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Let it snow and let peregrines unexpectedly appear

Some of this winter’s coldest weather has breezed in from the north east. It’s brought snow flurries, few of which have penetrated as far west as London but have deposited a few centimetres on the Greensand Ridge south of Sevenoaks, and along the North Downs towards Maidstone.

I was rather taken by the scene yesterday morning at 9am while cycling from my home in Lower Sydenham to the railway station. As I crossed Perry Hill in bright sunshine, flakes of snow suddenly intensified into a bit of a mini-blizzard, seemingly out of a blue sky. I looked around and saw it was being blown in from a dark cloud to the north. Just at that moment I heard the ‘cawing’ of a crow and saw to my astonishment a peregrine falcon clutching a small bird in its talons wheel away to the south, beating its wings rapidly, as two irate crows followed in lukewarm pursuit. An unusual thing to see in Sydenham, while it snowed – from a blue sky.

Anyway, proof that snow still happens south of London is provided by Ightam Mote’s Twitter feed. (Walk to Ightam Mote from One Tree Hill.)

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Fancy a mud-free January walk? Then, Knole Park, Kent, is the one

Well, almost; the forest (pictured below) in the far east of the park has a bit. But yes, Knole today was a joy. Glorious sunshine, brisk breeze – a special wintry atmosphere and little gooey saturated soil. Many of the walks on this site are now besieged by mud – One Tree Hill could be the worst. There has been a lot of rain in the past two weeks so good wellies essential for now – apart from Knole. My Knole walk is here.

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Hoo peninsula walk at Cliffe, north Kent

A lovely piece by Carol Donaldson in the Guardian at the Christmas weekend drew my attention to this area just east of Gravesend. It’s only an hour’s drive from, say, Brockley (potentially less if you can get to the A2 more quickly than I did today) and 40 minutes by train from Lewisham (direct to Higham on the Gillingham route). You can walk direct (about 2.5 miles from Higham station) to the marshes RSPB reserve at Cliffe Pools or get the 133 bus. The walk I did starts at Cliffe village on the little chalk ridge above the marshes, right by 13th-century St Helen’s Church and heads west, reaching the sea wall before returning through lagoons to Cliffe. The churchyard could be where Pip came across Magwitch in Great Expectations (it might be that the children’s graves at nearby Cooling is where this was imagined) and Charles Dickens’ daughter was married nearby at St Mary’s, Lower Higham. More recently, the marshes served as paddy fields in Full Metal Jacket, Kubrick’s Vietnam movie made in the late 1980s.

The beauty of the area is that you can just walk off into the marshes and make for the sea wall – there’s lots of interesting historical features including a beached boat. Otherwise there’s big skies, a lot of birds (the plaintive calls of waders accompany you throughout), ships gliding on the river beyond the wall, timeless atmosphere … I’ll add details of the route I took soon, as well as the Westerham-Chartwell route. Yet another place near London that takes you to another time seemingly hundreds of miles away. Some pix…

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Soft light on a December walk in Kent

There’s no doubt about it. Winter walks aren’t always particularly uplifting. Views are subdued and less vibrant. The oranges and reds of autumn have gone, to be replaced by toned-down browns and greens. There’s mud, damp and murkiness that can make you want to flee the country. But the sky picks its moments to remedy everything; pink and orange sunsets, swathes of deep azure; the rush towards dusk bathing ancient Kent rural scenes in yellow and grey light. There are times when you feel that our little pokey-out county is in tune with the timeless far north; Iceland, Norway, Lapland… maybe the Vikings who settled here felt most at home on these dark cold days. Am I being pretentious? Stop me if I am. I’ll stop then.

Here are some pictures from early afternoon on December 16, 2017, on the high-level Meenfield woods walk, to the west of Shoreham and the little valley separating Meenfield and Andrews woods (an extension to walks 2 and 8).

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Winter walks of Downe, Shoreham and Sevenoaks

The autumn colours have well and truly gone and the more subtle tones of winter are with us. I’ve had to change all the header images on this website to suit… didn’t feel as though the autumn ones got much of a run. My favourites of the headers are the row of trees against a blue sky in late afternoon at Lullingstone with flinty field in the foreground, and beautiful winter sunset colours from east of Shoreham. Snow at Downe and in Meenfield Wood feature, as does a fantastic fog at Ide Hill.

Mud has set in on all the walks so if you lack wellies you may want to know that Knole Park, Shoreham circular, Lullingstone and Downe are the most mud-free strolls on this site (See walks at top of page) – perfect for Boxing Day. Below is that misty sunset from farmland just east of Shoreham.

Nearing Dunstall Farm

Nearing Dunstall Farm at the end of the walk (walk 14 and walk 5)

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Remembrance Day walk – lost in the woods

Deciding to do a half-remembered walk without map or instructions I set off from Westerham to Chartwell on a 4.5-mile circular route taking in French Street hamlet. Of course I got lost. These woods (Tower wood, Hosey Common) are pretty full-on and some of the paths they contain draw you in only to spit you out into a ditch or thicket with no choice but to retrace your steps. Still, I stumbled across Chartwell eventually but saw nothing of French St. Being Remembrance Sunday it seemed a good choice; but then I remembered that Churchill hadn’t stayed there much during the war, having been withdrawn to Chequers – far away from possible commando raids. It’s not a particularly amazing house but it’s hard to think of one in the south of England with as much significance and in such a brilliant setting.

Looking back towards Westerham

Looking back towards Westerham and the North Downs ridge, 11 November 2017

The path up on Mariners Hill gives a great view over Winston’s house and into the Weald beyond to the Ashdown Forest. There are also some fantastic sequoia-type trees (giant firs?) to admire. I took a trail back in the direction of Westerham in the twilight; another false path that delivered me without fanfare right on to the dangerous B2026, which hairpins around the greensand ridge on its way to Edenbridge. As I hugged the verge, most cars slowed and gave me a wide berth – and I thank them, but not Mr Audi Q5; he sped around the bend oblivious to the possibility of a vehicle coming the other way and me, a pedestrian, plodding along on the verge. He nearly ran me down. I gestured; he beeped. A prime SUV numpty – a person wrapped up in their own importance I thought.

Chartwell from Mariners Hill

Chartwell from Mariners Hill

By now it was the gloaming time and I spotted another path on the left leading down through woods into a valley. What a joy this was: a carpet of red leaves and glimmering water to my left. I later found out this was the infant River Darent. A gorgeous path. I’ll have to incorporate it into a walk soon.

Weald view from Mariners Hill, Kent

Weald view from Mariners Hill, Kent

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Downe walk

The Downe walk is very handy when you haven’t got much time (and you have a car) because it’s relatively close to SE London. It’s also great to do after/before visiting Downe House and has two good pubs, a lovely cake shop and a pretty good curry house. It’s also quite short (2.5 miles) – enough for a bit of exercise without risking pulling a hamstring. One thing I’ve noticed of late is that whoever farms the final field on re-entering the village keeps obliterating the footpath every time they harvest/plough. It’s quite annoying and thoughtless. There are enough walkers to re-establish the path but after it rains that final field won’t be a lot of fun. I can’t really suggest a diversion either. Anyway, with autumn colours it’s all looking rather nice … (pictured is the penultimate field, not the ploughed up one).

Autumn colours on the Downe walk

Autumn colours on the Downe walk

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Special trees on these Kent walks

Of the countless arboreal delights of north-west Kent there are a few standout trees. There’s the tall, straight oak on the Ightam Mote path, the enormous yew near the sandstone holloway’s entrance on the Hever walk, the high, buzzard-friendly larches encountered on the Shoreham eastern valleys walk, just about every tree in Knole…

But few are more striking – or precarious – than this beech growing out of the greensand escarpment at One Tree Hill, which walkers pass on their way towards, or back from, Ightam Mote. The picture below doesn’t do it full justice: because the camera is pointing down, it’s hard to appreciate the gradient this amazing tree is growing out of. Let’s hope it lasts a while yet.

The amazing tree growing out of the escarpment at One Tree Hill

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Ide Hill colours

All of these walks are great for autumn colour but Ide Hill’s panoramas, valley mists and tree varieties are a bit special. Even though the red/orange thing hadn’t really got going last week these pictures give a flavour of the season’s changes (see the walk’s page for more great autumnal shots). At Emmetts last week I really liked the weird bush with pink ‘berries’ – it loves it down in Patagonia where it lives above the tree line and it’s called gaultheria mucronata. The berries are apparently edible.

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