Autumn colouring

Autumn colours have been quite outstanding this year, more exotic and saturated than usual. We had a ramble from Newnham, near Faversham, via Eastling, Stalisfield, and Doddington, and the woods near Eastling were astonishing in their richness of colour. Must be something to do with the rain.

Echoes from the Sky

At the back of Lade Pit, Lydd-on-Sea, are the three Listening Devices, Concrete Ears or Sound Mirrors, built in the1920’s and 30’s as part of a national early warning system against enemy aircraft. They are not normally open to the public. As part of Heritage Open Weekend, these could be visited on 14 September in a guided tour –some 200 people took the opportunity. We joined that tour, and walked the mile or so from Lade car park to the island in the lakes where these concrete installations are. The area is privately owned, and our guide explained it required about three days worth of paperwork to arrange visits. Dr Richard Scarth accompanied the tour and lectured at each one about its details –but such was the size of the crowd that we did not hear a great deal.

Kent Coast in Pictures

Kent Coast in Pictures is a website run by Harold Wyld to illustrate the Kent coast from Dartford to Dungeness. The puropose is to illustrate the Kent coast, and some time ago Harold invited me to send him photos which might be of interest. Many of the photos on the site are by Harold, but there are several other photographers represented, including my good friend Gerry Costa. The coast is split into a number of sections. It is a gallery of illustrative photos rather than necessarily of high pictorial content, but it is highly informative when you want to get a view of what some parts of the coast are like. I've included one of my photos of Shakespeare Cliff in a storm here, plus a link to see the site. There's always room for more good coastal photos. Harold also produces the Walmer Web, a website containing local news in Walmer and Deal.

Kingsdown Church

Kingsdown Church
Originally uploaded by Conundrum37

Some time ago I admired the silhouette of Kingsdown church when seen of an evening from the beach road near the Zetland Arms. Last night I tried a few shots: I shall try again in a misty light.

Romney Marsh and Dymchurch

Yesterday (Sunday) my walking group had a 13 mile walk from Hythe along the Royal Military Canal, then via Burmarsh along the sewers to Dymchurch: then back along the seafront, back across the fields to Botolph's Bridge and then through West Hythe along the other side of the canal to Hythe. No hills to speak of, very humid conditions, but a grand walk nevertheless. Sewers is the name given to the drainage dykes which criss-cross the Marsh. They do not carry sewage as we understandit. Lunch in Dymchurch was a bit uninspiring -I and two friends found a cafe where the best we could do was toasted cheese and ham sandwiches. A sunny morning, but threatening skies in the afternoon, but in fact we kept dry throughout. The canal is very pretty, used only by anglers at this distance from Hythe. I don't think I'd walk on Romney Marsh regularly, it can get uninteresting and is less scenic and more intensely farmed than the Oare and Faversham marshes.

A Year in the Life of Faversham

This is the title of a photographic project set up by Faversham resident Nathalie Banaigs. The project is to display 366 photographs taken between 1 July 2007 -30 June 2008. The result, timed to coincide with Faversham's Hop Festival, is displayed as from 30 August in the Drill Hall, Preston Street, Faversham. I have walked a number of times around the Saxon Shore Way, beside Oare and Faversham Marshes, and I love the area for its solitude and ambience. I'd posted a number of photos of this area on Flickr -see link- and Nathalie contacted me -and others- to see if I would allow some photos to be used. Of course I agreed, and the final result was that 4 of my photos are exhibited in the exhibition. Every photo had to be taken on a particular different day, in sequence throughout the year. The one which attracted most interest was of a bicycle outside the Sun Inn, West Street, in which I used used selective colour, showing the sign in colour and the street in black and white. The others were of a flight of geese over the creek, a fishing boat at Harty Ferry, and the creek near Nagden with a line of pylons. The work of some 52 photographers is exhibited: most are local residents, a few like me are frequent visitors. It's an ambitious project, and an excellent exhibition. The photos are appended. Madeleine and I went to the formal opening on Friday, and had a good view around, and I met one of my flickr contacts, Jack Picknell, another non-resident exhibitor. A very pleasant evening, preceded by a visit to a really excellent Farm shop, Macknades', in Selling Street,where there is an enormous range of food: including some very fine Italian cold meats and some lovely bread flour for the bread machine from Wessex Mills.

Wengen

We've had two holidays now at Wengen, in the Bernese Oberland, in September 06 and June this year. We've now booked the next one in September 09. It's an idyllic little mountain village, on the way up to the Jungfrau, and can only be reached by the mountain cog railway -or on foot. We have a favourite hotel, and people go there year after year. The views are stunning, and the walking possibilities endless. The trains themselves are great fun, riding up very steep gradients and affording gorgeous views. A few miles up the line there is Kleine Scheidegg, must be one of the highest railway junctions in Europe, where you can catch the red trains going up through the long tunnel through the eiger to the Jungfraujoch. Or the green and yellow trains down the next valley to Grindelwald. There we can take a gondola up to First, another starting point for superb walking and views. In June this year, some of those walks were still covered in snow in parts. All in all, a wonderful palce to be, but you need two weeks to explore- and to spread out the inevitable wet days, when the clouds come down and the best walks are in the Lauterbrunnen valley.

We travelled there by train from Ashford: overnight in Paris, then via Mulhouse, Basle, Interlaken and Lauterbrunnen. You can fly to Zurich, but you will still have a long train journey and we're fed up with Gatwick.