Project 365 day 295: Russell Gardens, Dover

Yesterday was a very nice Friday, which didn't leave me with any free time for my Blip journal. In the morning J's writing group had an informal chat session before starting the next unit of the project; it was pleasant and friendly, as always. After lunch, we drove down the Alkham Valley to Temple Ewell, on the edge of Dover, to stroll in the Russell Gardens. This is a park, owned and maintained by the local authority, opposite the much larger Kearsney Abbey park, and like its neighbour was originally attached to a large house. Kearsney Court was a late Victorian house whose owner ran a large paper mill; in 1901 he commissioned garden designer Thomas Mawson to create formal terraced gardens running down the hillside to the river Douer. After several changes of owner in the first half of the twentieth century, the lower part of the gardens was sold separately from the house, became increasingly neglected, and in the 1950s was eventually acquired by the local council and named Russell Gardens after a former mayor of Dover who was instrumental in saving both these gardens and Kearsney Abbey park from being developed for housing. A recent lottery grant has supported considerable restoration and replanting. There are a lot of beautiful mature trees, and an orchard has recently been planted along one of the terraces. There were swans, mallards, coots and moorhen on the river, and we watched a yellow wagtail bobbing on a stone beside a small weir and a cormorant flapping its outstretched wings on the river bank. It was a very pleasant place to stroll, and I'm sure we will return.

Back at home, we switched on the heating for the first time this autumn, and luxuriated in hot baths in our newly cosy bathroom. J and I then enjoyed a pizza and movie night: we watched Hidden Figures, the story of the African American women who worked for NASA as "computers", performing complex mathematical calculations essential to the development of the space programme.