Length: 20.1 km (12.5 miles) Shortened to 11 miles if you start walk in Chartham
Toughness: 4 out of 10 No steep hills today
Either
London St Pancras: 10-12 hrs Southeastern High Speed service to Margate
Arrive Ashford International: 10-50 hrs Change trains
Leave Ashford International: 11-05 hrs Southeastern stopping service from Victoria to Ramsgate (as below)
Arrive Chilham: 11-17 hrs
Arrive Chartham: 11-21 hrs
Or
London Victoria: 09-25 hrs Southeastern stopping service to Ramsgate Bromley South: 09-42 hrs
Arrive Chilham: 11-17 hrs
Arrive Chartham: 11-21 hrs
Return
Canterbury West to St Pancras: direct service at 26 mins past the hour
Canterbury West to Victoria: direct service at 03 mins past the hour (and 26 mins changing at Ashford International)
Canterbury East to Victoria: direct service at 16 and 47 mins past the hour
Rail ticket: buy a day return to Canterbury Stations. If travelling on HS1 for all or part of your journey you will need to pay the HS1 supplement between St Pancras and Ashford International
In recent years (apart form Covid lockdown) today's walk has been posted on Good Friday, a sort of pilgrimage to allow those who wish to attend the short but uplifting service of Choral Evensong in Canterbury Cathedral at walk-end.
The walk starts either in Chilham or in Chartham (for those preferring a shorter walk). The only lunch pub en route today after a number of unfortunate closures is in Chartham, at the Artichoke pub, which serves basic but perfectly acceptable pub grub. Otherwise, it is a picnic lunch today, so do please bring along provisions for your lunch. A suggested place to stop for your picnic is in the playground as you leave the village of Chartham Hatch: there are a number of wooden picnic tables with benches here.
As for the walk, you have a lovely mixture of farmland, woods (early bluebells, possibly) - and apple orchards, where early signs of apple blossom might be showing. After Church Wood and Blean Woods you soon find yourselves in the extensive grounds of the University of Kent, which you walk through and up. Just beyond the University Sports Centre, at the highest point of the campus, you have a wonderful view of the city below - and the Cathedral. You now drop down a grassy way to the outskirts of the city, through residential streets, then on into the city proper with all its special sites - and Canterbury Cathedral. The Cathedral is usually closed to the general public on Good Friday - but open to those (without paying the entrance fee) attending today's services - including Choral Evensong at 5-30 pm.
For tea in the city and for directions to the two railway stations please refer to the Walk Directions.
Today's Good Friday Walk seldom disappoints.
T=1.28
Walk Directions are here: L=1.28
2 comments:
"about" n=20, I'm told
Yes, at 20 on this walk in w_fine_spring_sunshine. At least 3 went for an early lunch in the Artichoke. Along the way, there were superb displays of Anemones and Bluebells which seemed to be slightly ahead of areas further north. The Apple orchards were just opening their buds and a wood ants nest was discovered in Blean woods.
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