Day: 164 1/9/96 Margate to Faversham

Weather:  fine, hot, still

Distance: 40.0 km ( 24.9 miles)    Total Distance:   2084.6 miles

A mammoth days walk for me though I did not intend it to be.  I planned to catch the train back to Margate so I tried to park as close as possible to the station.  The fee for the station car park was a lot even on a Sunday but fortunately a side street near by provided me with what I wanted - a free place. 

I do like seaside town early in the morning and my impression of Margate was so much better early on a Sunday morning when it is waking up, than on a busy Saturday afternoon.  The beaches were being cleared of all the seaweed washed up yesterday by the high tide.  That looked a big job.  Many of those out on the promenades were jogging or riding bikes.  There was concrete promenade virtually all the way to Birclington and then good paths on the whole to Herne Bay.  The cliffs started to disappear at about Plumbpudding Island - and even if they did not its an excellent name for a place to put in a diary,

I needed my break at Herne Bay and resolved to stop at the first cafe.  Surprisingly I had to go quite a way along the prom to get to it and it turned out to be a council affair in a sort of theatre.  Whitstable was more pleasant if a lot harder to walk around.  There was no promenade as such and I had to cut into the town at one stage.  Some very pleasant old houses had their gardens face onto the beach. 

It was either stop here or press onto Faversham and as it was early and a nice day I pressed on not really judging very well how far it was.  The beach got harder to walk along and at Seasalter I left it for a while and headed over the railway line to get to a shop to stock up before I left civilisation all together. I enjoyed my Solero Ice lolly while the proprietor inside watched the Eastenders compilation on high volume. 

I rejoined the coastal road and was surprised how many cars were on it - without a pavement it was not a particularly pleasant stretch.  When the road turned inland at Graveny Marshes I spent the rest of the day on sea defence walls.  This stretch was surprisingly popular. I had expected it to be quiet by there were groups of people out walking dogs, fishing even shooting.  Beyond Nagden Marshes I turned inland up the river bank towards Faversham. What a long trek this was made worse by swarms of small flies especially around hawthorn bushes.  I was exhausted for this last three miles and hobbled into Faversham through the town which looked very impressive and was clearing up after a market day and to the station where I got a train back to Margate. 

I spent the night at Canterbury YHA.  It was quieter than last time I stayed here - no Gibraltan schoolchildren this time.  I met another Japanese lad - abroad for the first time and determined to attend as many pop concerts as possible, a German girl studying the Science of music and Martin,a gardener from Peterlee Bible College who subsequently sent mew a book of his poems. 

I ate in a tandoori restaurant and had a very palatable chicken Tika Marsala, phoned home picked up some milk and had an early night.

Day: 163 31/8/96 Sandwich to Margate

Weather:  fine, warm

Distance: 23.0 km ( 14.3 miles)    Total Distance:   2059.7 miles

I made it away from the house by 6am. You can always tell it is early because the fishing programme, Dirty Tackle, is on Radio 5.  Today they were interviewing a top casting champion. It took me a while to realise that in casting championships, no fish are involved, they cast on dry land at a target. Why? 

I parked the car at Sandwich train station in the suburbs, and went to ask train times back from Margate in the afternoon.  The lady very helpfully wrote the times down for me.  Service with a smile.  

The very first part of this walk was good, along the banks of the river and into Sandwich.  For the next hour however things got a lot worse, along main roads, past the Pfizer works and laboratories who were in the process of building an effluent treatment plant, and then along a worse main road without a pavement towards Ramsgate, past a power station. 

Eventually I reached a point where a coastal path began. Here a Viking boat replica was on display, along with oars and shields.  The cliffs at this tip of Kent were low, only 50 feet high and chalk. The first bit of cliff top path looked down over Pegwell Bay, a vast expanse of what looked like mud.  The remains of the hovercraft landing structures were being worked on.  It looked like they were being demolished.  No hovercrafts landed here these days I believe.  I had to cut inland a bit at Pegwell itself before getting down onto the lower promenade and heading to Ramsgate.  A very dilapidated area just before the port looked like a sign of bad things to come, but as soon as I walked through the port area things looked up.  I stopped in the Stagecoach offices to pick up a bus timetable even though I had more or less made my mind up to use the more expensive but more relaxing train option.

I tried to stay on the lower promenade but it eventually ran out without much warning and I had to backtrack a couple of hundred yards to get onto the cliff top.  I soon arrived at St George’s park and a cafe flying the St George’s flag looked so inviting I stopped for lunch - tea, cake and crisps on the plastic furniture on the grass.  It was a popular place with dog walkers all who seemed to need refreshment when reaching the cafe. 

I liked Broardstairs from the moment I saw it.  Full of very large cliff top housed mostly converted into homes for the elderly on the southern side and then a quaint little town which was named after a mixture of Dickensian references and Italian cafe owners.  After the decent and ascent out of the town it was onto the cliffs again.  One point near a disused school forced me inland and I made an error of trying to regain the coast too soon and had a fruitless trek down to a cove and back up again.  Not long after that I took a road marked up as private which took me down to the coast - full of very large houses - given that Ted Heath lives in Broardstairs its probably not a bad guess he lives here.  Southern Water had kindly built a new sewage works at the end of the road, no doubt halving the value of some houses overnight.  At the tip of North Foreland I stopped and took a deep breath because this was the tip of Kent  and the end of the South Coast!

The surfers were enjoying the rough seas off North Forehand.  Onto the road again, past a private castle and then back to the coast again. The tide was very high by now, smashing into and over the promenades in spectacular fashion meaning I stayed on the cliff tops.  Margate was a 'kiss me quick' seaside resort in the full and not very impressive on a busy Saturday afternoon after a long walk.

I got to the station and then had a long train journey back to Sandwich with a long change at Ramsgate, but at least a train station is a reasonably nice place to wait around as opposed to a bus station.  Some boys on their last days of summer holidays got on at Margate and disrupted the peace of the journey. 

I got to Broardstairs YHA to be surprised that it was a town house as opposed to the usual mansion I had come to expect from the YHA!  The dorm was in the basement but fine.  I met a lad over from Japan.  I went for tea in Broardstairs and had a massive portion of gammon, egg and chips in the Prince Albert.  It was so large the gammon balanced on top of the peas and chips and salad and the egg on top of that. 

Day: 162 23/6/96 Dover to Sandwich

Weather:  fine

Distance: 24.0 km ( 14.9 miles)    Total Distance:   2014.7 miles

I made an early start by my standards from the Youth Hostel and was walking by 9 o’clock.  I was able to park the car pretty close to the centre of town because it was a Sunday.  I went to the sea front, the busy dual carriageway and towards the ferry terminals.  A small path led under the main road out of Dover and up onto the cliffs.  This first part of this walk was excellent.  It was great to get back to some cliff top walking.  Bird-watchers were hanging over the side of the cliffs trying to catch glimpses of their favorite bird. 

St Margaret’s at Cliff appeared a very attractive village.  A steep path led down onto the beach.  To begin with I was suspicious that there was no way off apart from the way I had come down but there was a steep path to the east - just past the toilets!  I stopped on the beach and had a snack in the cafe whilst looking at the local dog patrol turn up and offer help to a lady who had evidently lost her pet. 

The cliffs got lower and led to a track and Kingsdown and eventually Deal.  Just before I got to Deal I had a mission to complete - to take a couple of pictures of Walmer Castle for my Dad who was writing an article on its history or more likely someone famous who had lived there.  

I was disappointed with Deal itself, it lacked any presence.  I stopped in a cafe on the sea-front which also lacked most things including customers.  I could not understand why there were taking in the tables and chairs at midday on a Sunday.  They assured me they were not closing - I guess it was to scare away anyone but the most intrepid tea drinker.  Deal sea front is strewn with fishing boats and their assorted accessories.  I seem to recall a piece on TV telling about trying to smarten up Deal beach and have the boats moved on.

The rest of the walk was a bit of a trek to be honest, along two or three golf courses, one of which was Royal St George’s.  I was expecting high security and lush fairways and greens behind fences but if was far from that.  I followed another young man for much of this stretch - I’ve no idea why he was walking in such dull surroundings.  

Some of this path / track was tough walking because of the stones on the track.  There was no path marked beyond a certain point and the golf course was looking more and more private, so I cut up to Sandwich on the marked path, keeping my head down when crossing the fairways.  The last bit into Sandwich was through a farm and then along the banks of a river - very nice. 

Once in Sandwich I headed through the suburbs up to the very quiet station.  The lack of a time table did not inspire me with confidence that a train would ever turn up.  The station did gradually fill up and an odd couple where the man was dropping off his acquaintance to go back to London imposed themselves on my personal space.  Eventually a train did turn up after about 45 minutes.  I was glad to get back to Dover and stroll back into the town and to my car.