A Wealden Walk

   I've been off gallivanting again, but am now back home. This gallivant was a two-day walk (rather little of which was spent actually walking) down in Sussex, with my brother and the doughty remnants of the walking group. We spent the first day and night in Chichester, that fine town, where my brother, an expert on the subject, gave us an exhaustive tour of the cathedral – the site of the Arundel monument that inspired Larkin's famous poem, and of a touching memorial to William Collins, not to mention a fine statue of Sir William Huskisson, the first person to be run over by a railway engine, and some superb modern artworks commissioned by the art-loving Dean Hussey (whose own collection is now housed in Chichester's excellent Pallant House gallery). 
  The next day – only yesterday, but it seems longer ago – we drove north to walk in the Rother valley, beginning and ending in heather-and-gorse-clad heathland, but mostly in the lush, well-wooded river valley (the picture above shows Stedham bridge) – beautiful Wealden countryside, with glorious views of the South Downs. There had been much rain overnight and we had to shelter from a couple of morning downpours, but most of the time we had sun, and walking in such surroundings at the turn of summer/autumn was a delight. Even better, the walk route took in four lovely little Sussex churches, tucked away amid trees, all but one quite unspoilt by Victorian restoration. The undoubted gem was St George's, Trotton, home to some spectacular medieval wall paintings – below are the Seven Works of  Mercy from the west wall – and two very impressive brasses to members of the Camoys family (one commemorating the commander of the left flank at Agincourt and his wife, the widow of Harry Hotspur). There were butterflies too – Whites and Speckled Woods in abundance, with a Humming-Bird Hawk Moth thrown in. All of this, and we'd barely walked five miles. The riches of the English countryside are truly  inexhaustible.