The River Medway at Wateringbury

A pleasantly suprising and beautiful walk along the River Medway this afternoon. This was at the midway point after walking along the banks of the river from Barming Bridge. After this we followed the Medway Valley Path for most of the way back to Barming.

The return route was if anything better than the outward leg as we were higher on the valley side and looked out up and down the river. The sun was shining and the air warm on our backs - a perfect late summer day after a few days of unseasonably cool weather.

We'd not walked the higher part of the Medway Valley before and it was a revelation, some lovely properties with superb outlooks over the river and its valley. We' ve always regarded the Medway west of Maidstone as particularly nice but rarely made the effort to walk along it.

Earlier in the day I'd spent the morning in eager anticipation of the delivery of 12 new sheds, half of the 24 we'd obtained as a result of a grant application by the Parish Council. Unfortunately, despite being told they would be on site between 8.30am and lunchtime, they did not appear. At 12.30 the "van was still in New Romney and had to come back to the depot and load up and it would be sometime in the afternoon" so it would be "sometime in the afternoon" when we would expect delivery.

I don't know whether the sheds arrived as we went out on the walk, but the morning was usefully spent tidying up and weeding and picking a few more beans, courgettes and beetroot.