of VE Day.  And so we left this now very special place which now has the peace and serenity befitting its surroundings, thanks to men like Tommy Pinkham and his colleagues, to whom we owe so very much.

No. 19 Fighter Squadron at RAF Duxford - Squadron Leader Tommy Pinkham in the centre.

A HAVEN OF REFUGE...

The last leg of our day`s wander through the more distant parts of Kent took us to the village/township of Elham.  (I wonder when a hamlet becomes a village, a village becomes a township, a township becomes a proper town and so on....)

Elham lies, unsurprisingly, in the lovely Elham Valley and within the `Kent Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty,` so I`m a little surprised that it is not more `touristy` than it sems to be.   Maybe it was because  we visited on a late Autumn day in the late afternoon but there was an air of quiet contentment about the place.  We hardly saw anyone during our amble around, during which I took a couple of photos - the one at the top kind of sums up the sleepy ambience of Elham and the one below shows an example of the architecture that typifies the village......  

Which might explain why it has become something of a haven of refuge, not only for those seeking a quiet backwater away from the maelstrom of modern day Britain but also for those, in times gone by, who were seeking escape and solace from other forms of intensity.  A couple of examples:-

Former Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden lived at Park Gate just outside of Elham during the Second World War and award winning actress Audrey Hepburn spent some of her childhood in Elham during the same period.  (Elham is not the sort of place to `commercialise` its claims to fame but the entrepreneur in me would suggest that opening a place that does breakfasts and calling it Tiffany`s might work?)  

A quiet corner of Elham

Now Kent is of course a hotbed of cricket and it`s really no surprise to discover that Kent and England wicket-keeper/batsman Les Ames was born and brought up in Elham and another Kent and England cricketer, Mark Ealham used to live in The Square in the village.  (The clue is in the name, I guess.)  Among others finding peace in this tranquil setting is actress Pam Ferris, who has lived in Elham for the past ten years.

So it has a lot going for it and it was a real pleasure to spend a little time there, discovering its charm and some of its secrets and I look forward to our next adventures into the hidden byways of the county of Kent.

Part two of our journey through hitherto unknown parts of deepest Kent saw us say a fond farewell to Wickhambreaux and venture to the nearby village/township of Wingham.  Not too sure what to make of Wingham.  It seems pleasant enough - plenty of architectural interest but it`s spoiled by having a main road (the A257 from Canterbury to Sandwich) running through it.   Wingham also seems to lack any real claim to fame but its church has a sundial above the main door rather than a clock and Wingham is allegedly the former home of `celebrity chef` Paul Hollywood so you can see what I mean about its claim to fame.   

But I did come across a coffee shop with the intriguing name of `The Politician`s Daughter.`  After a few bells rang in my head I realised that that was a snippet from a popular song which was first recorded by Frank Sinatra in 1946.  It contains the line:-

"A politician`s daughter 
Was accused of drinking water
And was fined a great big fifty dollar bill.
They`ve got an awful lot of coffee in Brazil."

And that was about it for Wingham, so off we went to our next stop which was the hamlet of Barfrestone, which I had heard about but never visited before.  It lies in a pretty remote area of east Kent which used to include the now defunct Kent Coal Fields.  Barfrestone used to have a pub - it`s now a private house;  it used to have a telephone box - it still has the box but no telephone.

But the glory of Barfrestone and the reason for our visit is its 12th century Norman church of St. Nicholas which is a Grade 1 listed building and has been described as the best Norman church in the country.  The quality and profusion of the decoration is breathtaking.  The outstanding feature is the south doorway but there is also a fine and rare Norman wheel window.  There is so much to see and admire both inside and out.

Here are a couple of photos I took on our visit:- (Please click on them for better images).......

New light through old windows

  

The wheel window

For much more about this glorious and very special church, please visit http://www.greatenglishchurches.co.uk/html/barfreston.html

ESCAPE TO THE COUNTRY..

To Wickhambreaux with my eldest son to begin our expedition of Kent villages I have never been to before. We picked a glorious early winter day with the sun nestling above a startling blue sky.

Wickhambreaux lies some miles to the east of Canterbury among the hidden lanes of east Kent and has a long recorded history going back to Roman times.  It is first mentioned in 948, so over 1,100 years ago, when King Eadred granted land to a woman of religion.   The village, for it is no more than that, still retains its medieval pattern with the Church, manor house, rectory, inn and mill encircling the village green.

The 13th Century Church of St. Andrew (see my photo above) was restored in 1868 and is known for its art nouveau stained glass window of the Annunciation which dates from 1896.  This was the first commission given in Europe to American glassworkers, designed by Arild Rosenkrantz and manufactured in the New York studio of John La Farge.  Here`s a photo I took of the window.......

The churchyard of St. Andrew`s includes a memorial resting place of one of the Dambusters heroes - Squadron Leader David Maltby, DSO, DFC, who completed over 30 bomber operations during World War 2 before being killed when his aeroplane crashed in the North Sea in 1943 returning from an operation that was cancelled due to bad weather.   He was just 23 years old.

We strolled around the village and were struck by the quietness, the peace and almost timelessness of it all.  One of the reasons for our visit was to  see `Quaives`, an imposing residence mostly hidden behind imposing walls and hedges, for this was the former residence of chanteuse par excellence Christine McVie of the Fleetwood Mac rock combo.  She settled here to find some peace and refuge from the mad world of rock `n` roll but perhaps it was a little too quiet and so she moved on and the property is now a holiday and retreat centre; despite which we duly paid our homage to the much admired Christine.

So we enjoyed Wickhambreaux and here are a couple more photos I took that might capture something of the uniqueness of the place......

The Stour river flowing through the village

Wisteria Cottage

(As ever with my photos, please click on them for much better images.)

Well it sure was a Bank Holiday weekend to remember.  The cricket was fantastic, as was the Rugby and the Saints won a game away from home, prompting yet another open top bus ride around Southampton.

The weather was more than a bit on the scorchio side and I felt for those thousands who had decided to spend a glorious weekend at a city centre carnival or some ear splitting music festival or, even worse, fighting through motorway madness just to get where thousands of people were there already.

So how to avoid all that and find some peace and quiet away from it all?  Well, we decided to take Dudley our retriever for a nice walkies through some of Kent`s finest countryside.   So we parked the car in a nearby village and started our walk through open fields which had been harvested a week or so before.   We looked back to the village and this was the tranquil scene with the village church resplendent in the early morning haze.......

We then climbed up the hill towards the foot of the North Downs and saw this old but prosperous farmhouse proudly standing on its hill and surveying its domain........ 

After climbing a little further we joined the Pilgrims Way - the long distance footpath that leads from Winchester to Canterbury, a large section of which passes through this part of Kent.  I took this photo to demonstrate the peace and quiet, not to say solitude, that rush hour on the Pilgrims Way can bring - so different from the M20 Motorway just a couple of miles away........

And as we left the Pilgrims Way and headed back across the fields we came across what I have called Sunflower Cottage, buried deep in the quiet lane back to the village.........

I won`t bore you with any more photos but please click on them for better images.  But I hope you agree that even if there are countless things to do on a Bank Holiday the glories of the English countryside in all its high summer splendour really do take some beating.

A LOCAL VISIT...

As a break from all the trouble and strife of the world, had another visit to the local village of Birling, nestling beneath the North Downs here in deepest Kent.   

Now Birling is one of those archetypal English country villages where you can spend a fortnight in an afternoon.  It has a long history with the Church and Manor being recorded in the Domesday Book and like many of the villages around here, Birling has its own village sign - pictured above.

It has a couple of claims to fame - one genuine, the other less so.  The genuine one is that the churchyard includes the grave of one of the country`s best admired and most prolific artists in Rowland Hilder.  He spent some of his early years with his grandparents in Birling and, as he himself recalled, "It seemed miles from anywhere.  Even the people living in the next village to us, Ryarsh, were considered as foreigners."  See more about him here - http://www.artnet.com/artists/rowland-hilder/

Local myth has grown over the years concerning the speech given by President John F Kennedy in 1963 in which, despite local claims, he did not say, "Ich bin ein Birlinger."

Anyway, here are a few photos I took, along with the one at the top, on my recent visit - please click on the photos for better images........

The Lychgate

Birling Park Farm

Away from it all

Harvest time

A GAP IN THE HEDGE..

Such glorious weather for late October - dry, warm and sunny - just the sort of days to tempt you out and explore local surroundings.   Dudley, our retriever puppy, is now six months old and although he has done very well in his training classes (he has the certificate to prove it) he really needs to explore the world around him and so he has been introduced to the North Downs, the Pilgrims Way and the North Downs Way, all very accessible just a short drive from home.

The Pilgrims Way is especially interesting, steeped in history as the route taken by pilgrims heading to Canterbury and we are lucky in this area to have a stretch of this long distance footpath which follows the line of the north downs and affords spectacular views of the Kent countryside.   The photo above which I took yesterday through a gap in the hedge shows the  hillsides  bright with autumnal green as the winter crops emerge and seemingly thrive in this good weather.

Here`s another photo I took, this time of the church at Trottiscliffe which nestles beneath the north downs and provides a quintessential image of rural England at its finest.......

And just to prove that not all the footpaths around here are dark or even a little forbidding, here`s a photo of the path from the village leading up the hill to the escarpment above.......

It`s more than an eye opener to discover what lies just beyond your doorstep.......

A DECEPTIVE QUIETUDE..

I took this photo yesterday.  It`s an idyllic scene on a quiet, late September morning, the photo taken from a public footpath looking up towards the North Downs here in deepest Kent.   It`s close to the village of Birling, where we parked the car - just a few minutes drive from home.

Birling is famous for two things really.  The first was way back in 1963 when President John F Kennedy made his stirring speech which ended, "And there are some who say in Europe and elsewhere we can work with the communists.  Well, let them come to Birling.  Ich bin eine Birlinger!"  (He might have said `Berlin` - I might have misheard.)

The second is that Birling`s churchyard includes the last resting place of Rowland Hilder - surely one of the country`s most well known and well loved artists.  Here`s an example of his work and his love for this part of Kent:-

On our walk we came across a gamekeeper who told us that the pheasant shooting season was due to open on 6th October and that 3,000 pheasants were currently enjoying life in the nearby wood and fields.  I hope they have a good week as next week they will be scattered into the air to become targets for those who enjoy killing pheasants just for the fun of it.  

And so the quiet peace we enjoyed on our walk in this tranquil corner of Kent turns out to have been deceptive, especially if you`re a pheasant.

EXPLORING THE WORLD...

Our new puppy, Dudley, seems to travel well and he enjoys being in the car.  When we brought him home from the breeder in the New Forest, he settled in to travelling very well and now gets a bit excited when he thinks we`re going anywhere in the  car.  Mind you, so far he has really only been on very short journeys to places like supermarkets, vets and dog food shops.

So this morning we took him for a scamper around some footpaths a little further afield in  this part of Kent so that he could enjoy new sniffs and new surroundings to make a change from walking round our parish.   The photo I took on our walk this morning shows the view from one of the paths which leads down from the Pilgrims Way to the village of Trottiscliffe (known locally as `Trosley.`)  It was part of Dudley`s need to explore the world around us and he seemed to enjoy it - he`s conked out fast asleep now after a hearty lunch.   

I might join him.

Only a couple of days ago, I posted a photo I took wandering around our local lake and what a glorious sunny day it was.   Well, today I wandered down to the riverbank again and took this photo.   As the song says, `What a difference a day makes.`  And I really would like to know whatever happened to global warming.......

Well, I really thought Winter was turning in to Spring but it seems to be going on and on despite the fact that the sunsets are getting decidedly later.   I listened to the weather forecast today and, if anything, the prospects, which were already pretty gloomy, are getting worse.   Very cold days, even colder nights, biting east wind and the prospect of snow and all kinds of disruption in the week ahead.

And as I wandered around the parish with Barney this morning, I was reminded once again of Don Maclean`s American Pie -

`But February made me shiver
With every paper I`d deliver
Bad news on the doorstep
I couldn`t take one more step.......`

But whilst this February morning made me shiver, it was a beautiful sunny day and so I took a few photos of our local lake, still looking peaceful, quiet and serene.  Here`s a sample (please click on the photo for a better image) :-

(I`m already thinking of Jerry Keller`s `Here comes Summer.)