Category: Thames

Upnor Castle

Quirky windows and doors caught my attention

While in Kent, we took a short trip up the Medway to visit Upton Castle.

This is an Elizabethan Artillery fort, to protect the Navy docks further up river.

Between the car park and the castle is the delightful village of Upnor, which demanded I take photos. I hope the residents don’t mind.

 

We then entered the castle, which the Dutch Navy raided in 1667, as Rochester and the Medway became the main harbour for Royal Navy ships during Henry VIII’s reign..

It overlooks the Medway and is solidly built.

There is the usual tourist paraphanalia, and you can even get married in the Arsenal.

As usual, old and quirky windows and doors caught my attention, plus the spiral staircase from one of the towers

Lots of views from the ramparts. Those wooden spikes look pretty fierce.

Beauty in Bleakness

I love the contrast of nature with industry

In October, in total contrast to our safari, we also spent a family week in a static caravan at Allhallows, on the south side of the River Thames estuary.

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This would not win any awards for being picturesque, but the industrial and muddy views proved photogenic.

The holiday was for family to walk the dogs, and relax and play board games together, and this venue fitted the bill nicely, even if we had to shower the dogs several times from the Thames mud.

looking back towards the caravan park
from the hills behind the park over the Thames looking towards Southend on Sea
view across the Thames
Oyster catchers

We saw many sea birds including white herons, and managed to capture a sky lark in flight after listening to its beautiful song from up high.

One of our walks took us along the Medway estuary, with views of the oil refinery beyond. I love the contrast of nature with industry.

Of course, the 3 dogs enjoyed the walks – standing guard maybe?

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And it got a bit windy – here is Reggie styling a side parting.IMG_3300Much of the landscape here was created as part of the Thames flood management program, but from the state of the memorial raised to celebrate that, I’m not sure how much I trust them to work, as it is now at a jaunty angle.

DSC_0569 We also came across some old concrete bunkers from the wars, that once served to keep the Thames safe from invasion.

Ian didn’t help me in getting some moody shots of the angular structure, but I won eventually.

I can see you
I can still see you
at last

I realised after that I could have had more fun with next these shots, but this was the best I managed.

One benefit of being next to the Thames was that the long but narrow pebbly beach was littered with sea glass, so I just had to employ the family to assist in the collection.

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We didn’t make much use of the facilities of the camp site, and no-one would join Rita for a funny family photo

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While in Kent. we also visited Upton Castle and Canterbury, so keep watching