Egypt4u

Within a radius of about 15 miles, which is most of east Kent, I have dozens of small villages and hamlets. Many are spread along busy secondary roads and as a result are not very attractive. The nicer and more tranquil villages tend to be approached along narrow country lanes. Many of these lanes are single track so you need to look well ahead for oncoming vehicles or you may find yourself having to reverse anything up to a quarter of a mile to find a passing place or field entrance.
One of the best known of these villages is Chilham, about 5 miles out of the city. The village has been the setting for many period film and TV productions. A couple of weeks ago Mrs G went to lunch on a Friday with a friend in another charming village, Wickhambreaux, also around 5 miles from home. She thought I might like it so we went to the village pub for some lunch this morning. The weather was a bit dull, although the sun broke through in the afternoon after we had gone home. Also, as she pointed out, mid week is the best time to visit because at weekends the narrow streets are jam packed with residents cars, so picture taking was limited.
Anyhow, here are a few to give a flavour of this lovely little tucked away village and its pub, The Rose Inn, circa 1500...

There is a village green with this imposing house on one side. There were even guineafowl pecking freely along, and on, the front wall.


Next to this house is the village church of St Andrew. Unfortunately it was not open.


Looking north across the green is the Rose pub, quite small and quaint but full of charm inside. There was a carpet of early crocus around a tree on the green.


I am always intrigued as to how such an inn was built so far away from the main Canterbury to Sandwich road. Oh to be able to go back in time a few hundred years..


And here are a few inside the pub and our simple but very adequate lunch of omlette and salad wahed down with a good bitter shandy....still driving you know. The ceilings were strewn with bines of local hops.





Perhaps another day we will go to Chilham, midweek of course...

When I first went to work there was a colleague who like a drink at lunchtime. When he returned sometimes he would call out in a loud voice as he entered, "Rye, Chilham, Chartham, Canterbury. All stations to Reading, but not this train" and we knew there wouldn't be much work done for the rest of the afternoon.

Mad Dilys wrote:he would call out in a loud voice as he entered, "Rye, Chilham, Chartham, Canterbury.

Or as they would call on Ashford station 'why kill 'em and cart'em to Canterbury?

Lovely looking pictures of the village, church & pub & your lunch looks yummy too

I do enjoy a stroll around village cemeteries , you never know what you can find or see.

Look forward to seeing more of your quaint villages

An interesting trip out for you both Grandad and some nice pictures, I think some of these out of the way pubs were often 'coaching houses' located on routes that were later replaced by main roads. Is it down to some perspective of the image, or is that portico above the door in the first picture really sloping down on one side?

Horus I think you are probably correct about the portico. I did adjust the levels a bit in that picture but here is another picture, untouched, and that shows the same effect. Also, look at the window shutters, they look as if they are not hanging true.


You could also be correct about the pub once being a coaching inn but as it is about 2 miles from the old Canterbury to Sandwich road that has old coaching houses every 4 or 5 miles, I think the jury is out on that one.
If only we had a time machine.

Horus I just Googled the village and it seems that that house, Wickham Court, hides a secret. Here is what it says in Wiki:
Wickhambreaux Court (Grade II) sits on a small slope above the green and its Regency buff brick 1700s façade with green shutters is the dominant built feature from the green. This re-facing masks an older building which could well be medieval in origins and was likely undertaken on the instruction of the then owner of the Manor Sir Thomas Palmer, 4th Baronet, of Wingham

Also it says that the village was on the old Roman road from Richborough to Grove and the Rose Inn was a likely stopover for travellers. I think that is very likely and that stage coaches would have used the main road through the villages of Littlebourne, Wingham, Ash, en route between Canterbury and Sandwich. Sandwich was an important port in medieval times. It is a delightful, albeit very very quiet, little town steeped in history.

I worked for 25 years for a manufacturer in Sandwich and passed this sign every day.

It is the 1905 list of tolls due for passage across the toll bridge. A by-pass was built around 1990 so council income from the toll ceased. We used to pay10p each way.

Perhaps I will write a bit about Sandwich, I have plenty of pictures and don't need to visit again....

First time I've seen reference to a Calash in UK, so close to caleche in Luxor. I also love the reference to "Neat" cattle.

I had to have a look at the Nail Bourne at Wickhambreaux on a map, because if there was a mill, it was likely to be water driven of course.

Mills had deliveries of wheat in bulk and needed the roads for vehicles collecting and delivering so access was more than a narrow track. I spent a happy hour comparing the village with Golden Green, which is where our northern boundary was the River Bourne, which only looked like a little stream but had 12 old mills before it got to us and another 2 I understand before joining the River Medway, about a mile or so away. Three of these were/are paper mills the rest corn mills.

My neighbour traced the stream to it's origin, because like us, he had stock which drank the water and it sometimes smelt strongly of petrol and had obviously been contaminated. It seems that at one point the steam was contained in a culvert beside a garage. Illegally, the garage owners had fitted a storm drain from their forecourt into the stream as it left the culvert. They thought it was a ditch and didn't matter.

I found a very long account of the village on Wiki MD. It is fascinating to me that such a small village can have so much recorded history, I thought the river feeding the mills was/is the little stour. But Nailbourne or Little Stour, there are 3 mills that it provided the power for and I believe they are now converted into apartments.

I think you have mentioned Golden Green before. The husband of my wifes cousin was a gamekeeper there at some time if memory serves me.