Kent Holiday Day 1

Today we headed south to Allhallows-on-Sea on the Hoo peninsula in Kent for a 4-night stay at the Haven Kent Coast Holiday Park, where we have a caravan for our stay.

We didn't leave home until 10:10am but we we were still at Hoo St Werburgh on the Hoo peninsula before midday. We had a little walk here and  were lucky to find the church open to have a look inside before we had our lunch.

Thomas Aveling is buried in the churchyard.

There is also a memorial plaque. Thomas Aveling and Richard Thomas Porter entered into partnership in 1862, and developed a steam engine three years later in 1865. By the early 1900s, the company had become the largest manufacturer of steamrollers (road rollers) in the world.

The churchyard had ben mown and tidied this morning and the volunteers were just about to leave the church, but invited us in for a look.

Here is the story of St Werburgh

I loved this sign.

Dawn liked the brasses on the floor but we didn't have time to investigate further as the church was being locked up.

I had intended having lunch at The Chequers...

...but although lights were on inside the door was still locked at 12:15, so we ended up going to the Five Bells instead. The beer and toasted sandwiches we had were a little underwhelming, but never mind.

We liked the name of this local shop.

We came across these signs for the English Coastal Path. We will be back here later in the week, I think.

Here is the village sign.

After lunch, we drove to Grain on the Isle-of-Grain and did a short walk there before heading for our holiday home and checking in at about 3:20pm.

This was our route.

We parked close to the front at the Beach car park for the Grain Coastal Park.

It was just a short walk down to the sea.

To the North we could see Southend-on-Sea in Essex on the other side of the Thames.

We had an easy path along the coast.

Further on we could see across to Sheerness on the Isle of Sheppey. This is Garrison Point Fort.

The beach was littered with shells.

Just offshore in the mouth of the river Medway is Grain Tower.

We met a local on his bike later and he told us that there is a causeway to the tower that is still usable at low tide. Apparently local lads used to walk out to the tower at low tide, stay and fish when the tide came in and walked back when the tide went out again. Sometimes the Sheerness police would come and take them off the tower... and deposit them in Sheerness to make their own way home, which is a bit of a long way round!

We saw this container ship...

...and this ferry sail out the mouth of the River Medway.

Further round we could see a power station.

We returned on an inland route.

We were soon back at the Coastal Park.

It was after 3pm now so time to go and check in. Here are a few photos from the holiday park.

Our caravan has two bedrooms and a large open area for kitchen/dining/lounge.

We were close to the Yacht Club bar.

Looking up the Thames - yes we are on the Thames Estuary here.

We saw a laden container ship heading for port further up river.

This turnstone posed obligingly.

We walked along to the main complex....

...and had a drink at the Marina bar.

Later we returned to the Huffkin of Hoo retaurant for our evening meal.

After dark we could see the lights of Southend...

...and west along the river.

You can find more details of our 2.7 miles walk on the Isle-of-Grain here on MapMyWalk (or download a GPX file here) and see more of my photos of the day here on Flickr.