I arrived into a foggy Canterbury on the afternoon of the 9th April. I took a look around the city because I was keen to be off early the next morning. The plan had been to get over to Calais by the same evening.
It’s a strange city. There’s such a density of visible history it almost feels like a medieval themepark. Although everyone seems a bit unfussed about the importance of it all.
I walked up to St Martin’s church which is the oldest church in the English-speaking world. It is part of Canterbury’s UNESCO heritage site but you wouldn’t really know it to look at it; there were some teenagers drinking cider in the yard. I went to evensong at the Cathedral and then went to sleep at my Airbnb.
The following morning I went to Eucharist at 8am at the cathedral. I was a little surprised to see Justin Welby in the congregation but I expect he had just come to send me on my may so I took it in my stride.
As I was sitting waiting for the service to begin the celebrant, Canon Reg Humphriss, approached me and asked if I was the Good Pilgrim. I replied I was the Pilgrim but I wasn’t sure yet as to whether I was Good.
I was blessed and given the first stamp in my pilgrim credential. Afterwards, Reg very kindly invited me for coffee with the congregation. On the way out we met five Italian pilgrims who were making their way to the Great St Bernard Pass, having done the other half of the Francigena last year.
Over coffee one of the Italians (who had also walked 700km of the Italian Francigena) was very keen to talk to me. She gave me lots of great advice and told me: “Don’t worry: the first day is the worst.” At that point, I wasn’t particularly worried.
Following the coffee I left from the Christ Church Gate and headed out through the city. Very quickly I managed to confuse myself with the guidebook, or, get lost. I’m very used to having an arrow on my phone point me in the right direction. However, I’m using a guidebook which is largely a list of instructions ‘At the crossroads take the first left and then immediately right.’ This can get confusing when the route isn’t super obvious.
Whilst is passes through England, the Via Francigena follows the North Downs Way so is reasonably well signposted. I asked a group of walkers if I was heading the right way to Dover and was told it was, in fact, the opposite direction. One of the first mistakes of many that day.
The walkers, who were a group of men called the ‘Silver Striders’ very kindly walked me to the end of their road and pointed me out into the countryside.
The route from Canterbury to Dover on the North Downs Way is 32km. It takes a considerable detour through the village of Ashley. 32km is above the average distance I’ll usually be walking.
My walk for the day started well. I was full of positive cheer from the friendliness and good will that people had shown me in the morning. I met a several other walkers on my way and stopped to talk to nearly every one of them. I was confident I would make my 5:25pm ferry.
The first ten kilometres passed fairly painlessly. After that I really started to feel the weight of my backpack (20+kg without water). And although Kent is hardly known for its hills, I came to dread each slight incline.
I arrived at the village of Sheperdswell which was roughly half way at 1:30pm. I was starting to worry about the ferry. My ticket said I had to be there an hour before departure. I checked other times and was reassured to see another ferry at 6:25pm. Hourly.
Still, I wanted to make the ferry I’d actually booked so after a ten minute break I resaddled my backpack and set off again. I was doing lots of maths in my head to try and make sense of the distance. When I had walked 5km after Sheperdswell it would only be 10km more. Each kilometre felt like a long way at this stage.
I ran out of water about 10km out of Dover and I got badly lost twice, adding about another 5km. My legs were getting seriously tired in a way I hadn’t expected. I had walked before. Walking is just walking, right? I felt very, very stupid. It became obvious I was going to miss the ferry. It also became obvious I had developed a pair of large blisters on the balls of my feet. It felt like I was walking on a small squashy cushion of pain.
All of this meant I was walking slower and slower. The distance to Dover was hardly reducing. The last few kilometres to Dover were very hard and very painful.
I arrived at about 6:10pm and thought I might be able to catch the 6:25. Turns out the ferry was quite serious about turning up an hour before. It also turned out there weren’t any more ferries that accepted foot passengers that day. I had missed the boat. I was not leaving the UK that day.
It a lot like failure. Like I had attempted far too much and fallen very short.
So after a quick panic and a short sojourn in the Slough of Despond I booked into a hostel five minutes from the ferry port. I hobbled my way there and it seemed to be run by three alcoholics, although, they did provide free toast so I couldn’t really complain.
I showered and dressed my blisters and then slept until a ferry the next morning at 8:25am. I arrived at the terminal an hour and a half early. I was getting out of the country. I met a man who said he was hitch hiking to Benidorm. He said he was sick of the UK: too much tax, apparently.
The crossing was straightforward and I arrived at Calais only about fifteen hours after I planned to. I’m staying here until Saturday spending a few days helping out at the Auberge des Migrants which is also giving an opportunity for my feet to heal.
I’m very grateful to the Italian pilgrim who told me it would be the worst day. With hindsight it is incredibly comforting. The next couple of walking days are only about 20km so should be noticeably easier. I’m also hoping my feet get tougher and my body gets stronger fairly quickly.
Don’t worry: I won’t be doing a post about every day of the walk but felt like this one was defining/ amusingly catastrophic.
Thanks for reading!