We woke the morning afterwards .... to a blizzard! Our first walk was going to be a chilly one!
Our walk today was to take us from our start point, Monkbretton Bridge in Rye, to Dungeness, a journey of around 4 hours and covering some 11 miles. The route would take us initially along a popular local walk from Rye, following an old tram track then through the Golf Club, to the beach at Camber and then folow the coast along to Dungeness.
We started, well-wrapped pretty much on the dot of 9.30 and ... it was snowing and bitterly cold! We celebrated the start of our journey ... by taking the wrong turn right at the start! The initial part of the walk took us along the bank of the River Rother towards the channel. The footpath veers inland and crosses Rye Golf Club via an old tramway.
The Rye and Camber Tramway was opened in 1895 and, from its terminus at (ironically) Monkbretton Bridge via a station on the Golf Links took passengers to the popular seaside resort of Camber Sands. It was requisitioned in 1939 for military use and was never used by the public again. Today you can still see eveidence of the tramway and the old station on the Golf Links is also still visible.
Our route took us right across the Golf Course. Rye Golf Club has been ranked the 25th best golf course in the world by Golf World Magazine. Some locals consider the Club to be stereotypical, with arguably outdated high standards of dress and decorum required, a few hurdles needed in order to play and a reputation for upholding all the golfing tradtions that us non-golfers find incomprehensible! The annual Oxford v Cambridge match - the President's Putter - has been played at Rye since 1920.
One can't help thinking that as we walk over the course that we're intruding on something very special. And that us mere mortals (non golfers) are probably barely tolerated. And as for me - I think most golf courses are such a waste of decent countryside!! Today though the course is deserted apart from a couple of lads pinging balls towards a snow covered green, a couple of dogs with their owners - and a couple of chilly people looking to walk round the country!
After a sharp turn at the 4th tee we head towards the dunes that will take us on to one of the finest beaches on the south coast - Camber Sands. When we reached the beach the snow was still settled and Camber Sands had a slightly surreal look to it.
We're all pretty proud of Camber in these parts, though few will admit to enjoying its seaside experiemce! Its fine 7 miles of sandy beaches are popular with day trippers and, of course, visitors to the Pontins Camp that dominates the village. The dunes are included within a site of special scientific interest. There have been several shipwrecks off the coast and one notable wreck is still visible at low tide.
The area is well known as a location for film, TV and TV commercials. The beach was used as the D Day landings in the iconic filn The Longest Day and was also the setting in Carry on Follow that Camel.. The beach is also a popular location for kite surfing, windsurfing, kiteboarding, kite buggying and other silly kite activities.
After passing through Camber we followed the promenade path on the sea wall and headed for the Firing Ranges. To our left we could see the new Wind Farm that now sees some 26 windmills gently turning from their location on a remote Romney Marsh farm. The (Lydd) Ranges is a military firing range that has been used for military training for over 150 years and is part of the Dungeness, Romney Marsh and Rye Bay Site of Special Scientific Interest. Because the range is used for live firing, access is often restricted. Firing occurs on about 300 days a year and so there are very few opportunities to walk along the path along the sea shore. There is a 600mm gauge railway on the range which is used as a target railway.
Fortunately we were walking on a day when no firing was taking place and this emnabled us to follow the shorter route to Dungeness. As we walked, we were quickly aware of the looming presence of the Power Station at Dungeness. It looked quite a way off but Cathy reassured me it was only about a mile or so ahead - it turned out to be almost six miles away!! The going was reasonable to begin with as we passed various rusting bits of military hardware which presumably are used for target practice. Eventually though the pathway came to a windy halt on an exposed part of the Marsh and after clambering over barbed wire we headed for the lookout point on the beach and from there to Dungeness we tramped along the shingle beach. As the tide was in, this involved covering much of the distance over shingle at a 45 degree angle - and as the miles were covered it became tougher and tougher.
We passed the town of Lydd in the distance. Lydd is a corporate member of the Cinque Ports, a "limb" of Romney and as with much of the Romney Marsh area, the town was a base for smuggling in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Before World War I Lydd became an important artillery practice camp. Experiments with high explosives carried out on the shingle wastes around 1888 led to the invention of the explosive Lyddite. Lydd was at one time a garrison town, and the area is still an important training ground for the military - hence the Firing Ranges.
Lydd is also the site of an airfield, the first constructed in Britain after World War II - now bizarrely called London Ashford Airport.
With the shingle now beginning to take its toll on legs, it was a blessed relief when we reached the Power Station at Dungeness - and the end of Day 1 of our walk around the country! The weather had gradually improved - though the temperatures remained resolutely below zero - but at least the sun was shining!
Though quite keen to celebrate our first leg in the Britannia Inn, we'd managed to arrange a lift back to Rye and so that pleasure will have to go on ice (!)until Day 2 of our walk around Britain.
Miles covered 11.44 miles
Time taken 4 hours and 3 minutes
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