• Day 1: Southwark to Dartford, 36.3km
• Weather: cool and grey in the morning, sunny in the afternoon
• Accommodation: The Royal Victoria & Bull Hotel
• Stamps: Southwark Cathedral, The Royal Oak on Tabard Street, The Red Lion in Shooters Hill

Kat and her good friend John had talked about walking from London to Canterbury – the pilgrimage of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.  The idea of John and I doing it together came up, but with Covid delays and whatnot, it was not until March 2022 that we were finally ready to go. This is our tale.

The day before our departure we collected our Pilgrim Passport from Southwark Cathedral and got our first stamp.  To get us in the swing for what we expected to be a rather long-distance pub crawl as foretold in Chaucer’s magnum opus, we went down the road to the wonderful old galleried coaching tavern, The George Inn.  It’s the closest thing one can get to experience the long lost Tabard Inn which would have been a stone’s throw away and was where Chaucer’s pilgrims gathered for their journey to Canterbury. Visiting Saint George the Martyr church for another stamp, calling the vicar on his mobile didn’t help in locating it.  Over Borough High Street at the St John Bakery we improvised with a sticker, and then sourced a thumb print at The Royal Oak on Tabard Street.  I cannot vouch for the quality of the conservation by the time we ended up at The Lord Clyde, but I do know it was a gem of a pub.

Setting off the next day from the George Inn (not yet open at 10am), we headed south east beside the A2 and then the A207. It was not, as one might imagine, the most pleasant of walks by such a busy road, but there were points of interest along the way, most notably the really quite impressive mural on the former North Peckham Civic Centre by Adam Kossowski.  It depicted scenes from the ages, including Roman times, the Jack Cade Rebellion, the coronation of Charles II and pilgrims heading to Canterbury.

In Lewisham we got to enjoy some amusing street art, the former residence of Sir Barnes Wallis and Deptford Town Hall, with a sail ship sitting proudly atop its clock tower. Past Shooters Hill, post lunch and a stamp from The Red Lion, about 9.5 miles done, the trail left the old Roman Road and its traffic, and we diverted north east through suburbia and the Bostall Heath & Woods to an ancient Mulberry Tree at Lesnes Abbey. I was disappointed not to get another stamp at the Chestnuts Kiosk – the chai latte wasn’t much to write home about either.

Continuing north east, we passed the impressive and ancient St John The Baptist, Erith. Soon after, at 4.10pm, we reached the River Thames and joined the Thames Path / England Coast Path.  The skies were blue and the tide out exposed the thick mud, flotsam, jetsam and supermarket trolleys.  There was a plaque on a wall commemorating the 800th anniversary of the founding of the ferry between Rainham and Erith in 1199. Soon after we ignored a diversion for some roadworks and cut through a building site right before Erith Morrisons.  Misreading the guidebook, I took us away from the River Darent a little earlier than necessary to Slade Green and we had a stretch beside the busy A206 into Dartford.

Reaching The Royal Victoria & Bull Hotel in Dartford just after 6.30pm, we had been on the trail for almost 9 hours to walk 36.3km / 22.6 miles.  While the day was not going to win too many awards for scenic beauty, there had been some lovely cherry blossom at various places magnolias were peaking, and there had been plenty of points of interest.  Eating cottage pie for dinner, John commented that it looked like it had been scooped off the floor.  I was more concerned about the burnt gravy – how do you even burn gravy?

These are some photos from Day -1 in Southwark and Day 1 of the hike: