Читать книгу Walking in Kent. 40 circular short walks and day walks онлайн

10 страница из 58

A few days ago we checked the final walk for this collection. It just happened to be my favourite – as well as one of the closest to home. I don’t know how many times we’ve walked it – or variations of it – over the years we’ve lived here, but it never ceases to surprise with its beauty and sheer variety.

Midway through the morning we emerged below a woodland to a panoramic view as vast and exciting as any in all of Southern England, and there we rested on a seat erected in memory of a local farmer; a charming, generous man with a passion for nature and an environmentalist’s attitude towards the husbandry of his land. (I found it hard to believe it’s 20 years since I attended his funeral.) Several miles and a couple of hours later, we came by chance upon his son who took over the farm from him. We’ve known each other since he was a teenager (he’s a grandfather now), and we were soon chewing the cud, discussing his crops and sharing his father’s passion for the countryside as we talked of the heavy-leaved trees, the long feathery grasses, and the meadows patched with ‘common’ flowers. And we both agreed that it’s too easy to take the beauty of such everyday plants as daisy, stitchwort, the yellow ragwort and even the massed ranks of cow parsley for granted; for each one is a miracle of nature, as exquisite and worthy of attention as the rarest orchid.