My trip to the Isle of Thanet two weeks ago began in Ramsgate, continued to Broadstairs and ended up in Margate. It's a favouritewalk, overlooking the sea atop chalk cliffs, doable in four hours and with a convenient station at each end. Here are some snapshots taken after turning the corner at North Foreland to complete my seaside reportage.
✉ Kingsgate Bay brings your geography textbook to life. That is indeed an arch at the end of the beach, and here too are examples of the previous stage in the coastal erosion cycle (a cave) and the subsequent stage (a stack). Thanet council would rather you didn't walk through the middle for fear of falling chalk, but if the tide's in (which it was) that'd stop you anyway. The angle of my photo is deceptive, the arch is no longer attached to the cliffs due to the collapse of a previous arch, which also cut off footpath access to the top of the headland. If geomorphology isn't your thing there's always the Captain Digby, a pub-stroke-restaurant in the shape of a not entirely convincing castle, who overcharge for their car park safe in the knowledge that drivers have nowhere else to go.
✉ Here's a typical bit of north Thanet coastline... rough grassland above not especially high chalk cliffs above a broad concrete promenade above a sweep of beach. This is Palm Bay below Cliftonville, less visited than Walpole Bay to the west and less impressive than BotanyBay to the east. Access from up top to down below is intermittent at best, either via long sloping ramps cutting underneath the clifftop path or down tottering staircases sufficient to deter the casual beachgoer. In livelier seasons, or in normal years, the Jet Ski Cafe dispenses thrills and tea to fans of watersports. The headland in the distance is Foreness Point, home to a water treatment plant whose unsavoury function can be detected as a pungent whiff, so perhaps don't rush to hit the surf.
✉ This bench made me do a double-take. Who is (or was) Hayden, and why would a sarky plaque of this ilk end up affixed to a sea-facing seat? A bout of later Googling confirmed that Hayden Kays is a Margate-based artist, so I suspect he made the plaque as some kind of self-mocking statement... but his website is so comprehensively empty I can't be certain. A little further up the coast I found another memorial bench labelled In Memory Of The Football Season, H Kays 2020, one of a lockdown trio by the same artist (also including In Memory Of Festival Season and In Memory Of Rush Hour Travel). Works for me.
✉ If you fancy swimming in the sea with minimal risk, the Walpole Bay Tidal Pool is for you. Opened in 1937, and designed by the Borough Engineer, it's a huge concrete-edgedenclosure on the foreshore replenished twice a day at high tide with fresh seawater. The two longest sides are 450 feet long and the seaward end 300 feet wide with a maximum water depth of 6 foot 6, according to its Grade II listing. I walked round it once when the tide was out, which was unnerving enough, but didn't fancy risking it with an easterly wind whipping waves towards the outer wall. One family were undertaking some very limited fishing from the breakwater, while a plastic hat bobbed up and down in the water further out as part of a regime of bracing exercise.
✉ There used to be another bathing pool just along the coast at CliftonvilleLido. You can still see the depression where the water isn't, and walk through the complex of decaying buildings onshore where only the Cliff Bar and snooker hall struggle on. What really stands out is the 'Lido' beacon on the roof, a bright orange pillar it's very hard not to photograph, so I did. Another nigh-subterranean building is the Winter Gardens, tucked low behind the esplanade, where Jason Donovan has had to cancel next month but Paul Weller still hopes to play in March. On a windswept weekday afternoon I was more preoccupied by dodging bags of dog poo blown from missed bins and accumulating beside the promenade wall.
✉ Hurrah it's Margate proper, and the tide's out, and the beach is almost empty because it's Thursday afternoon. Normally I'd nip inside the Turner Contemporary for some art, but they've just closed for several months for "a series of capital enhancements" (including improved visitor facilities, redesign of the retail area and enhancements to the digital infrastructure). Dreamland too was very much closed. Instead I got to walk out along the harbourarm past the micro pub to disturb courting teenagers skulking behind the shell lady statue, and to stride unhindered across an enormous crescent of sand. Up on Marine Drive dozens of daytrippers downed pints and guzzled fish and chips at carefully spaced tables, while one Jack the Lad inspected his new leg tattoo as blood slowly dripped through his sterile dressing onto the pavement.
✉ The first building you see as you arrive in Margate, or the last you notice as you head back to the station, is ArlingtonHouse. This 18-storey Brutalist block was completed in 1964, its rippling facade affording residents panoramic views of both countryside and sea. At its base was a 52-store shopping mall, a pub, a filling station and a first floor parking deck. The base has not aged well, its shops now terminallydepleted after a long decline and the car park hired out for visitors to Dreamland. But a 2-bed flat is currently on the market for £140,000, so if you were planning to flee to the seaside for a concrete skyloft here's your chance.
Seaside postcard: Margate → Broadstairs
Why take the bus or train from Margate to Broadstairs when you could walk? It's only five miles along the Thanet coast, perfect for a stroll on a sunny winter's afternoon. This is part of the longest stretch of coastal chalk in the country, and there's a choice of cliff-top or cliff-bottom for most of the way. I ventured this way on Saturday afternoon, trying to maintain a decent speed in my race against sunset. And there really was plenty of interest along the way, including several delightful beaches and one gobsmacking surprise.
» Margate Winter Gardens: You could easily miss the the entertainment hub that is Margate's Winter Gardens. It was built in an artificial seafront hollow, almost 100 years ago, with only a covered staircase to lead the way down to the main entrance from the road above. The three mayors of Margate, Broadstairs and Ramsgate each have their own reserved parking space on the beachfront, from which aspect the building's municipal design now looks somewhat salt-encrusted and weatherbeaten. But big name acts still occasionally pack in the crowds - this month, for example, Boy George and Dionne Warwick.
» Cliftonville: Margate spreads eastward for a couple of miles along the clifftop, past increasingly upmarket avenues of retired folk. Their faceless non-bungalows keep an almost-respectable distance from the sea, providing a grassy edge ideal for winter strolls and dogwalking. The beach may be a little concrete-y in places, but at low tide there's plenty of sand for a four-legged runaround. And is that, ooh yes, a chalk stack at the end of Percy Avenue[photo]. What retired geologist could ask for more?
» Kingsgate Bay: You want more? How about a chalk arch too? A proper hole in the cliff [photo] has been carved through White Ness, as seen in all the best geography textbooks. This bay is a proper exclusive residential location, as exemplified by the unexpected castle on the opposite clifftop [photo]. Kingsgate Castle dates back only 250 years, which explains the ostentatious brickiness of it, but has since been divided up into rather ordinary flats.
» North Foreland: If you want an under-visited sandy beach, head for the former smuggler's haunt of Joss Bay (toilets and ice creams summer only). Up the gently-sloping hill, between fields of winter cauliflowers, looms the tall white tower of the North Foreland lighthouse[photo]. A beacon was first lit here in 1499 to warn off ships entering the English Channel, and 500 years later this became the very last UK lighthouse to be fully automated.
» Cliff Promenade: On the 'private' North Foreland Estate, on a strip of grass hugging the cliff edge, I stumbled across an unlocked iron gateway half hidden amongst a clump of bushes [photo]. "THIS TUNNEL IS DANGEROUS" screamed a notice beside the entrance, along with some disclaimer about using it at your own risk. I was through the gate like a shot. In front of me stretched a long uneven staircase, cut deep into the rock, whose function wasn't immediately apparent. A few steps down a gaping rectangular chasm opened up to my left, with a grille at the bottom to stop supermarket trolleys and human bodies being hurled to their doom. On the far side a red metal door had been wrenched from its hinges, allowing unrestricted access down several more steps to an enclosed graffitied landing below [photo]. I half-expected to find local youths wielding blades or sniffing lighter fuel, but reassured myself that this was a respectable Neighbourhood Watch area and therefore such behaviour would be frowned upon. The next flight of stairs doubled back into darkness, at which point I decided that this was no place to stumble unaccompanied and returned regretfully to the surface. I got the sense that this was somewhere special, but it was only when I got home that Google provided the reason why...
Blimey, who'd have thought?! These were The Thirty-nine Steps, as described in the famous adventure novel by John Buchan. He'd been recuperating in a villa called St Cuby at the top of the cliff, immediately opposite this private staircase in the bushes, and decided to immortalise them in prose. Had I ventured three flights down to the bottom I'd have emerged onto the beach below (or been murdered by a passing German spy, one or the other). Oh, and I'd also have descended rather more than 39 steps. There were 78 in Buchan's time, which he conveniently halved to make a better title, but the old oak treads have long since been removed to make way for 108 concrete replacements. The 108 Steps - it's not quite so catchy is it? But, believe me, just as atmospheric.
» Broadstairs: And finally, just before sundown, to a seaside resort best lit at dawn. Not that the bride and groom posing for photos on the beach appeared to mind [photo]. The old town nestles above a chalk-edged bay, from the bandstand round to a castellated homestead now called "Bleak House" [photo]. It was here, in the study overlooking the sea, that Charles Dickens wrote the majority of David Copperfield. In lodgings elsewhere around the town he also penned chapters of the Old Curiosity Shop and Barnaby Rudge, so it's not surprising to find a special museum devoted to him on the seafront [photo]. Don't expect a lot for your £2.30, there's only one room of proper Dickens memorabilia and the remainder is local paraphernalia and contemporary Victoriana. From here for 20p you can pick up a Town Trail leaflet to help guide you round the other historic sites and buildings that this pretty town has to offer. But it's hard to sightsee in the dark, so I headed instead to the station (and my four hour journey home).
» Kingsgate Bay: You want more? How about a chalk arch too? A proper hole in the cliff [photo] has been carved through White Ness, as seen in all the best geography textbooks. This bay is a proper exclusive residential location, as exemplified by the unexpected castle on the opposite clifftop [photo]. Kingsgate Castle dates back only 250 years, which explains the ostentatious brickiness of it, but has since been divided up into rather ordinary flats.
» Cliff Promenade: On the 'private' North Foreland Estate, on a strip of grass hugging the cliff edge, I stumbled across an unlocked iron gateway half hidden amongst a clump of bushes [photo]. "THIS TUNNEL IS DANGEROUS" screamed a notice beside the entrance, along with some disclaimer about using it at your own risk. I was through the gate like a shot. In front of me stretched a long uneven staircase, cut deep into the rock, whose function wasn't immediately apparent. A few steps down a gaping rectangular chasm opened up to my left, with a grille at the bottom to stop supermarket trolleys and human bodies being hurled to their doom. On the far side a red metal door had been wrenched from its hinges, allowing unrestricted access down several more steps to an enclosed graffitied landing below [photo]. I half-expected to find local youths wielding blades or sniffing lighter fuel, but reassured myself that this was a respectable Neighbourhood Watch area and therefore such behaviour would be frowned upon. The next flight of stairs doubled back into darkness, at which point I decided that this was no place to stumble unaccompanied and returned regretfully to the surface. I got the sense that this was somewhere special, but it was only when I got home that Google provided the reason why...
» Broadstairs: And finally, just before sundown, to a seaside resort best lit at dawn. Not that the bride and groom posing for photos on the beach appeared to mind [photo]. The old town nestles above a chalk-edged bay, from the bandstand round to a castellated homestead now called "Bleak House" [photo]. It was here, in the study overlooking the sea, that Charles Dickens wrote the majority of David Copperfield. In lodgings elsewhere around the town he also penned chapters of the Old Curiosity Shop and Barnaby Rudge, so it's not surprising to find a special museum devoted to him on the seafront [photo]. Don't expect a lot for your £2.30, there's only one room of proper Dickens memorabilia and the remainder is local paraphernalia and contemporary Victoriana. From here for 20p you can pick up a Town Trail leaflet to help guide you round the other historic sites and buildings that this pretty town has to offer. But it's hard to sightsee in the dark, so I headed instead to the station (and my four hour journey home).
