Canterbury and home
Sunday morning I made my way to Canterbury by way of Dover again, sinc
e the trains were not running straight through due to track work. Canterbury is of course the mythical site of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Like Dover, its history goes way back - at least as far as the Romans, if not further. The still-intact city wall marks the old defenses, and inside the architecture reflects the layers upon layers of historical occupation of the town. Ruinous and re-constructed remnants of Roman constructions are overlain with medieval stone walls, and next to that a few remaining Tudor buildings squished between the inevitable uniform brick of post-war British suburbia. Towering over the town is the
Canterbury Cathedral, a massive edifice that is a testament of the devotion of a newer Rome, having been built in the fifth or sixth century by a Catholic emissary of the pope. Like everything else in this territory, the whole complex was damaged during World War II, and in between those monumental occasions, the site was famous for other sundry incidents such as the murder of Thomas Becket over a frank disagreement with the king over royal control of the church.
Most of the city inside the walls is made up of narrow traffic-free alleys, and like most other gentrified cities, it was brimming with overpriced boutiques and coffee shops. But the old town retains its charms, with some alleyways replaced by slow-flowing canals and a winding stream-side park inhabited by an odd combination of ducks, pigeons, and sea gulls. I walked for a couple of hours,
stopped for lunch at a little cafe, and wandered back toward the train station around four o'clock. Which put me back in Dover just as the sun was going down on a Sunday afternoon - not a stellar time to be looking for a bus. I did make it back to Folkestone after about an hour's wait. By that time most of Folkestone was also firmly closed for the evening, so I settled on a dinner of instant soup back at the B&B. In the morning I caught a mid-day train back to Charing Cross and was shortly back at home, in time for class at two.
e the trains were not running straight through due to track work. Canterbury is of course the mythical site of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Like Dover, its history goes way back - at least as far as the Romans, if not further. The still-intact city wall marks the old defenses, and inside the architecture reflects the layers upon layers of historical occupation of the town. Ruinous and re-constructed remnants of Roman constructions are overlain with medieval stone walls, and next to that a few remaining Tudor buildings squished between the inevitable uniform brick of post-war British suburbia. Towering over the town is the
Canterbury Cathedral, a massive edifice that is a testament of the devotion of a newer Rome, having been built in the fifth or sixth century by a Catholic emissary of the pope. Like everything else in this territory, the whole complex was damaged during World War II, and in between those monumental occasions, the site was famous for other sundry incidents such as the murder of Thomas Becket over a frank disagreement with the king over royal control of the church. 
Most of the city inside the walls is made up of narrow traffic-free alleys, and like most other gentrified cities, it was brimming with overpriced boutiques and coffee shops. But the old town retains its charms, with some alleyways replaced by slow-flowing canals and a winding stream-side park inhabited by an odd combination of ducks, pigeons, and sea gulls. I walked for a couple of hours,
stopped for lunch at a little cafe, and wandered back toward the train station around four o'clock. Which put me back in Dover just as the sun was going down on a Sunday afternoon - not a stellar time to be looking for a bus. I did make it back to Folkestone after about an hour's wait. By that time most of Folkestone was also firmly closed for the evening, so I settled on a dinner of instant soup back at the B&B. In the morning I caught a mid-day train back to Charing Cross and was shortly back at home, in time for class at two.
posted by skylanda at 2:36 PM
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