Blogs from Margate, Kent, England, United Kingdom, Europe

On the rainiest day of the trip so far we decided to keep our pre-arranged appointment for a trip down to the seaside resort of Margate - billed in the brochures as "the original seaside". There is some evidence for this claim. Even our business class mag in Emirates on the way over had a piece charting Margate's fall from holiday destination of choice for Poms in the early 20th century to economic irrelevance and now slow return to somewhere a little more hip and happening once again. A long closed theme park, Dreamland, is being reinvented as a 'heritage' attractions and is servo reopen next year. Even on the Monday of a long weekend here there is a fast train every hour from the centre of London (and slow ones more often), and we made ... read more

Sorry Kent ... I found you mind numbingly boring with flat, uninteresting countryside and none of the quaint I associate with English seaside locations. We were hiking from Herne Bay back to Margate and expecting a seaside path i was so disappointed to find myself walking along a wide, concrete path on a gray day. The most excitement I got from the hike was dodgy warning signs and jumping a bus back to Margate from Birchington-on-sea. My pics I think tell that story well enough ... I took few, was uninspired by most of them and just wanted to get back to the hostel for a nap. Lucky the trip was an excuse for the hiking communit social event of the year ... Halloween ... the annual party which is just an excuse for a bunch ... read more

Friday (09/05/08) - The end of the trip! This day was a strange mixture of feelings for me. On one hand I felt “oh God, already?” and on the other: “Finally, it’s over!”. Alberto and I were driven to Vere Road at ten past eight to put away our luggage. After that school started (again…) at 9 o’clock. I forgot to mention that we were already in our proper skill level groups by this time. The lessons were probably one of the most boring experience in my life. We were trying to retype word for word a 10 line text. I really don’t get the point of this type of exercise. I mean I think that it doesn’t matter how you rewrite (or retype word for word…) a text as long as it get’s the general ... read more