Last Thursday I jumped on the train (3 trains actually) and went to Dover. I selected the high speed train through London option so it only took 2hrs and cost around $100.
Dover is famous for the huge white chalk cliffs, and it is also the place where the ferry and chunnel go to France. The weather was forecast to be good, 14 degrees with patchy cloud and only 5% chance of rain. Perfect for an outside walk!
From Dover train station it is a 40 min walk to the White Cliffs visitor centre. Half of it is up a very steep hill. Very steep, around 45 degrees. Along the way you get a view of the truck ferries loading and unloading.
From the visitor centre, it is a 50 min walk to the South Foreland lighthouse. This is the most popular walk apparently. The path splits a few times along the way so you can walk right on the cliff edge or away from it. From the cliff edge path you get some incredible views of the white cliffs. Spectacular views! It is also extremely windy on the edge and you could literally fly away if you have an umbrella! You can also see France and mobile phones may connect to France and change to international roaming!
At the lighthouse, there is a café & toilets open for visitors. No tours of the lighthouse yet though. Lunch with a view was needed before the long walk back.
I decided to go to Dover Castle as well. Unfortunately for me, you have to go ALL the way to the bottom of the cliffs before turning around and reclimbing back to the top of another cliff to reach the castle. My legs were not liking the steep downward walking so by this stage, my knees were aching and my thighs cramping. Well worth it for the views though.
Dover Castle is open for the grounds only still due to covid restrictions. The grounds are quite large though and there are lots of buildings to look at. They have plaques all over the place giving the age of each building which is good. There is a Roman lighthouse and church, both built around 1AD. That is around 2020 years ago! The lighthouse is still standing!
After I had enough of the icy wind and my legs had almost quit on me, it was time to head back to the train station (another 30mins). In total from the time I left home to the time I returned home, I walked 23km and my elevation was the equivalent of 83 floors! It took me 3 days before my legs felt normal again but it was definitely worth it! Highly recommend the White Cliffs of Dover to anyone who comes to England.
On Saturday I took a trip to Brixton to check out the market. As I had to change trains at Green Park, I decided to walk past Buckingham Palace to see if there were many people there due to Prince Philip’s passing. There were quite a large number of people there, however they were very orderly, following the security instructions for the flower laying queue and maintaining social distancing. There were also a huge number of news crews.
Brixton Market is supposedly one of the best ones in London, but unfortunately there is a huge number of closed food shops. The one thing I did notice was that there was a lot of the same style of shop. Out the front they have fresh fish on the left, fresh fruit/veg on the right. Just inside the door they have fresh meat and then behind that they have dry goods. I would say maybe 20-30 of these types of shops. Very stinky fishy smells!
Continuing my theme of eating around the world, I decided to have Jamaican for lunch and took a risk with Jerk chicken. It wasn’t super spicy fortunately! I got a Maryland chicken with tamarind BBQ sauce, rice with beans, pineapple & mango sauce and purple coleslaw. It was quite delicious!
Well that’s all for this post. My next post will be the start of my road trip around England.