JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR (3)

In my wanderings around the Fifth Quarter of the World - "The World, according to the best geographers, is divided into Europe, Asia, Africa, America and Romney Marsh" (Rev. Richard Barham) I tend to avoid the coast around Dymchurch during the holiday period, from Easter until late August. This is because the little town, or large village, is the magnet for daily  and seasonal holidaymakers. The first because it is so accessible from the towns of East Kent and the second because there is a number of large residential caravan parks in the vicinity.

However, during this Easter week I decided to cycle the 15 miles down to it to see how the "lockdown" was affecting it.

The lanes I cycled on the way were absolutely deserted by the usual traffic, making my journey pleasantly quiet and brought back memories of my early cycling days in the 1950s. But, on reaching Dymchurch I found it a ghost town, with all shops closed and shuttered and very little traffic in a High Street, which at this time of year, is usually quite difficult to cross.

Of course my usual cafe was amongst all those closures, but I had allowed for this and packed a raspberry jam sandwich and banana (the ultimate in naturally self-packaged cycling snacks) along with a flask of coffee, laced, as usual, with whiskey.

I rode up onto the sea wall to sit and eat my elevenses and viewed the sands which in Easter week would normally be teeming with holidaymakers. I could just make out one man and his dog.

 The sea wall is usually a favourite promenade, but this year, no one

Quite eery, really. I felt alone in a deserted world and it is not something I would ever wish for again, in spite of being a solitary and natural avoider of noisy crowds.