This is part 2 of my hiking society trip to Hollingbourne; you can read part 1 here.
Into the Downs
As I mentioned in my post on Leeds Castle, our itinerary saw us return to Hollingbourne after two hours. The overall route followed a distorted figure of eight, with the second section following a more meandering loop through the North Downs, ending once again at Hollingbourne.
That said, we were only going to see a small slice of the North Downs at best. After all, the North Downs span a vast chunk of Surrey and Kent. Specifically, we were going to take in the Hollingbourne Downs, an area 150 acres wide. Still impressive, but at a far smaller scale.
The hike was relatively continuous. Once we got to the station, we just crossed over the footbridge and continued walking. We passed through low sloping hills, draped in tracks from farming, with some soil visible amidst the grass. This was a fairly straight section which mingled with the Upper Willow Beds. The hike started to get quite hilly around here, and I'll admit I wasn't entirely prepared for this. Occasionally, I felt out of breath, though it wasn't like the hills were torturous or anything, though. I'm just not an experienced hiker!
Soon enough, we took a left and ended up on the Pilgrims' Way. This is the historic route taken by pilgrims heading from Winchester to Thomas Becket's shrine in Canterbury. We passed by Allington Farm, where we saw cows resting in a barn and munching on hay. As I took a picture, I could see one of them heading towards the fence, almost eyeing me out of curiosity. At least it felt that way.
We turned off the Pilgrims' Way and continued heading uphill, passing into Forestall Wood. The wood spans a hundred acres, and was reportedly used as a hunting ground in Saxon times. Forestall Wood's part of a wider network of woods in the area, making up the Hucking Estate which is 700 acres in all. The view from here was wonderful, too, and I only then started to realise just how high up we'd climbed. According to the itinerary map, we'd gained 80m in elevation just through walking through the woods.
We then had lunch along a pretty viewing point, which I was relieved by. We'd just hiked for three hours, and I was somewhat exhausted. My sandwich was a bit destroyed, but on the whole things were alright. The view was a bit restricted by a dense mesh of nettles and flowers, and the sun was constantly in my eyes whenever I bothered looking outward. However, it was fun noticing how small Allington Farm looked from up here, amidst the rolling fields.
We continued hiking about an hour later, heading down fairly narrow trails for two kilometres straight. There wasn't much else to see along this stretch of the journey, which I spent mostly by myself taking fairly similar photos of the route from below. There were the odd hills to scale, including a particularly tiring trek up to our peak elevation of around 189m. Occasionally, a valley would come into view at just the right time, though I found myself nearly tripping up as I walked down them. We were surrounded by trees, and the view stayed constant. Rolling fields, a few pylons, the smoke from a distant pumping station. Occasionally, I was half wondering why I'd signed up.
Thankfully, the views were worth it, watching the hills bask in the glistening sunlight, not a single village in sight. Hills I'd gladly roll down for miles if the grass wasn't so muddy. I could even make out the beginnings of an impending sunset, with a thin orange layer breaking through the sky.
Thurnham Castle
Idly looking at the itinerary map, I noticed we'd soon be passing by another castle. I asked a committee member about it, and she said it wasn't en route so we probably wouldn't see it. I was naturally disappointed, especially as we were so close, but I'll tell you about it anyways.
Thurnham Castle dates back to the 12th century. However, the site had been home to fortifications as early as the Romans. They built a watchtower around here, which was later developed into a castle by the Saxons. The castle was then completely rebuilt by Robert of Thurnham in 1154 in flint, and took up about a quarter of an acre in size.
Robert became a good friend of King Richard the Lionheart, with the two embarking on the Third Crusade. He was placed in command of the English fleet and served in the conquest of Cyprus in 1191. In this time, with no one to provide upkeep, the castle began decaying. Today, only one 3m tall wall remains of the castle, a far cry from its historic peak.
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| The steps up to Thurnham Castle |
I photographed a sign for the castle, which had the side effect of leaving me stranded from the others. Many had gathered pace, clearly aiming for an earlier train, whilst a few lagged far behind. I did meet someone, admittedly, and we spent a while walking together. We took pictures and chatted and found ourselves passing through Thurnham. By this point, we were also back on the Pilgrims' Way. We didn't hang around for long, at most passing by the local pub. We spotted some sheep grazing in a nearby field and passed a few cars along the way.
The final stretch
After a while, we reuinted with the rest of the society. Everyone was looking to catch the earlier train, it turned out, so the rest of the hike proceeded at brisk speed. We even deviated from the intended route to pass through a shortcut down to the station.
Said shortcut was especially picturesque. It felt like I was walking through fields suited for computer wallpapers. The glowing sun probably helped this feeling, come to think of it. We passed through farmland along a faint trail, making haste towards the station and chatting away. Somehow, we made it after twenty minutes...and the same train ended up cancelled. Hmmm.
It took a while to get back home, unsurprisingly, but it was still worth it in the end. All in all, our leg around the woods lasted nearly 12km and four hours. It may not have been as stunning as the walk around Leeds Castle, but it was nonetheless worth it. Not bad for a somewhat remote village in the countryside.
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