Cliffs of Dover & Seven Sisters

This weekend we walked. A lot. Our best guess is somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 miles over the two days, and I would say that probably about 15 of those miles were in rain of varying degrees of tenacity.

Our Saturday walk began in Dover, home of some of the most famous cliffs in the world, but also a location doing a lot of trans-channel traffic.

This was a very nice walk, although there was a mild rain throughout. From Dover, we made our way up to the top of the cliffs, and then walked along stony trails for the majority of the day. However, the position of the trails didn't allow us the best views of the cliffs, and we got better views when we made our way back down to sea-level, and the weather did not allow us to get a glimpse of France, just 22 miles away.

We also got to pass Ian Fleming's former residence, where the Eton man wrote some of his James Bond novels, which was a nice little highlight.

The white house was once occupied by Ian Fleming

Following a brief bathroom stop, we climbed our way back up the trail to the top of the cliffs, and continued on eastward. After about 9 miles total, we stopped at a cozy pub for lunch, home of a wandering black lab. From here, it was about another 2 miles into the Deal train station.

While this was definitely a nice walk with a relatively low difficulty level, there was not much opportunity to get the dramatic views that one pictures when thinking of the cliffs of Dover, although I may have had a different opinion had we been walking in fairer weather. However, the drizzling rain did add an element of atmosphere to our day, and it was never raining hard enough to be particularly unpleasant.

Once we arrived at the train station, our day got quite a bit more complicated. First, we found that our train was cancelled, replaced by a train over an hour late due to a suicide further down the tracks. Once we got on, we only made it a few stops before being held again due to a broken down train further up the tracks. At this point, the three of us who were not going back to London swapped trains for one that was going back the way we came, but would eventually bring us to the station where we needed to switch trains for on going to the beginning of our next day's walk. We finally reached this station, got our tickets, and boarded the train, only to be joined in our carriage by a man with an acoustic guitar who thought it appropriate to serenade us all with his original songs, and a group of young men drinking Rum and Coke from the bottles, and loudly intimidating anyone on the train who looked at them wrong. Needless to say, we were extremely happy to reach our final destination after about 3 hours of travel, and exhausted enough by the day's events to choose McDonald's for our evening meal. I have never eaten a 'Big Mac' before in my life, so it was a very strange experience to have one in a small seaside town on the south coast of England. After our meal, we made our way to our hotel and reveled in the fact that we actually had a TV for the first time in almost 2 months before passing out.

The next morning, we got an early start. Up for breakfast provided by our B&B, and out the door by 8:45 to begin our trek across the Seven Sisters. The day started about as well as we could've hoped. We weren't sore, we had slept well, and we had a good meal to start the day. To top it all off, the weather in Eastbourne was outstanding, with clear, sunny skies and only a light headwind. We had to walk for about a mile before picking up the trail we would follow for the rest of the day, but it was well worth it, as we had beautiful views and the sound of the surf against the stony beach as companions.

As we made our way up onto our trail, we were greeted with spectacular panoramic views of the town of Eastboure, the sea, and the chalk cliffs that lay ahead.

We had to struggle our way up to the top of Beachy Head, but other than that, the combination of great weather and breathtaking views made this one of my favorite days so far. For the majority of the walk, our path ran no more than 15 yards from the cliff edge, and with no fence, we were able to find some wonderful view points.

Evidence of just how quickly these cliffs erode, the old lighthouse
foundation is visible to the right

After just over an hour of walking, we got our first views of the Seven Sisters, a series of hills along the cliffside.

We made our way down to the base of the first one for a quick restroom break, and then continued on across. For the most part, this was not too challenging of a walk, but we were walking close to the cliff edge, so we did have to go up and back down all seven hills, which was pretty tiring work. However, the payoff was worth it as we got some amazing views of the sea and the cliffs. I took an obscene amount of photos, but the majority of them don't do the views justice and instead just look a bit repetitive.

After about 2.5 hours, we had reached the summit of the final hill, and were greeted with many messages made of chalk fragments, so we decided to leave our own as well.

From here, we made our way down to sea level, and walked about a mile up river to find a bridge and get some lunch. What we found was a perfect British pub that felt much more like home than like a restaurant. There was a wood fire burning, the staff was friendly, and both beer and food were delicious. It was the icing on the cake of a wonderful day to sit by the fire and enjoy a Sunday Roast beef with all the fixings. Personally, I could have spent the rest of the day there curled up in a corner taking a nap. Alas, we had to carry on.

We made our way back to the sea, now on the west side of the river, where the weather was starting to become a bit more unfriendly, and the waves were really crashing.

We climbed over one more hill, and then back down to sea level where we found a secluded beach littered with chunks of chalk that were being slowly worn smooth and dissolving back into the ocean, as well as a wonderful view of what we had just walked. The lighthouse was on the hill furthest to the right (not part of the Seven Sisters).

Right as we were leaving this beach, the rain began to fall. We only had about a mile and a half to the next town where we would catch the train, but it was probably the most challenging as the rain fell heavily from all angles as the wind really picked up. By the time we reached town, my jeans were plastered to my legs and I had pledged to obtain some waterproof pants for future hikes.

Finally, we made our way down into town and found our way along the streets/rivers to the train station. Not only were we wet and uncomfortable, but we had to deal with a few more obnoxious passengers before finally arriving back in London for a warm shower, a warm meal, and a warm bed.

Disregarding the last portion of our walk, the walk from Eastbourne to Seaford provided some of the most beautiful views I have ever seen in my life. If you ever come to England and have just one day to walk, I would strongly suggest doing this walk, rather than Dover to Deal as we had done the previous day. While it was cool to see Dover, and the walk was less strenuous, the views that our Sunday walk provided were completely unmatched by anything I've done so far. And while Helvellyn might have been the most physically challenging thing I've ever done, the combination of the views and the food made this my favorite day in England yet!