11.5 miles 18.5 km. Difficulty: 3/10
Along the coast of Chichester Harbour AONB, sometimes venturing inland.
Chidham church, passed in the morning, has a collection of teasel dolls portraying key events from history. (Black Death, Joan of Arc, that sort of thing).
Lunch is in Bosham, once an important harbour. The church there is depicted on the Bayeux tapestry and the doorway bears marks where returning crusaders* blunted their swords. So it's old.
Finally, on to Chichester and through the Bishops Palace Gardens.
There’s a cathedral there. It’s an old one, full of old stuff. Individual entry is free (£7 donation suggested) closes at 5pm.
Trains
Get the 9:35 Bognor/Portsmouth train from Victoria. (Clapham Jct. 9:42, East Croydon 9:53) , arriving Southbourne at 11:15
Get a return to Southbourne.
Return trains to Victoria from Chichester: xx:09 and xx:39
Lunch
An early option is the Old House at Home in Chidham 01243 572 477 open from 12.
The recommended pub is the Anchor Bleu 01243 572956 in Bosham, (You pass another on the diversion). There's also Wendy's Cafe at Bosham Walk Arts and Crafts Centre 01243 572 475
Tea Cloisters Café (tel 01243 813590) in the grounds of the Cathedral is recommended though it closes at 4. There’s a Wetherspoons, The Dolphin and Anchor, in West Street 01243 790280
Directions here
A footpath on the approach to Bosham has been closed for a while, due to a gap in the sea wall. You are advised to take the diversion along a road (unless you can leap like a gazelle or are happy with wet socks). T=1.37
*Crusading is what people did before they had football. The winning team got to keep places.
2 comments:
The pub is fully booked so the cafe or sandwiches may be the best lunch option…
n=5 on a day that w=started-cool-got-hotter After bigging up the church at Chidham, Mr Tiger was extremely dischuffed to find it locked. No teasel dolls for us. A strongly syllabled yowl has been sent to the authorities.(frowny face).
And so to Bosham. Well not directly. The path to it is still out of action. And what rankled more is that the blindingly obvious “this path is closed” notice has been replaced by an easily missed one tucked in the bushes, lesding one to believe it might be open again A feeling reinforced by the shiny new Charles III coast path signs pointing that way. Another yowl festered. The group fragmented here with 3 following the tedious diversion into Bosham and 2, who we thought were following, disappearing. This may be because we ourselves disappeared into the Berkley Arms for drinks. Pleasant enough. We then headed down into Bosham, where one ate in the cafe and 1 picnicked by the church. The Anchor Bleu was of course fully booked.
We continued to Chichester in the heat, having split into 2 fast and 1 slower one then went home
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