Wednesday

After a full day’s driving, we arrived in the small seaside village of Whitstable, which is about 20 minutes north of Canterbury. Our apartment is fully self-contained, with a mezzanine level and sunken lounge room. It’s smack in the middle of the village and very comfortable. Rod popped into the local supermarket to get a few supplies whilst Hamish and I unpacked. We had a simple home cooked dinner, but it’s the first we’ve cooked from scratch since leaving Australia!

Thursday

At breakfast, I asked Hamish to look through the tourist information and pick something he’d like to do: he chose the swimming pool. Not exactly what I had in mind, but a good choice none-the-less.

We spent the day exploring the village on foot. Whitstable has plenty of shops, including a second hand book shop. I was about to walk past it when Hamish said, “Mum, you can’t walk past a book shop – let’s go in!”. (Of course, he found a book he wanted and has read it three times since!) We found the local castle, the indoor pool and the waterfront. We were lucky with the weather, a balmy 11 degrees and no rain! After walking the length of the village, we found treats from a cake shop and sampled the local cod and chips – Rod also sampled a “giant pancake roll”. The boys swam at the pool in the afternoon and I hit the local Sainsbury’s.

Friday

After a bit of Googling, Rod worked out a strategy for spending the day in Canterbury. This included a ‘Park and Ride’ car park/bus situation, as Canterbury centre is foot traffic only. We made our way to The Canterbury Tales, Hamish and Rod dressing as a Knight and King. The tour included some of Chaucer’s Tales and a bit of history about pilgrimages to Canterbury, and the bad blood between Henry II and Thomas Beckett.

After this, we stumbled across the Roman Museum, which was fascinating (and had also been on Rod’s list.) We literally descended into Roman history below the streets of Canterbury. The artefacts, history and archeology we encountered were amazing. Those Romans really knew how to build things – they invented ducted heating! Watching Horrible Histories (the TV show, not the live stage performance) has made many parts of the trip so far very relateable for Hamish. This has meant more time for all of us exploring things that might not normally interest a nine year old.

Like a rookie parent, Rod had pointed out on arrival to Canterbury, that the Christmas Markets sold German sausages and Hamish could have one for lunch. However, when it came to lunch time, we couldn’t find the sausage booth, could we. When I suggested eating elsewhere, Hamish’s eyes pleaded with me. “But Dad said I could have a sausage!” Canterbury was very busy that day and nothing happened quickly. The aforementioned sausage involved a ten-minute wait by Hamish and Rod, whilst I glowered from the distance. I might take this opportunity to also drop Rod in it, re: the weather. “No, you won’t need your puffy jacket, it’s going to be 12 degrees” It might well have been, but there was no accounting for the wind chill factor. I purchased a scarf from Debenhams.

 

Taking the opporutunity of still being in an English-speaking country, I duly lined up at the post office, to send home two tiny parcels and a handful of postcards. Again, this took forever – enough time for Hamish came up to me to whinge that Rod wouldn’t buy him a Jumanji DVD.

Oh, and lastly; the Cathedral. It’s incredible. No pictures we took do it justice. It is an architectural masterpiece – who said there’s no money in religion? (Nobody I know.) Amongst other things, there’s a shrine to Thomas Beckett (Saint Thomas), and a showcase of where he was brutally murdered.

The hallways are lined with the tombs of past noblemen and clergy, some dating back to 1100’s. Interestingly, the Cathedral costs 18 000 pound per day to maintain, so I didn’t really mind paying the entrance fee of approximately 38 pound. However, Rod wasn’t so keen to further support the Cathedral via the purchase of a tie (30 pound). Fair enough. (It was a rather good tie, though. And Rod prides himself on his tie collection. Still …)

The trip back on the double decker bus to the car park, was a bit of a highlight, as we sat up the very front on the top deck. Spot the country kids in the city.