please empty your brain below

Unless you have been, of course.
The first time I was here was on 8th May 1994 whilst walking the Saxon Shore Way.
Yes, back in January 2011, walking the Saxon Shore Way. Less graffiti on the Brennan torpedo then.
That's not just a crisp packet - it's archeology.
I've been up that way recently as it was an excellent blackberry and sloe picking area about 4 weeks ago. You're right, it is a bit bleak mind.

To be fair, I'll never make it to the patch of triangular forest you hit yesterday, so you can keep that hideaway to yourself still
This is one of the more interesting, uninteresting posts, if that makes sense.

Adjusted for inflation, the 65p in 1974 equates to £7.10 in today's terms.

I was there in August 2015, a very very hot day and a great walk.
It makes sense I suppose that you have not given us your usual directions for how to get there. Not that I'm thinking of going at this time of year of course.
Train to Rochester, then the hourly 133 bus to Cliffe (not Sundays), then walk. Or a slightly longer walk north from Higham station.
I've been :) https://www.flickr.com/photos/32293736@N04/7176238599
My stupid side was actually tempted towards getting a look inside the fort... but I wasn't clever enough to find a way in. (Plenty of others have.) I had to settle for seeing the later defences added to the fort with the coming of WW2 from the outside.
Jools holland lives just up the road in Cooling Castle

dg writes: Indeed.
I hoped you picked up the packet?

dg writes: Indeed.
A 40 year old crips packet! Gosh. If it has been exposed on the surface like that for very long, I'd have thought the UV from sunlight would have degraded it much more than that by now. Perhaps (like the one at Stonehenge) it was burried for some time? Perhaps a return visit next year to see if it is still in place?

Wikipeda has a photo of the torpedo launch trench from 2007, with much less graffiti, but with the metalwork in a very similar condition.
They have the torpedo on display at the royal Engineers museum at Chatham with an excellent description.
The museum is close to Rochester and is well worth the admission charge.
I've been too. Saxon Shore Way to blame.
Pah, I'm gonna go. Looks great. An all day walk from Gravesend via the fort and Cooling Church to the pub at Lower Upnor looks feasible. Might wait for the summer, or at least longer days though. Thanks.
I like the clouds in your photos in last couple of days.
Whilst you've explored out this way before I'm wondering if you've been inspired by Rachel Lichtenstein's book Estuary. It's on my list to read
@DG
Having picked up the packet, did you subsequently bin it, or have you kept it?

@Lorenzo
Do-able in a day (even in January) but a long way - I went from Gravesend to Strood railway station.
@shirokazan I can just imagine DG keeping it to add to his collection of treasures!

Fascinating (and scary) that it survived so well!
If you started the walk from Gravesend you'll have gone past the The Ship & Lobster pub, one of the most "backstreet" pubs if ever there was one. It features in Great Expectations I believe, as The Ship.
After posting that, I realised that I probably should have searched the website to see if you had already mentioned The Ship and Lobster in a previous post. You have, indeed.
Today’s writing style is similar to that used on Oct 16 which, as Waterhouse commented, reads as though written by a different writer.
Today’s link on ‘perilously unsafe and very stupid’ leads to a page on the derelictplaces website where a forum member writes in this style.
Coincidence?
if you download the original images from DG's flickr page you can see he uses an iphone 6 (if you look at the file information) and all todays photos are the same technical spec as previous ones (colour profile and resolution etc).

unless of course DG is lending his phone to the "other" blog author, or they have the exact same phone.
I've been there - in September 2014 from Higham Station to Strood via the Saxon Shore Way, with North West London and Hampstead Ramblers.
On my reconnaissance, I joined the SSW at Higham Creek. I managed to get across the washed away section (the tide was out). For the led walk, I took the group past the gravelworks to join the SSW at the head of Cliffe Creek.
Why make it so difficult? You just drive to Cliffe and park along Pond Hill :)
I've been! On a blazing hot summer day when I really wished I'd packed more water for the long, shade-less walk along the estuary. My main recollection of Cliffe Fort was a Dutch coaster being loaded with gravel at the jetty, in an apparently fully automated process, without a human being in sight.

Not sure I'd agree that Shornmead Fort is harder to get to - it's a rather pleasant 2-3 mile walk from Higham station via Church Street and Higham Common, though as always around here, best done after dry weather. And unlike Cliffe, Shornmead is very much open for wandering!
I've been there a few times, both on foot and by bike (a better idea) from Gravesend. And of course taken photographs, some in my book/PDF 'East of Gravesend' (1981-5) - the cover picture is of Shornmead. Took more pictures when they threatened an airport there (on My London Diary) and have returned a couple of times since. Good to see another view - but I hope it doesn't bring to many crowds:-)
not that there are many birds in October. Obviously you are not a birder. Spring, Autumn and winter are the peak months for birdwatching at Cliffe. The marshes are a stop off for migrating birds and a refuge for over wintering birds. Top Kent site for birding.
Given that it was the end of October, and this a well known migratory stop-off, I was expecting flocks of birds. Barely any, alas.










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