I am beginning to dislike the Pilgrim's Way. The North Downs Way is fine; it is a great walk when it sticks to the top of the ridge or follows the contours around its slopes. However, it has a habit of dropping to the valley floor and taking a route along the Pilgrim's Way. I admit that I started this journey
wanting to follow the Pilgrim's Way, because of its history, but now after more than 80 miles walked I have started to loathe the monotony that is the Pilgrim's Way. The modern Pilgrim's equivalent of wearing a hair shirt I suppose.
The Pilgrim's Way that survives today is either a tarmac road or an unsurfaced byway open to motorised traffic generally running in very straight lines. Apart from the tedium and the hard pounding on the feet, the byways are used by vehicular traffic leaving them riddled with water filled potholes and, for the walker, the constant danger of being knocked down by a speeding vehicle. Not that I have seen many motorised vehicles, in fact only a few, but those that I have seen have shown little empathy for a pedestrian with little room to get out of their way.
The Pilgrim's Way also sits at the
bottom of the North Downs and the North Downs Way's preferred route is, naturally enough, on
top of the North Downs. So, each time I head downhill to the Pilgrim's Way I know that I will be regretting the loss of altitude later in the day.
There was a lot of the Pilgrim's Way today and the weather was not kind. Miserable even. A strong and cold southerly wind blowing fine but very wet drizzle in from the side as I am travelling East. I suppose I should be grateful from the shelter that the hedges of the Pilgrim's Way gave me. Today's photographs are consequently rather lacking in decent lighting.
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| The Pilgrim's Way, long and straight with little room for escape |
I set off from the Blue Bell Hill picnic site after a vehicular drop off and realised that I missed talking about the prominent memorial stone in the car park. This is a large stone dedicated to the memories of the three man crew of an air ambulance who died when their helicopter crashed nearby in July 1998.
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| Memorial stone at Blue Bell Hill |
Shortly after leaving the car park and negotiating around the numerous busy motorways and dual carriage ways in that area the route passes Kit's Coty House.
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| Kit's Coty House |
Needless to say, this is not a house. It is a well preserved example of a stone chamber which once formed the entrance to a barrow or burial mound built in Neolithic times (4,800 - 5,500 years ago). I have to say that I am a little sceptical myself, the stones may well be original but this looks distinctly like a Victorian Folly to me. However, English Heritage claim that this is original and would have formed the entrance to a mound of earth and chalk dug out from ditches nearby. Apparently the ditches are still visible from the air. There would have been more stones, and these may still be buried in the field. Kits Coty gets its name from an association with a Celtic leader called Catigern (Kit) who died in a battle with the Saxons in 450AD, thousands of years later than the true origin of the stones.
Just around the corner from Kit's Coty is another large stone. The White Horse stone, after the 5th Century Saxon warlord, Horsa. However, this too is believed to be part of a Neolithic burial chamber laid down thousands of years prior to Horsa.
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| White Horse Stone |
The trees around this stone were decorated with strips of cloth; Druids? This stone has been the subject of controversy in recent years after Orange applied to build a telephone mast within a few metres of the stone in 2004. This and a subsequent proposal were thankfully rejected by local planning committees on the basis that it would be an unsightly intrusion in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (I have heavily paraphrased that).
My complaints about the roads in the area and along the route in general were proved to be justified when I got to Detling. Here the A249, a busy dual carriage way built in 1962 linking two motorways, cuts the village in half. Quite bizarrely the planners and builders of the road made no provision for a crossing for the villagers. In the 1960s no doubt the road was quiet by today's standards but now it is anything but. As you approach the road you cannot miss the huge footbridge that now climbs and crosses the road. This is Jade's Crossing, named after Jade Hobbs aged 8 who was killed along with her Grandmother whilst crossing the road in December 2000. This wasn't the first tragedy, two others had died in similar circumstances in 1974 and 1986; Jade was however the first child and that seemed to galvanise the community to do something about the issue themselves in the absence of any official recognition of the dangers. The footbridge was opened in 2002 having been paid for by public subscription.
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| Jade's Crossing at Detling on the A249 |
As if to add insult to injury there is a memorial plaque explaining the above with a collection box to continue with the fund for other needy crossing points. I donated a pound only to find that round the back of the collection chamber the collection box has been partly chiseled out of the wall exposing its contents. Unfortunately, my hands were too big to retrieve my coin; I suspect the work of thieves with small hands and I doubt my well earned cash will be building any bridges.
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| Memorial to Jade Hobbs, Detling |
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| Scum bags... |
Having been saddened by the tale of the road crossing and feeling somewhat ripped off to the tune of a pound I was pleased to find that the other side of Detling was very welcoming with a handy bench seat next to an RAF war memorial. RAF Detling was a Spitfire base during WW2, no doubt playing a critical role in the Battle of Britain, closing in 1959. It is now a showground and hosts the annual Kent County Show.
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| Memorial to RAF Detling |
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| Detling, The Cock Horse and Raf Memorial and bench seat mid left |
Detling also had a very fine gateway to an old Tudor resting house for Pilgrims on the Pilgrim's Way. This marked the start of one of those long, boring, trudge sections for me.
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| Tudor Gateway at Detling on the Pilgrim's Way |
This is typically Tudor, with its ornate brickwork similar to that seen at Hampton Court Palace. This is all that remains of the resting house that once stood behind it. Strange that the gateway survives but the house does not.
Shortly after Detling I took a short detour off the route, uphill, to visit to the remains of Thurnham Castle. This is thought to date back to the 11th Century, originally built by Bishop Odo of Bayeux who was William the Conqueror's brother. It had a commanding position on the top of the ridge overlooking the Weald of Kent and consisted of a circular earthwork and ditch with a bailey within. By 1540 it was a ruin and later chalk quarrying put it at risk of disappearing altogether until Kent County Council began a project to conserve it 1999. There is very little left now, just a few remnants of walls. I have not included any photographs here, because in the dwindling light there really was not much to look at.
Further along the Pilgrim's Way I was further cheered by some appropriate and recent artwork in the form of Brother Percival. I sat next to him for a while for a snack and a drink; I think he was asleep.
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| Brother Percival on the Pilgrim's Way |
I headed off the Pilgrim's Way into Lenham at about 3:30 and made my way to the station to get the train home. The train worked well for me, changing at Bromley South and getting home at about 5:30.
Now, the next two stages are Lenham to Chilham and Chilham to Canterbury at 15 and 9 miles respectively. For logistical reasons I have decided to combine them into one long stage. It will be a long one but with an early start and cafe stop in Chilham (Shelly's tea room, please be open) it will be a good challenge. From Canterbury it is then only two stages to Dover and the plan is to complete the rest of the walk from Lenham in one Campervan supported trip. No date set yet, depends on the availability of my support crew.
AW
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