Closer to home

Bored I decided the snooker match I'd been following had reached its conclusion so I needed fresh air. A pulled calf muscle required a gentle stroll so, flask of coffee in hand I drove to a local village and pulled over in a lay-by on its outskirts.

Nothing fancy but a good stop off point where the car would be out the way and parking wouldn't be challenged.

I've driven through Hadlow for years rarely looking to left nor right save to make sure it's safe to proceed. 

Today I decided, if the calf muscle wanted a stretch then I'd wander into the village and back and be thoroughly nosy whilst doing it......I'd forgotten just how busy the road is!

The village itself is old, and is recorded in the Doomsday book as Haslow. 

In 795 ad the village was Saxon and where the much larger and quite ornate parish church (with a peel of 6 bells( is now standing, was a small, unasumming wooden church. It was an important centre, probably situated on the road linking north Kent to its southerly coast. Tonbridge,  which is not far away was a navigable river and many of the commodities where moved in barges up to there for distribution. It is possible this village was the first stop north.

According to Kent records;

"In 1786, Walter May inherited the manor house, Hadlow Court Lodge, which he demolished and built Hadlow Castle, in an ornate, Gothic style. Upon inheriting the castle his son, also Walter, built 170 feet high folly, which lightning damaged in 1987.."

Since then it's been restored using public donations, opening for a week each year to raise funds for its upkeep and be a local tourist attraction.

Sadly,  it is has now fallen into private hands and is closed to everyone. At one time it was hoped to open it on an extremely expensive 'holiday let' but I'm not convinced there would be many takers....far too expensive.

 From what I remember of my history, there was somewhat of a tit for tat going on between land owners; who had the highest tower. This spat had raged between parishes too and church spires punched ever higher toward heaven.

Anyway, this folly was built with one room per floor and a very narrow spiral staircase going to the top. The gardens around it are small, but magnificent. I was lucky to get in on one of the very last open days before its sale and went to the top floor. Magnificent views.

Many of the buildings around the church and folly are half timbered. There are numerous stable blocks and coach houses, which, although renovated into homes, are still visible. 

One thing I didn't realise was the spring or stream running along the side of the road. I followed it; never deep but probably a torrent during that very wet spell we had. Thinking about it, if this was a small hamlet and a coach stop then fresh water would be a great boon so a stream running through would make this location perfect.

It must remain quite wet all year round as the typical stream bank plants grew in abundance.

Sad to think within 20 feet of this verdant carpet was a busy main road pumping its exhaust fumes everywhere.

So, now I'm back at the lay-by enjoying my coffee. The traffic is relentless but the view over the fields is lovely.

Ooh, was that a woodcock I just heard over the roar of the HGV just rolling through?

Isle of Sheppey and contemplating a camper

 

Leaving the groins behind at Minster we headed down the coast towards Eastchurch coming across large piles of dead trees and shrubbery which would have occupied the banks above. Twisted metal, old fishing lines and plastic hung like Christmas baubles giving it an eerie sense of life in the afterworld.

If there is one place I am slowly falling in love with its the Isle of Sheppey. I realise many before me have enjoyed its beaches and its bird watching, especially at the marshes in Iwade, but I have a very special friend who lives there and to be honest, although I have often gone to visit, we have rarely gone out to explore. So, it was decided during one of our many phone calls and with packed lunches, black coffee, cameras and sound recording equipment we set off.

It must have looked odd, one person in cam jacket and track suit bottoms carrying a black bucket with me, also in tatty track suit bottoms, old horse riding jacket, sporting a back pack, walking purposely towards the far reaches of the beach.

Yep, the original odd couple vanishing down the beach, but we had an aim, the sunken second world war barges which had been sunk in a relatively straight line to act as a sea groin.

Over the years the barges have begun to break down and that valuable, somewhat radioactive metal is rusting back into Nature.

The tall marker posts indicating the site of the barges. The beach around here is really nice and there is evidence of lug worms taking up residence in the very silty sand.Numerous birds inhabit this area as the tide goes out and they filter the mud for small crustaceans and seaweed.

 

The first in the row of rusting hulks. Once responsible for the safety of tanks, troups and vehicles of war, now their radioactive metal is rusting back into the ground.

 
 The weather was deceptive; being April, the sun shone brightly but the wind whipped round the headland and was so cold it bit into my ears and robbed me of hearing unless I turned my head. Still, it was fabulous to be out and what we saw confirmed why the cliffs at Eastchurch are giving way so quickly.

As we left Sheerness beach we stepped over numerous flint laden gullies which funneled the surface water toward land drains and these in turn, carried the water out into the sea. They are dug at regular intervals and have given a chance for the cliffs to become more stable, dry out and develop some sort of plant covering with the result they also soak up some of that excess water which runs in rivulets out of the ground.

There is also a shallow sea wall which will break the advancement of Spring and Autumn tides and the vagaries of the worst of the winter storms. Regular groins slow the sideways advancement of the silt and break the waves as they approach the pebble beach. All in all, Sheerness is well maintained and has adequate sea defenses for the present time. 

Go further along the beach, past the beach huts and the end of the sea front and you start to encounter beach without prevention. 

The fragile, silty beds of compressed alluvial deposits are open to the sea and all it can throw at it. All that breaks the waves onslaught are these barges and the marker posts. Slowly, the sea is reclaiming this part of the island and possibly heading back to the Saxon shoreline. 

The beach at Eastchurch with the corner of a collapsed 2WW pillbox showing. This will have come down from the cliffs above during one of the collapses which, by the looks of the seaweed, happened a while ago. What appears to be headland is a cliff collapse which happened some time ago and there is still enough soil above the sea for some of the plants to stay alive.

I suspect this is more recent evidence of landslide activity; an old 60s TV, at one time someone's pride and joy. There was a car strewn in pieces and rusting to nothing as well as old plant pots, trees, shrubs, garden walls and other fripperies from homes which did not go under the hammer, more like, slipped out of sight.

Regardless of the losses, to the land above, this is a lovely stretch of shoreline. As I said as we were coming back, this will be the only time we will see this stretch of the beach looking exactly like this because the waves will pound at the collapses each and every day taking more of the alluvial silt back and walking it down the beach towards the deep-water channel up to Tilbury and Sheerness docks itself.