The Last of England

Another bright sunny day, another chance to complete another significant stretch of the Kent coast.

collecting the coast

I hadn’t realised I’d embarked on a sub-project to walk the coast of Kent. However, on reflection, it seems that’s what I’m doing right now. I’d decided to walk from Dover to Deal on Saturday, mainly because engineering work on many other routes on the south-east rail network meant going anywhere else would be painfully slow. Once I’d, chosen this walk, though, I realised this would be a more interesting route than some of my more recent ones. For a start, the terrain would be significantly different, with welcome changes of elevation throughout the journey, I’d be walking through one of the most iconic landscapes in the country and it would add a significant segment of the Kent coast to my portfolio.

So, bright and early, last Saturday morning we arrived at Dover station – learning from my previous walk (and knowing something of this part of Kent), I figured it would be better to start in Dover and head north, keeping the sun out of our eyes and getting the dreary exit from Dover over with quickly.

history

Once you’re up on the cliffs by the castle, you’re effectively out of Dover and the views and the air improve enormously. There’s a lot of history around here. For example, on the way out of town, you pass a Norman church, badly damaged by German shellsing (from France) in WWII, there’s the place where Louis Blériot landed after making the first flight in a heavier-than-air aircraft across the English channel and, of course, the castle itself, which has been occupied for nine centuries.

photos

Visibility out across the channel was somewhat limited by a sea mist (especially around the port), but inland and along the coast, the air was bright – unseasonally bright – and there was a good opportunity to get some bright, punchy photos.

Building on the lessons I’d learned from the last couple of walks, I had already decided just to concentrate on material for my pathways project. We had quite distance to cover in the day, so opportunities to linger and take more considered photos were limited. Today was to comprise mainly of a series of quick snaps, that could document the route along the way.

Things are moving on, the basic errors I’d re-encountered in recent outings were not in evidence in these photos. But there are other issues, some are technical and others are artistic, but progress is in evidence and that’s the important to me right now. A few photos from this session turned out to be under-exposed and somewhat contrasty, but the basic ideas are there and, with the experience gained recently, I can move on. It was a good walk and a good session and I learned more about the camera. I’m getting much more comfortable with the handling and actions are becoming more automatic for me.

This walk was very loosely based on the description from Stuart Field’s web site, albeit in the opposite direction, the route (split in two by the D-Tour, after a picnic break), can be viewed here and here.

PS – thanks to Ford Maddox Brown for the title.

posted on 25 March 2012
category: daily photo, pathways