Dover, England - May 19, 2012

We had visited Dover several times in the fifties - one of our cycling haunts. We have also visited from cruise ships and various RV vacations. We did need can English version of an English-French dictionary however and also a pot of beautifying potion for Marian that had been confiscated at Fort Wayne Airport a couple of weeks earlier. Thus we took a walk into town on a warm and sunny Saturday morning.
A visit to W H Smith and then to Boots drugstore met our shopping needs after which we sought out a Fish and Chip emporium. Found one - it was awful! Nothing much else to report so here, in case you ever find yourself in this town, is a note about Dover Castle.
Dover Castle is the largest castle in England and is a medieval castle founded in the 12th century. It is sometimes referred to as the "Key to England" due to its strategic defensive location atop the cliffs at the narrowest part of the English Channel.

Earlier, there might have been an earthworks fortification here and certainly, after the coming of the Romans in 43 CE the location was extensively developed. One of the 80 foot high Pharoses - Roman lighthouses - still stands at the site.
During the reign of Henry II the castle began to take on the shape seen today with Maurice the Engineer being responsible for building the keep, one of the last rectangular keeps ever built.
By the Tudor age, the original defences had been obsoleted by gunpowder and armaments development and they were substantially updated during the reign of Henry VIII. Further massive rebuilding took place at the end of the 18th century at the time of the Napoleonic Wars and it was during this period that the tunnel system was developed. By 1803 2,000 troops could be housed 40 or 50 feet below the cliff top.
At the beginning of the WWII in 1939 the tunnels were reopened following a century of abandonment and were used for a variety of purposes throughout the remainder of that conflict. A few images are here.

Getting there, Part 9 - Canterbury, England - May 31, 2011

The next port that we stopped at was Dover and the plan had been to meet Michelle and Nick there, clump around town for a while and then have a life shortening Fish and Chip lunch. We had visited Dover fairly recently finding not much of interest and Nick, who had been stationed there at one time, couldn't come up with any fresh delights either. So, pleasant surprise, we were scooped up and taken to Canterbury, about fifteen miles inland.
Canterbury is an historic English cathedral city in the county of Kent and lies on the River Stour. After the Kingdom of Kent's conversion to Christianity in 597CE, St Augustine founded an episcopal see in the city and became the first Archbishop of Canterbury, a position that now heads the Church of England and the worldwide Anglican Communion.
Thomas Becket's murder at Canterbury Cathedral in 1170CE led to the cathedral becoming a place of pilgrimage for Christians worldwide. It was this pilgrimage that provided the theme for Geoffery Chaucer's 14th-century literary classic The Canterbury Tales.
For more pictures around this historic city, click here.

Dover and beyond, England - August 20, 2010

The Duty Free Candy Store
called loudly to Marian

The ferry takes a couple of hours to get from Calais to Dover and, once we disembarked we drove clear around the south-side of London to our first overnight stop.
Dover, a major ferry port in the county of Kent in South East England, faces France across the 21 miles of water at the narrowest part of the English Channel. Rising from the sea to the east and west of town are sheer chalk cliffs known popularly as the White cliffs of Dover. Services related to the Port provide much of the town’s employment, augmented also by tourism. Dover’s name originated with the River Dour which flows through the town while the white cliffs gave Britain its ancient name of Albion - "white".

If it's not one thing it's another -
this is a tube of English M&Ms

In the Domesday Book Dover was noted as an important borough and of course over the centuries it served as a natural defense against would-be invaders including the French during the Napoleonic Wars and the Germans during WWII.
In 1800 it was reported that the town's population was almost 10,000 while the current population is closer to 25,000. In the meantime however, since eastward and westward growth is prevented by the cliffs, the town has grown back up the river valley absorbing numerous small communities along the way and growing its total urban head count close to 40,000 people.

Finally though, all was well when
the White Cliffs appeared

The English Channel is the busiest shipping lane in the world and ferries crossing between Dover and the Continent have to negotiate their way through the constant stream of shipping crossing their path. The Port of Dover is also used by cruise ship passengers, and the old Dover Marine railway station building among others, cater for those passengers.