Stour Valley Walk

We beat the rain on our walk today with Dennis and Irene and defeated the fog too.

All the way to Chilham it was very foggy, clearing up to bright sunshine for a couple of hours along the walk with the first raindrops falling as we arrived back at the car park.

This walk, “Mr Darcy’s Chilham” around Chilham, past the Castle and Godmersham Hall which was billed in the guidebook as 5 miles turned out to be 7 miles and no, we didn’t go wrong at all.

The guidebook says that although Jane Austen is more usually associated with Hampshire she spent a great deal of time in Kent visiting her brother Edward who was adopted the Knights who were a childless couple and went to live in their stately pile, Godmersham Hall.

The Darcy connection comes from the suggestion that Pride and Prejudice may well have been written in Kent and Darcy may have been based on one of “dark haired men in tight breeches” who would be riding around this superb bit of Kent Countryside.

Today’s blip from part of the Stour Valley Walk looking down towards Woodsdale Farm and the Down Woods beyond. It is also the site of a rather ignominious skid I performed of sheep droppings a little further down the slope.