Exploring the South Downs

The South Downs are my back garden. I can fall out of my house and be on those rolling hills within ten minutes. Working in London I can retire to my country estate (two up two down terrace) sandwiched between the sea and the Downs at the weekend and wander anywhere within this 100 mile stretch of lush gentle hills. Go west from my abode and if you like shaded glades, deer leaping out of the undergrowth and cool forest paths interspersed with open fields you’ll be in your element. Go east towards Eastbourne and it’s mainly wide open downland covered with sheep and cows, expansive vistas and sun dusted flinty tracks. 

The weekend of the royal wedding and FA cup final day was an opportunity to wallow in extreme enjoyment, and between the two events was a significant window of opportunity to escape to the countryside on a glorious early summer’s day. It was a day to go west, young man! That meant heading out down the A27 towards Chichester, whipping past Arundel and then heading towards Slindon. Utterly spoiled for choice as both of those towns are full of interest as well.

Turn off at the Slindon turning onto the A29, head briefly north east and then escape the busy coastal route by taking a left turn at 90 degrees and entering the village of Slindon, a comfortable village sprawl on the southern edge of the Downs which is famous for being Britain’s pumpkin capital (don’t even ask!). As you drive into the village you pass the village hall on your left immediately followed by the Forge, an attractive community shop and cafe with outdoor benches where you can enjoy your ploughman’s or whatever takes your fancy. It’s a cool place to stop on a long walk or if you just want an excuse for a full English or a cream tea.

From here follow the winding village street up past St Mary’s, the church on your left, then past the duck pond. Keep ahead and then you have Slindon college, walled off to your left, an independent day and boarding school for boys needing learning support. In the Middle Ages whatever building preceded this present ‘village manor’ type edifice was the site of one of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s residences. Just past the entrance the road bends round to the left in one of those inexplicable contortions found all over England. At this point a lane branches off down to the right which will take you to the evocatively named Gumber Bothy, a dead end which makes it even more enticing. It’s actually a farm and centre for outdoor activities ideal for Duke of Edinburgh Award types, but that’s for another day.

Keeping to the main road, from here a mazy route through rolling countryside eventually gets you to a T junction. Turn right and then drive up through the village of Eartham to eventually merge with the A285 from the left. Head on north and you really hit the delicious folds of the South Downs before taking a left turn onto Drake Lane. Hugging the valley bottom, the lane takes you to the village of East Dean on the road between Singleton and Upwaltham. Here you are really getting lost in the backside of the Downs.

East Dean duck pond

Your classic signpost

East Dean village centre

The tidy hamlet of East Dean congregates around a duckpond planted on the village green opposite the non-Conformist chapel sitting on the main road. On the green is one of those black and white painted signposts that makes you think you’ve landed in the Thirties in a time machine, a circle on the top branded with the letters WSCC (West Sussex County Council) and pointy pointer directions to more leafy villages. It’s straight out of a Will Hay film. Up the hill is the village hall, once the village school and then you reach the church. Don’t forget the pub which is almost opposite the green and you’ve got your archetypal English village, a glorious retreat if you commute to London or anywhere else for that matter. Villages like this are two a penny in England, it’s not one of the iconic Cotswolds or Devon eye candy places, but it would do me fine.

Road from East Dean

Rustic charm?

Industrial type building

The Fox goes free!

I took the route west along the road to the village of Charlton, in the Chichester district of West Sussex, which seemed to be a little more countrified than East Dean, even more in the back of beyond and funnily enough minus a church and village green (perhaps I missed them) but there was still a welcoming looking pub with a wonderful name, ‘The Fox goes Free,’ and some attractive rural settlement. You might think nothing ever happens in a place like this but if you’re a Doctor Who fan you’d know of course that the village was used for the location filming of ‘The Terror of the Zygons’ as a fictional Scottish village. And did you know that the first women’s institute in England held its inaugural meeting in the First World War? 

Charlton village

Back to front cottages?

Charlton village

Path up to the downs

Heading through the main street west you get to a long old building bordering the road which seems to be back to front i.e. what should be the front garden seems to be out the back! Just after there is a road junction and a little lane goes off to the right. Take this lane and you are taken up into the Downs above Charlton and another enviable choice of paths as you rise towards the crown of the Downs. A walkers paradise. I could have stayed up there for much longer, but was being lured by the possibility of catching the remainder of the cup final. More walking will have to wait for another day

Eastwell/Westwell, Ashford, Kent

North Downs

I used to live in Ashford, Kent as a child, teenager and well into my twenties, and remember it as a small market town on the main rail route from London to the channel ports. Down this route thundered the Golden Arrow, perhaps the only touch of glamour for this corner of Kent, the iconic luxury boat train that linked London Victoria with Dover where passengers caught the ferry to link up with the Fleche D’Or or Chemin de Fer du Nord on the other side. I still to this day remember catching a glimpse of this iron horse at Ashford station.

There was nothing particularly special about Ashford apart from its parish church surrounded by a gaggle of old buildings, but it was in the county of Kent, the Garden of England. I wonder how much more beautiful Kent was before they cut down some of the cherry trees which I heard about when I was very young. You know Henry VIII ordered cherry trees to be planted in Kent, they go back a long way. I’d maybe forgotten the lovely countryside that surrounds this quite ordinary market town and where I’d spent most of my childhood and youth, travelling out to places like Wye, Hythe, Folkestone, Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells. This area has a rich history. Barely 14 miles to the north east lies the beautiful cathedral city of Canterbury reached by the verdant and pastoral Stour Valley. Not far away is Pluckley, supposedly the most haunted village in England. HE Bates, writer of that carefree Kentish family in the Darling Buds of May, lived just down the road in Little Chart.

I returned to old haunts when I recently explored Eastwell and Westwell at the northern end of the town, in the lee of the North Downs. Here you can be in gorgeous countryside a mile or two from the Towers School on the edge of town. You pass the locally famous Eastwell Towers on the left as the road first swings to the right, at the entrance to Eastwell Park, then this A251 Faversham road swings round to the left and up to Boughton Lees. By now you are ascending the scarp slopes of the North Downs which rise enticingly to your left while the views right look way down into the Stour Valley. Further up you get to the village of Challock where you turn left onto the A252 Canterbury Rd. Here a wide grassy strip spreads out to the left of the main road and gives an expansive and scattered air to this hilltop village.

A rip roaring blue sky day always helps to bring the countryside to life, no less today as the sun washes away the winter gloom. At Challock or more specifically Paddock you turn left off the main road and get lost in the narrow lane that slips back down the hill towards Westwell, but away from the hustle and bustle of a main road. Here in a hidden valley you can park the car in a wooded leaf filled hollow and just walk. So out of the car I got and first I followed the lane past isolated farms like Dean Court Lodge and through wooded stretches until finding a path into Eastwell Park at Dunn Street. Looking at the Ordnance Survey map you can see the ancient Pilgrims Way heading west from this very point along the slopes of the North Downs. But my destination is in the opposite direction. The path slopes invitingly down a gentle gradient flanked by the hills to your left and the lowlands to your right, a wide sweep of country flecked with patches of woodland with evocative names such as Squintels, Skeat’s Wood and Black Shed. The only sound that shatters the peace might be some pheasant flying across your line of vision as its resting place is disturbed.

The views here are expansive, wide open, featureless fields splashed with indiscriminately placed woodland that creates a perfect picture of harmony, a lone track furrows like an arrow towards Eastwell Lake, with Home Farm on the left. We are now in Eastwell Park, home of the prestigious Eastwell Towers Hotel and former home of Sir Thomas Moyle, the Earls of Winchilsea and Nottingham, and Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, the second son of Queen Victoria. 

The path ends up near the ruined estate church of St Mary the Virgin, which sits on the edge of Eastwell Lake, unused since after the First World War. Here there is a memorial to the grave of Richard Plantagenet, allegedly the illegitimate son of Richard III and who once was employed on the estate. There’s a mystical air about this spot, an abandoned roofless church perched on the edge of a large shallow lake. Up the road is Eastwell Manor, the hotel, but I don’t really have the time to explore any further on this occasion. Before I’m mistaken for a lost guest I retrace my steps back through the parkland. 

Eastwell Manor itself was built in the neo-Elizabethan style between 1793 and 1799 and now looks a pretty impressive pile surrounded by landscaped gardens. A Victorian Tudor style wing was later added. England is stuffed to the gunnels with ancient mansions like this, round corners of leafy lanes, hidden in wooded valleys, and towering over rolling parklands full of deer and that most batty of creatures, the pheasant. Ashford itself has three estates virtually on its doorstep, Eastwell, Godington Park, and Mersham Hatch, seat of the Knatchbull family. Spoilt for choice!

Halnaker Tunnel and Windmll, South Downs National Park, West Sussex

Here’s an autumn treat that can be comfortably done in an afternoon with a visit to a pub or coffee shop to round off crunching through the leaves. It’s amazing what gems lie just off those main roads that you use to get from one town to another. If you take the high road from Worthing to Chichester and turn right at the Tangmere roundabout you hit the village of Boxgrove. Turn right at the junction with the A285 after passing through the village and head north-east a short distance and you get to the entrance to Wearhead Farm. Here you can park up with room for up to ten cars at a guess and take the footpath up the appropriately named Mill Lane which tracks the old London to Chichester Roman road, Stane St. 

Early on a flint cottage looms to the left, a fitting introduction to the magical Halnaker tunnel of trees that tubes up onto the downs and then to Halnaker Windmill. Who might live in this medieval like dwelling, the guardian of the tunnel? Gandalf the wizard? Perhaps one of the Hobbits? Soon we are in the tunnel, an ancient drove way carved by the feet of thousand of humans and animals and shaded by an arc of greenery that seems to have arranged itself in the most alluring fashion, trees on either side thrusting upwards and then branching over towards the middle to meet boughs from the opposite side. A sea of fallen leaves covers the sunken footpath and leak up the banks that cosset this special spot. The autumn sunlight piercing through the  branches adds a special magic to the scene.

The day I visited at least four photographers were loitering in the tunnel looking for the best shots. I felt a mere rookie with my simple Samsung camera phone. This must be a daily occurrence when the weather is good, photographers descending for the perfect autumn shot like bees to a hive. If you see one or two ‘bodies’ in the photos, those are leaf peepers sporting a Leica or whatever. This tunnel has ‘atmosphere.’ If a ruddy cheeked chappie wearing a leather jerkin, a red hat, pointy shoes and smoking a three foot long pipe sauntered down the tunnel you would not think him out of place, perhaps with a giant rabbit or goat dressed as a human on its hind legs bringing up the rear.

Once you get to the other end of the tunnel there is a divergence, with a path to the right heading down to Seabeach House, apparently a fine bed and breakfast establishment about which I spotted some delightful reviews. The path ahead carries on upwards and leaves the evocative tunnel to head up north onto the downs. Follow the path as it traces the hedge to the left and after a relatively short walk you reach a circular field at the crown of Halnaker Hill encircling the Halnaker windmill, at present cordoned off for repairs. You‘re rewarded with a fine 360 degree view over downs and sea after what overall is a pretty easy walk from your car, more of a Sunday stroll than a heavy duty hike.  The view is expansive, exactly why I guess second world war installations are scattered around the site. There is a World War Two observation post with what looks like the tracks for an anti air raft battery, whilst in an adjoining field another set of tracks arise out of the stubble. The view is unencumbered by gentle rolling hills, woodland and seascapes. It’s not difficult to imagine standing here during the Battle of Britain with a front of house view of the Luftwaffe scrapping with Spitfires and Hurricanes from nearbyTangmere and its associated airfields at Westhampnett and Merston.

There is an alternative route to reach the summit here, but you miss the tunnel fun. You can walk up from the entrance to Seabeach House, a little further on up the A285 to the north west, coming from the opposite direction up Stane Street, and then turning right onto the track up to the windmill. There is a fair sized lay-by by Seabeach House as well. Another idea is to walk from Eartham Wood which is even further out along Stane St. but a better bet for more serious walkers. There is a parking and picnic stop here to serve as base and which is accessible from the A285.

Hope this wets your appetite for a South Downs hobbit experience!

Portsmouth

 

Ship ahoy to starboard me hearties! Well here we are in Portsmouth getting a full on experience of the UK's main naval base, attached of course to a rather large town and associated urban areas scattered around the splendid natural harbour. If you didn't know, Portsmouth is indeed a large town on the south coast of England with an illustrious naval history facing the English Channel and somewhat sheltered from the direct open sea by the presence of the Isle of Wight, an island shoved into the estuary of Southampton Water and the River Itchen, and protecting both Portsmouth and Southampton, a great place for a bucket and space holiday in an old style English resort type of way.

 

 

 

Buy a year's ticket for the Portsmouth dockyard and it gives you access to a plethora of attractions in this old sea salt of a town. The historic naval dockyard gives you the Mary Rose experience, HM Victory, which of course was Nelson’s flagship, the Royal Naval museum, M33, (a monitor used in the Dardanelles), the Jutland exhibition, Action Stations and of course HMS Warrior, the Victorian masted warship that greets you as you step out of the train terminus on the waterfront. The ticket also includes a dash across the harbour by boat to the Submarine Museum with its post war Cold War sub specimen perched above the waters on the harbour side, and the Explosives Museum, as well as a further boat trip around the harbour to see what's left of the Royal Navy, and the various docks and ferry terminus. 

If you're visiting Portsmouth it's worth knowing about the Park and Ride scheme. If you come in on the motorway spur which comes off the main M27, take the first exit and end up in a spacious park and ride car park from where you can catch the bus into town for £4 return. This saves you the hassle of finding a town centre car park and only takes seven minutes to the Hard, an intriguingly named bus terminus right next to the Warrior, train terminus and Gunwharf Quay, a large modern shopping mall which will take you to the seventh consumer heaven. Even better, a few paces will take you to the entrance to the Historic Naval Dockyard.

I’d already been to the Submarine museum so concentrated on the dockyard itself. What boundless pleasure I took from bypassing a queue of heartbreaking and discouraging length to go straight into the ticket office as a year ticket holder and breeze through after showing the member of staff your credit card or identity doc. Then have a Costa coffee or just take your pick of the attractions.

On the Tuesday I had the Jutland Exhibition on my ‘to do’ list. This tells the story of the massive First World War confrontation off Denmark between the Royal Navy commanded by Lord Kitchener, then the world's most powerful navy, and the German fleet which had been trying hard to catch up in the race to build as many Dreadnoughts as possible. There may be some dispute over who came out best, but the long and the short of it was that the British were able to tighten the blockade on Germany as a result, making it far more difficult for the enemy to source their supplies from overseas, and so help to starve their population into submission, a deciding factor in the war. 

The exhibition includes a jolly academic with rock musician hair and glasses on hand to answer any questions, and ready to tell you all about members of his family directly involved in the British military. There are lots of photographs of massive battleships, a time line of the battle, various ship models and three films, two of which were not working at the time of visit.

The Nelson exhibition was a revelation and well worth the time. Currently as the statue bashing epidemic hits the western world and even Nelson’s Column has come under scrutiny, one has to seriously question the sanity of the idea a small number of enraged people motivated by ideology destroying statues of people who lived in a totally different time and mindset. By any standards Nelson was a collusus, even for his ability to serve in the King's fleet after losing an eye, an arm, and receiving a head wound in various battles, and still remain standing to command the kings fleet on HMS Victory. You just have to wonder that Englishmen of old were made of titanium steel compared with our generation. Just think, if Nelson had lost at Trafalgar we might all be speaking French and the Brittanic inheritance would have been lost to the world, although that would be a debatable point.

By any standards Nelson had an enormous place of affection in the hearts of the British people and must have been far more than the equivalent of our most popular celebrity in 2017. He surely would have been top of Google searches if the 18th century had such things. Display cases full of every form of memento, jugs, mugs, plates, statues, pictures and goodness knows what, all commemorating the image or exploits of Nelson as he bestrode the seven seas. And just how many households in the Britain of the time did not have their own Nelson item of memorabilia?

Painstaking efforts seem to have been made to recreate exactly what Nelson looked like for his portraits and busts. There's even a life like full size model which I have to say reminded me of Rod Stewart at a fancy dress party. Did anyone else see the likeness? Nelson of course is famous for his illicit relationship with another woman, the regaled Lady Hamilton, and much is made of this in the exhibition. There was even a woman dressed in the garments of the time impersonating Nelson’s spurned and heartbroken wife with a selection of epithets.

One thing that may not be so known about Nelson is that he had a strong Christian faith, and there is a  small section in the Nelson museum devoted to this aspect of his life. Biblical and indeed Christian history is replete with imperfect men and women who had a great impact on history and mighty faith, yet who had very human flaws. We think of Noah, Abraham, King David, St Paul and even modern saints like Martin Luther King who all had appointments with failure and moral falls, so Nelson was just another whose greatness was touched with an Achilles heel. Here is the prayer he wrote before the Battle of Trafalgar:

‘May the Great God, whom I worship, Grant to my Country, and for the benefit of Europe in General, a great and Glorious Victory; and may no misconduct in any one tarnish it; and may humanity after Victory be the predominant feature in the British fleet. For myself individually, I commit my life to Him who made me, and may his blessing light upon my endeavours for serving My Country faithfully. To Him I resign myself, and the Just cause which is entrusted to me to defend. Amen. Amen. Amen.’

I happened to be in Portsmouth the next day for the arrival of our new aircraft carrier minus the aircraft of course, the Queen Elizabeth, which arrived about 7am on the Wednesday for docking within sight of the historic dockyard. This huge carrier is an impressive sight but still well short of the size of American leviathans like the USS Gerald Ford, a mere minnow in comparison. 

The harbour tour gave us a chance to see this new pride of the Royal Navy in all its glory as the young captain of the ferry gave us an upbeat commentary on the surrounding naval furniture, peppered with the most cringeworthy bucket of jokes and one liners dreamt up this side of Hadrian’s wall. The ferry does a circuit of the docks, north past the Queen Elizabeth, then east into the land of frigates and destroyers before touching the cross channel ferry port and retracing the route back to the quay. If you take the last trip of the day the boat lands you by the Spinnaker and Gunwharf shopping centre, as by the time you finish your trip the naval dockyard has closed for the night.

 

By the way if you think there's not much left of the Royal Navy this isn't the only base, and I have it on good authority that Portsmouth is very well defended, and not just by warships. So watch out if you're planning an invasion!

If you're feeling like breathing in some fresh Solent air then take a walk along the harbour front from Gunwharf Quay out  towards the open sea. The walk is an uplifting mix of marina, industrial wharf, jolly sailor pubs, and ancient sea wall which twists its way towards Southsea. En route you pass youngsters enjoying a swim off the rocks below. Another group of lads squares up to one another in a bravado sort of way on the walkway while their girls lounge on the side. Inside the sea wall at ground level a statue of Nelson reminds us of the stern stuff that made old England. A plaque on the side of the plinth quotes the prayer uttered by Nelson before the battle of Trafalgar.

 

Sherborne

 



Abbey life

Sherborne is tucked away in the north part of Dorset and looks like a little piece of the Cotswolds has been scooped up and replanted 60 miles or so to the south west. That same honey coloured stone characterises this rather special little Dorset town with its very fine abbey, jumbled town centre and two castles sitting on the very edge of town. If you live in London why not take the train from Waterloo which deposits you in Sherborne in 2 hours and twelve minutes. If you wear a bright yellow cardigan, a tweed suit, a windowpane tweed garforth cap and a pair of brogues you'd fit in just fine swanning around this bit of old England.

I spent a few days here teaching Easter revision at Sherborne international, an associate organisation of its illustrious neighbour, Sherborne School, and took the time to explore this delightful town. Hived up in the girls boarding house (they were on holidays of course!), the view from the bedroom looked straight out over towards the famous abbey, whilst across the yard was an old building that provided lodgings for Alan Turing when he was a scholar at Sherborne School in the inter war years. A blue plaque on the wall records this little bit of history. Sherborne is a bit of a centre for world renowned educational establishments with Sherborne boys school, Sherborne girls school and the preparatory school as well. Sherborne school itself is popular for filmmakers who chose it for filming Goodbye Mr Chips in 1969, and more recently for The Imitation Game and Wolf Hall.



Sherborne School
 

The town sits in a valley surrounded by gentle Dorset hills and notably bounded by the railway line on the south side. Approaching the town from the south the road follows the hillside and provides a fine view down over the town to the north. Here lies an area of common land tracing both the rail line and the river, and of course you would be seen as a naked rambler if you did not have the requisite dog to accompany you. Once over the level crossing the road passes a modern Sainsbury's to the right, built with materials a cut above your average Sainsbury's to blend in with the general honey coloured ambience. After that you're right into the bosom of the town.

The abbey is a large and fine specimen, mainly 15th century, honed in that fine yellow stone that makes you think twice whether you're really in Dorset, hemmed in from the north by Sherborne school and its ancient courtyards, and bordered by an open area of grass, seating and pathway to the south. I was rather amused to see the Sherborne food bank in the abbey, an empty container which I thought reflected the obvious prosperity of this area! As for the abbey itself, none other than Simon Jenkins in his book, ‘England's Thousand Best Churches,’ says of the fan vaulting, ‘I would pit Sherborne’s roof against any contemporary work of the Italian Renaissance.’ And Sir Walter Raleigh worshipped here as well.



Sherborne Abbey

 If you fancy a museum tour after visiting the abbey, Sherborne museum sits in the little lane, Church Lane, that runs from the Abbey to the Conduit at the bottom of Cheap St. After the museum stop, passing under the Bow Arch you move from ecclesiastical to commercial territory onto Cheap St and the Parade where regular markets are held. Here is the Conduit, the monks lavatorium or wash house originally sited inside the cloisters but moved to this point after 1539 and the dissolution of the monasteries.

The main thoroughfare, Cheap St, swathes north - south through the town with the usual concoction of bookshops, chemists, cafes and chains purveying their business from medieval type buildings of higher than average attractiveness. About two thirds of the way down, a right turn into the wonderfully named Half Moon St takes you past the abbey to your right and on out of town, in fact past the girls boarding house. On this road are a couple of watering holes opposite the abbey and an Indian restaurant on the right just before you get to the abbey and worth a visit. I dined there like a king on my first night. 

Sherborne railway station at the bottom or south end of the town borders Pageant Park, a salubrious green space making any arrival think they have arrived in an English spa town. These gardens were funded by the great pageant of 1905 held to celebrate the 1200th anniversary of St Aldhelm, Sherborne’s first bishop. An attractive piece of greenery to draw one into Sherborne’s charm.

Sherborne is fortunate enough to be graced with not one but two castles, the Old and the New, both with Sir Walter Raleigh connections. How many towns can boast that? The Old Castle is much more of a ruin, although quite a respectable one as ruins go. Both castles are within walking distance of the town centre to the east and south east. The old castle is more or less straight out of the town centre along Newland, the main road east, then up a little side road, Castleton Rd flanked at the end by some ancient residences. Then up a track to the kiosk where you pay your entrance fee to English Heritage  (£4.30 for an adult). 



Old Castle

A bridge to the left carries you over the moat and through the south west gatehouse built by the Bishop Roger of Salisbury into an expansive circle of grass in the middle of which are the remains of the Great Tower, the upper parts of which were destroyed by parliamentary forces after the Civil War. Not too much to see here unless you have a thing for medieval brickwork. However it provides a romantic setting, a heap of ruins in the centre of a large grass circle itself surrounded by a moat and outer footpath. The views take In the town, the gentle Dorset countryside and a good peek into the grounds of the New Castle virtually stuck onto the edge of the old one. 

There's a lot more to the New Castle, poised on the edge of a lake and surrounded by sumptuously rolling manicured grounds. This castle, a sixteenth century Tudor mansion (and more of a mansion than a castle!) and built by Sir Walter Raleigh in 1594, I didn't get to see, but it's equally accessible from the town centre if you take the main street south towards the rail station. Over the level crossing and you've got the dog walking meadows to the left while the main road curls up and if you bear left the castle entrance is a short distance on the right. The entrance fee for the castle and gardens is £12. Sir Walter Raleigh was eventually imprisoned for treason and the castle was returned to the crown. Sir John Digby acquired the castle in 1617 and it has been the home of the Digby family  since then. That famous mainstay of stately home grounds design, Capability Brown created the landscape garden including the 50 acre lake. 

Incidentally if you cross the road before getting to the castle, straight on from the level crossing, there is a footpath that takes you up the hillside to the right of the castle grounds and on into rolling Dorset countryside with sweeping views of the castle and its grounds to the left and rustic panoramas generally all round. It's a good second best if you've little time or can't afford another castle visit, and you keep fit!



New Castle in distance



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What's not to like! Two castles sitting on the very town doorstep and accessible on foot from a town centre teashop. No more distance than the flight of an arrow! Go for it! I