​Thanet Gazette Wondrous Walks 7

St. Nicholas-at-Wade to Potten Street Circular

3 miles

We may be having a real winter this year but that’s no excuse for an overdose of daytime television. Postmen, milkmen and farmers are out there in the real world whatever the weather. Walkers have the advantage of being able to choose when they go out, but it’s always worth it. The countryside has many faces. It’s just as interesting to see familiar places on a crisp winter’s day with a yellow sun low on the horizon, on a brisk, grey day with scudding clouds, or when crunching across fields on a blanket of snow.

This walk from St. Nicholas is a pleasant stroll at any season but is especially useful in Winter when time might be short or the fields excessively muddy. It has all the advantages of great country views and tranquil walking as well as mostly hard surfaces so that the pace can be kept up and the blood circulating.

St. Nicholas is a fine village boasting a wonderful church with a tower that is a landmark for miles, and two warm and friendly pubs which welcome walkers and turn a walk into a day out. The countryside is a traditional Thanet landscape with isolated farms set against a backcloth of marshland. Names like Chambers Wall, Belle Isle and Snake Drove remind us of the days when the marshes were a major obstacle to communication and each feature was known and valued by local people as they struggled to live and survive in a demanding environment. As you walk these country lanes give a thought to the feet that mapped out each twist and turn over the centuries, now reduced to a disembodied comment over a satnav.

Thanet Gazette: Wondrous Walks 7

St. Nicholas-at-Wade to Potten Street Circular Stroll

IMPORTANT INFORMATION

Start: St. Nicholas Parish Church

Length/Time: 3 miles/ 1.5 hours

Taking care: Mostly on country roads with little traffic but always listen for vehicles, keep children and dogs safe and walk facing the oncoming traffic. There are no stiles. Wear stout shoes and clothes suitable for the weather. Apart from 200 metres of farm track there are no unmade surfaces on this walk so it can be done with a pushchair !

Parking: On road in St. Nicholas village.

Refreshments: The Sun and Bell pubs welcome walkers and offer food and facilities. There is a village shop.

Interest: St. Nicholas church is a fine building and well worth a visit. There are several historic buildings at this end of the village, mostly former farms. There is a playing field with children’s activities behind the Bell pub.

1. Start by the parish church in the centre of the village. With the church on your right and the pubs behind, walk forward past the ends of Shuart Lane on the right and Down Barton Road on the left. Keep forward, on the road out of the village, for some way. Ignore the turning, on the right, down to the London side of the Thanet Way. Keep on, to cross the overbridge ahead.

2. At the far side drop down to a T-junction. Turn left towards the houses of Potten Street. Ignore a turning right, by the first house, and keep on along this pleasant country road. Look out for the house on the right with nine nails in the wall, recalling an old Kentish game.

3. Walk down this road for some way to reach the old farm buildings at Chambers Wall. Here bear left, still on the road, and follow a drainage ditch on your right, with extensive views across fields to Reculver.

4. At the end of the road pass an isolated house at Warehorn with the Thanet Way ahead. Just pass the house turn right up a concrete track towards an overbridge.

5. At the top of the rise turn left over the bridge. At the far side turn left down to a corner of woodland and a meeting of tracks. Here turn right, directly away from the main road, and follow a rough farm track along the field edge with woods on your right.

6. Stay on this track for some way. Where it approaches a stand of trees and bushes directly ahead either stay on the track, which bears right and can be muddy, or bear left, still on the field edge. Track and field edge soon meet up again.

7. At the end of the field arrive at a junction of tracks and paths by the cottage at Belle Isle. Here turn left on a broad farm track going uphill known as Snake Drove.

8. At the top arrive at the extensive buildings of St. Nicholas Court Farm. Follow the farm track as it turns left through the buildings. At a T-junction at the end of the buildings, turn right up the approach road to the farm. Follow this around to another T-junction. Turn right here and follow the road all the way back to the start by St. Nicholas church.