Day 14: There Be Smugglers Afoot

RANDOMOSITIES

Hahaha! We're not the only idiot drivers on the road. There are signs around Dover reminding people to drive on the left. Also noticed that beginning drivers have a big ol' "L" magnet stuck onto their car to warn you to watch out.

English schoolchildren look so dapper in their school uniforms.

Umm . . . there are palm trees on the beach at Folkestone. #isthisflorida

I love all the old ladies out walking in their skirts and sensible shoes.

How much fish and chips can a man eat? I dunno, but Mark's on a mission to set a world record, so I'll get back to you on that one.

Judging by the texts I've been receiving, I'll be going home to a house full of broken appliances and angry people. Shouldn't adult children be able to figure things out and get along?

TIMELINE

9:00 a.m. Leave Deal behind and travel farther down the coast to Rye.

9:30 a.m. Stopped at the Battle of Britain Memorial. It's so hard to imagine the sky full of German bombers trashing this beautiful countryside.

11:00 Arrive in Rye and walk around the town.

Noon Eat lunch at The Mermaid Inn, in operation since the 14th century.

1-2:30 Tour the Rye Museum/Ypres Tower (which was a prison, built in the 12th century).

2:30 Have a brownie and some shortbread at Simon the Pie Man.

3:00-6:30 Walk around Hastings. Tour the Shipwreck Museum and the Fisherman's Museum.

7:00 Find our lodgings, then go out exploring the 5 miles of a neighborhood nature center.

THOUGHTS

 

Rye is a cute little town, liked it better than Hastings. Teeny tiny streets -- as in freakishly narrow, even by English standards -- many of them cobbled with rocks. It's a smuggling town, leastwise it was. We ate lunch at The Mermaid Inn, where the Hawkhurst Gang used to meet and plan their naughty adventures. Loved the old graffiti carved into the hearth mantle. 

I knew the Shipwreck Museum in Hastings would be small, but even so, it's packed with a lot of information. One of the more interesting shipwrecks just off the coast was a Dutch ship that had been bound for America during the Civil War. Had it reached there, a huge shipment of guns would've been delivered to the south. Hmm. Wonder if that would've changed anything.

I'm also surprised that so many ships are wrecked so near to land. Yeah, I know. I'm not well-versed in nautical type stuff, but I figured if a ship's going to go under, it's going to be way out in the middle of the ocean. Not so. Not only are rocks dangerous, but sandbars.