A Long Walk at Dusk

Taking advantage of being released from my isolation, I took the opportunity to go on a dusky ramble this evening.

This is a walk that I’m very familiar with, walking up and down countless times and with countless people. It’s an area I love to introduce to people who haven’t seen it before as it’s an area of true untouched natural beauty.

The walk takes you along the clifftop. Nothing separating you from the sheer drop below. As I walk to the edge of the cliff my stomach always does a little summersault, only made worse if someone else is the one to step closer.

!

The landscape has changed slightly since I came this way when I was younger. Some of the cliff top eroded by the tides. I always find this very confronting. A visual representation of the unrelenting power of the sea.

Below the cliffs lies Pegwell Bay. The terrain down there is pretty unforgiving, I’ve nearly lost a few shoes in the mud flats and salt marshes.

It’s also a sight of historic importance, unchanged and untouched; it is the same place that Julius Caesar began his invasion into Britain twice. It’s the same place that I scattered my Nan’s ashes a few years ago.

Apparently it’s common to find Amber on Pegwell Bay, I’ve never been so lucky. Although I did once get handed some foraged sea plant, I forgot what it was and never did cook it.

At the end of my walk I reached the Viking Ship. A ‘replica of a re-constructed Viking Longship which sailed from Denmark to Thanet in 1949. This was to commemorate the 1,500th anniversary of the A.D. 449 landing of Anglo-Saxon chieftains Hengist and Horsa at Ebbsfleet, and the betrothal of Hengist's daughter, Rowena, to King Vortigen of Kent.’

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The sun set. I went home.