Monday, April 19, 2010


Today is our 36th anniversary! Hard to believe that 36 years ago we were getting married in Miami, FL.

Today we decided to go down the coast to Deal and Dover and along the way as we were driving down the road we saw the sign for a Roman fort and decided that would be something fun to investigate. The fort is Richborough and it was founded about AD 43 and is one of the first Roman settlements in England.

We drove up and were amazed at the size of the walls and the size of the fort and how much there is left of it. However, we felt that this was not the focus we had today so we toured it VERY briefly and bought the booklet which is extremely informative. We also bought a small box of ginger cookies dipped in dark chocolate! Yum and thank goodness. Those cookies ended up being pretty much all the food we ate all day!

We got back on the road and moved on to Dover with the intent of visiting the castle, the war rooms of WWII and the tunnels developed during the same war. However, we first turned out to a National Trust site called the White Cliffs and we got our first view of the White Cliffs of Dover! Jaw dropping they are, believe me.   This picture was taken by John (as have all the pictures in this blog to date; he's good, isn't he?) as we were beginning our hike from the visitor center at The White Cliffs to the South Foreland Lighthouse.

We started hiking out on the trail to the lighthouse when we realized that we had a birds-eye view of the Dover Port. It was very obvious that the ban on flying right now because of the volcanic ash from Iceland was affecting the number of tour buses in line to get on the barges. Probably filled with people who are stranded, some trying to get away from England, others trying to get home to England. It was fascinating to stand on the cliffs looking down on to the port and watch the buses and 18 wheelers slowly driving in and through the lanes that separated them by vehicle style into other lanes to board the barges. We must have stood there for 15 minutes just watching the dance going on below.

The National Trust representative had told us that we would have a shorter hike to the lighthouse by going down a country road to St. Margaret’s Cliffs and start from there.   Since we had spent so much time watching the port and it was nearing 3:00, we decided to do that.  The village terminated on the English Channel just under some of the cliffs.  At the very bottom of the road, we were right on the waterfront - the English Channel!  To the right of the car park was a pub called The Coastguard which bragged of being “the closest pub to France” and to the left there were 4 private homes two of which had been occupied by Noel Coward and Ian Fleming. Definitely a place where they could find privacy.  The kitchen was closed so there was no chance of getting anything to eat so lunch was a pint and a bag of crisps (that's chips to us!)

We hiked up the hill and up another hill and up another hill to the top of the hills over the cliffs and got to the lighthouse. There we had a wonderful guide who was able to tell us how the lighthouse worked. You have to realize that this lighthouse was about 250 years old and the methods of operations were quite primitive in comparison to what we do now with satellites, etc. This lighthouse’s oil was sperm whale oil. The operators were a family who for 4 generations operated this lighthouse. As the technology changed, so did their duties and now this lighthouse is not in operation at all any more because of navigation satellites. Not being a lover of heights, I was quite proud of myself for walking out on the top level of the lighthouse.  I stayed REAL close to the wall.  This is a view John took from the top.  You can see the white cliffs way off in the distance.

Hiked back to the car and headed back to the flat. We were pooped from our 4 mile hike uphill and down and we’ll do Dover Castle tomorrow!  Watched The Full Monty for our evening entertainment.  If you haven't seen that and want a great laugh, enjoy!  It's about 6 men out of work in Britain when the steel mills all shut down and went out of business and how they decide they can make money dancing like the Chippendales after watching how many women paid 10 pounds to see them - only they decide that the only way their the community will take them seriously and pay to come is if they give them the full monty!  You figure out what that means!

By the way, since we don't have internet connection at the Broadstairs flat, we had to find a place to do our email and post this blog, so we are doing it from a pub that has Wi-Fi.  What a shame, huh?