Warm rain and ripening fruit

6th July 2014

    Pembury Old Church, St. Peter's, sits on the side of a hill with woodland behind and parkland in front. A couple of pretty cottages keep it company and nearby, Kent College School for girls is in the Victorian manor house. Of course, the Culpeppers had something to do with this idyll. All is peace here.
    I parked in the lane in front of the church porch at 6.30am, as the rain started. From there, I picked up the High Weald Landscape Trail to take me through Downingbury Farm where Redcurrants dangled in sparkling bejewelled bunches from bushes along the path. Then over the Lower Green Road into Pippins Farm where Blackbirds were trapped under the netting in the cherry orchards. They find a way in, but can't get out; they won't go hungry. Down the hill through a redundant, neglected orchard into the wood, as I slipped on the clay, I remembered my walking pole left in the car, damn! I saw no one in the woods except a security guard with a German Shepherd on the hill near Albans farm. I said, good morning. The dog wanted to eat me; and I wondered, whatever needs protecting up here in the wood?
    In Brenchley Wood, on the boggy parts of the footpath, a boardwalk has been built; about 100 metres in length curving its way through the trees, it made progress a lot easier. Then after pasture of sheep and well grown lambs, I emerged at Matfield Green. The cricket pavilion which burnt down in September 2011, has been replaced with a splendid black weatherboarded pavilion surmounted with a clock, all in time for this season's cricket on the green.
    From the green, I crossed over the road into a twitten which leads to fields of blackcurrants, of which a few ripe berries sustained me, and from there to Brenchley, orchards of ripening apples and pears were alive with birdsong and the rain pitter-pattered all the way to the church which has stood on the hill for 800 years and more. I continued up to the lookout on Pixot Hill for breakfast and soaked up the view across the Weald in the rain.
    From Pixot Hill, going back west, the path through apple orchards, comes out onto the Paddock Wood road by a hedge festooned with unripe and bitter(!) Greengages, then over to wheat fields and emergies north of Matfield on the Crittenden Road. Down Chestnut Lane and into Cinderhill Wood, I stopped for a break as the rain left off and looked over the steep valley where Tudeley Brook trickles through and a grey Heron was disturbed and flew gracefully following the gill north. On the other side of the gill, in the conifer wood, there was a motorcycle trials event taking place. It disturbed my peace, but I watched the lads expertly wending through the Scots pines over the steeply undulating ground with interest, then went on my way to arrive back at Pippins Farm. I considered buying refreshments at Downingbury Farm Shop, but continued to Pembury Old Church and drank tea on the bench by the porch in the Sun before driving home for a late lunch.