WWINK - Women Walking In Kent

This was a 9 mile walk entitled "To the very top" and was taken from the "Train Rides to Ramble" series of books from the Kentish Stour Countryside Project. Nine of us set off from Charing train station and headed through the village and past the 14th century Archbishop's Palace and the church, both of which are situated on the Market Square. We went in an easterly direction across fields until we reached the Pilgrims Way at Burnt House Farm and then began a steady uphill climb along an ancient sunken trackway through woods. We went on past The Kent Gliding Club where we saw a few gliders being launched on a winch and later one or two passed low overhead as they came in to land.

Last weekend when I pre-walked part of the route, there were bluebells in the woods in this area but today they were faded and were well past their best.

We then reached one of the highest points in the area at over 190m above sea level before heading down towards Westwell. We stopped for lunch before reaching the village and sat in a spot where we could just about make out the Crown on the Downs above Wye. We also had a hazy view over Ashford.

After lunch we went along a section of the Pilgrim's Way before taking a road south into Westwell, the furthest point from the start of the walk. The route back to Charing was firstly across a large arable field and by this time the sun was probably at it's hottest and we were glad to get into the shade of a wood known as Charing Beech Hangers. The wood is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) because of the diverse flora that occurs on the chalky soil. Unfortunately, many of the old Beech trees were lost in the Great Storm of 1987.

We then took the Pilgrims Way, which thankfully was a shady woodland path, to Burnt House Farm again before retracing our steps back into Charing.

The walk took approx 4 hours and we reckoned the temperature reached about 25 degrees. We had a quick drink in the newly refurbished Royal Oak in Charing before they chucked us out.