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Published: July 24th 2010
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Sachi was interested in the medieval villages in England and remembered Chilham after coming back from Germany. I hadn't been there and surfed the information on the Internet. Having learnt that the medieval village was recently used for the film setting for Emma, I was interested in Chilham, and I decided to go there with her on 6 July.
Chilham is near Canterbury and Chikyu no arukikata advised readers to travel to Canterbury West by British Rail and then take the bus for Ashford. However, when I checked the travel information on the National Rail's website, I found that it would be much quicker to travel from St Pancras station rather than Victoria and there is the station called Chilham. And it's not very far between the station and centre of the village.
We decided to take the high speed train departing at 11:42 from St Pancras. St Pancras station has become the terminal for Eurostar and International Rail services, and the modern platforms and facilities have been added to the back of the Victorian facade. There were a number of fast service trains running from St Pancras. We got the high speed train from St Pancras to Ashford
International. We had a picnic lunch while we were on the train. We caught the southeast service at Ashford International. We were advised to go the rear cars to go to the Chilham direction. It took just 1 hour from St Pancras to Chilham by train.
Chilham Station was very small and deserted. There wasn't a map in the station. There weren't sighposts for Chilham village around the station. I had to guess the route randomly. As I could see the buildings on the north direction, I said to Sachi, "We turn left and walk towards the brick houses." As we walked northwards, we saw the lawn and people leading dogs. Then, there was a village sign and it said "CHILHAM". I was relieved and she congratulated me on my random guess. I then talked to the people introducing that we were the tourists and asked how to get to the village square and medieval buildings. One of them understood what I was asking for and gave me the direction.
We walked on the hilly street and saw a series of charming timber-framed houses and brick houses, and then we saw the old-fashioned church, i.e. The Church of
St Mary on the right hand. The architecture of St Mary Church was typical Normal architecture and I agreed that it was one of the earliest Saxon buildings in England dating from 1210. We looked round the church, and found some interesting items, e.g. the school table, which was used by the village children who were once taught there and the marble memorial to James Wildman by Sir Francis Chantery. I saw a very old yew tree which I guessed would be over 1,000 years old.
We found the square and Jacobean style mansion in the opposite direction. I could recoginise the medieval timber-framed houses as they appeared in the film of Emma, which was televised a few months ago.
Chilham Castle looked very beautiful together with hanging baskets with colourful flowers. The informatin board said "The castle ground now opens 2nd Tuesday of the month". According to the information leaflet of Heritage Trail, there have been a number of people who have been involved in building, re-modelling, and restoring the castle and village. The castle garden was designed by John Tradescant and Capability Brown, and the detailed and extensive restoration work has been carried out by the
present owners. I have to come back there again.
We entered the Wealden Hall House, which served as a village shop. I bought the information leaflet of the historical houses in the village. The lady, who I assumed was the owner of the house, kindly explained to us that the Wealden Hall House is one of the olderst houses in Chilham and it was built 500 years ago. It originally served as an open hall where the people warmed themselves round a central open hearth, whilst the smoke went out through a hole in the roof. In the 1930s, the Wealden Hall House was used as a post office, and I could see the trace remaining. There were a number of attractive pure English stationery items, cards, jam jars, cushions featuring union jacks, sweets, classic books, lace items sold in the shop.
We started looking at the timber-framed houses infilled with laths of wood and some brick houses infilled with wood on the Square and Taylor Hill, which were originally built in the 16th century.
We then looked at the White House, which was built in 1422 in the reign of Henry V and was originally a thatched farmhouse, and brick terraces at 2-3 Church Hill, which were built in 1683, and used to serve as a bakery.
The Heritage Trail included the descriptions of the wide range of architecture used in the village on the Street, formerly Burgoyne Street, between the 15th and 17th century, and they were used as a Butcher's shops and bakery in the past. Apparently, some of those houses still have hooks on the facade.
We entered the site of the Church and walked through the footpath for the Old Vicarage. The Georgian house seemed to have been occupied by the private owner. We noticed that the Georgian house was connected with other buildings at the back of the house.
Next, we returned to the square and decided to go down School Hill. We walked past the school hall, the building of which was originally used as a farm building and the village school. All of the school buildings had perpendicular windows and round shaped windows.
As we descended the hilly street, we found the brick house, i.e. Hambrook House, which was once resided in by the Chilham Castle's stewards. We walked on Hambrook Lane, which was once part of the main road from Canterbury and Ashford. We walked past the two timber-framed cottages, Heron Court, in a style of architecture was meant to be in fashion in the 1960s in Kent, and the garage of Rose Cottage, which was once used as a cycle shop.
Afterwards, we saw the pub on the street, which we found when we started exploring Chilham. We walked back to the main road and popped in the teashop of Bagham Barn Antique Centre. We had hot drinks viewing beautiful flowers outside the tearoom.
We saw a couple going to the lake when we got off the station, and thought we would be able to access to the lake from the station. We found a very narrow path behind the platform leading to the main woodland trail. Unfortunately, Sachi wasn't wearing appropriate footwear, and so we decided not to go for a walk.
We caught the high speed train from Ashford International. We reached St Pancras station before 5pm.
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