On Saturday morning at 10:30 it was really chucking down rain but there were reasonable hopes of clearing by mid afternoon. I couldn’t really complain, it had been between 12 and 16 since my arrival in England and this was only the second day when it’d been truly wet. Mind you Hull was usually overcast with just glimmers of sunshine but it’d been nothing but sunny in Gravesend.
My brother Cameron’s plans today involve a private Rolling Stones tour of the Dartford area where Mick and Keith met and grew up. The rest of us are going to wander Gravesend but the highlight for all will be the evening Guy Fawkes fireworks display. We are going to a pub on the Thames to watch the festivities.
Guy Fawkes Night, or Guy Fawkes Day, or Bonfire Night, or Firework Night is observed every 5th of November. It remembers the events of the day in 1605 when Guido (Guy) Fawkes was caught while waiting to light the dozens of barrels of black powder the Gunpowder Plot members had placed deep in the bowels of the House of Lords. To celebrate King James l and the Lords surviving the attempt the public lit bonfires all over London. Months later the Observance of 5th November Act was passed stipulating an annual public display of thanksgiving for the plot’s failure. Within a few decades Gunpowder Treason Day became the foremost English state commemoration. The plotters having been Catholic it wasn’t long before the day became a focus for anti-Catholic sentiment. By the early 19th century the day became known commonly as Guy Fawkes Day. While Guy Fawkes Day remains November 5th the practice today allows celebrations on any of the four or five nights prior as one sees fit. We’d already seen and heard fireworks set off on the past few nights ourselves.
Once breakfast dishes were done we set off and dropped Cameron at the Dartford railway station to meet up with his tour. At the time we’d all thought there were clear and concise understandings of where and when Cameron was to be picked up. It would turn out that Cameron considered the understandings merely suggestions. There would later be a forty minute window of panic. But it all worked out and we’d didn’t have to call home to tell my mum we’d lost her youngest in Kent.
After dropping Cameron at the station we headed back the fifteen kilometres to Gravesend and found easy parking in the lot of the largest Hindu temple in England. At a total cost of fifteen million pounds The Guru Nanak Temple was opened in November 2010. It’s the largest such complex of its kind anywhere outside of India. In addition to prayer rooms and meeting halls there’s a separate building housing a school and a day centre for elders. There’s also a sports complex and the grounds sport a football pitch and a very large parking lot. In what I consider a remarkable gesture of goodwill the parking lot is always open to the public free of charge whenever there are no services underway.
Gravesend is a thirty five mile train ride southeast from London’s Charing Cross Station. The first time I visited was two years prior to completion of the high speed rail line and it took an hour and a half. Today the high speed train takes just twenty minutes and the carriages are usually packed, with many standing for the trip.
The city of 74,000 sits on the south bank of the Thames Estuary and its location has always given the place a strategic maritime prominence. Gravesend boasts one of the oldest surviving markets in England and the charter from King Henry lll was signed in 1268. In 1401 another Royal Charter allowed men of the town to operate row boats between London and Gravesend. The soon to be known Long Ferry became the preferred form of passage to the capital because of the perils of road travel. It would seem obtaining civic permission to conduct business has been an irritating custom for centuries.
One of the city’s claims to fame is being the final resting place of Pocahontas. She died in March 1617 shortly after the ship carrying her, her husband and son left London en-route to Virginia. She was buried on March 21 in the grounds of St. George Gravesend Church. Her exact resting place is unknown which complicates ongoing American interests in wanting to bring her remains home. There’s a stylized statue of her in the grounds of the church which might not be considered politically correct today by some.
After parking the car we headed for a walk along the promenade beside the River Thames. There has been a defensive structure on the western edge of the promenade since Henry Vlll’s time protecting the Estuary from maritime raids. The original defenses were built up around a wooden blockhouse and tower. By 1779 new stone defenses dubbed the New Tavern Fort had been constructed. At the time all that was left of the Tudor era blockhouse were some foundation stones and they were subsequently lost until rediscovery in the mid 1970’s. The fort was manned up to the end of the Second World War protecting against ships and submarines coming down the river.
Today the interpretive site houses a museum and also a late 14th century building called Milton Chantry. This building had been built on the site of an earlier leper colony, it was converted to a residence during the Reformation and in the 1700’s it became the New Tavern pub. That didn’t last either, in the 19th century the building was repurposed as a barracks and hospital. The well used building today serves as Gravesend’s Heritage Centre. Nowadays the grounds of the old fort are used by folks for a walk in the sun and by the homeless for a place to have a relaxing can of beer and a moment or two of solitude.
At one point when we were up on the top of the stone perimeter wall I could see an adjacent park where Gillian and I had wandered on a previous trip. That day she mentioned a splash we’d heard coming from a nearby ornamental pond was likely caused by a water rat. That news caused me to consider the pond was much to close and I insisted we skedaddle.
Walking along today the tide was out and there were flocks of seagulls, geese and swans on the mud flats at the water’s edge. They were passing the day as we were, with nothing really pressing and hoping to find something easy to eat. Once we’d had enough of looking at swans and World War Two cannons we went into Gravesend’s business district for a look round. But first up was a hot drink at a Gregg’s chain cafe, and a cheese and onion pasty. Downtown Gravesend is much the same as downtown anywhere, shops, people and bustle.
Walking aimlessly we came across a Clark’s shoes retail outlet. My entire life my mum has insisted and pounded into me that you must look after your feet. That means only buying and wearing the best quality shoes no matter the cost. In her knowledgeable, yet humble opinion Clark’s shoes are without peer. I admit decades of being told so has rubbed off on me. I went in and bought my grandson Finley some boots.
A short time later we passed by a second hand shop and it triggered an idea. The previous week while I was still in Hull my brothers had used their time wisely when they came down to Kent. One day they and Gillian’s husband Geoff went off to London. Unlike the pussy cat, not to visit the Queen but to visit the famous 02 Stadium. Part of the visit included a climb up the outside of the dome to its 52 meter high summit. They said the three quarter of an hour climb was like walking on a trampoline. After that adventure they did something more mundane but just as touristy, they’d gone to the famous Harrods’ department store.
It was there Cameron spent an insane amount of money on two silk ties, ties so expensive that they didn’t have price tags. One of those, if you have to ask you can’t afford it, sort of things. Some people pay a month’s rent for what he paid for two ties. I learned later the sales clerk who helped him happened to be quite stunning looking, although this reportedly had nothing to do with the purchase.
News of his purchase of a couple of expensive fat ribbons gave me the idea as we passed the second hand shop. A smartly turned out mannequin in the store window wore a tie round its neck bearing a crest of what I’d learn represented the Royal Yachting Association. Thinking it suitably pompous I spent the single Pound requested and bought it for my youngest brother. Giggling like school kids we headed back to the car for the return trip to Dartford. After the rather longish worrying wait for him to show up we made an informal presentation of the Royal Yachting Association tie to go along with his two fancy ones.
As it got dark we piled into the car for the short trip down to the Three Doors Pub and my greatly anticipated Guy Fawkes Night fireworks display. The pub was packed when we got there and the line-up to the bar was monumental, and in no way orderly. Having little interest in spending half an hour jostling the crowd to get a drink Gillian and I left the others to sort it out. We went outside to find a place to sit.
Alongside the pub was a courtyard with a number of picnic tables. By this time the tables and walls of the pub and river bank promenade were already propping up numerous people. We were fortunate to find ourselves a table at the edge of the property with a commanding view of the river for miles upstream and down. From our perch I could see a number of displays going off on the opposite shore, I presumed also at pubs. I’d easily counted a dozen different ones and while you could see them clearly any explosive noise was muted. It was very entertaining to watch the rockets silently shooting up into the heavens then explode into colourful bursting stars with nary more than a pop. It being a bit coolish I was sorely in need of a double brandy.
While still waiting on the others to bring drinks a waitress came by. She told us we would have to move from our spot for “health and safety” concerns around the fireworks. Thinking nothing of it we readily moved to another section of the patio. Truth be told it was a bit of a bonus as the patio was protected by a stone wall that blocked the wind off the river. The others finally joined us with long sad tales of how difficult it is to get a drink in England. Settling back we waited while many other venues nearby started setting off their own fireworks. The sky was filled with rockets exploding in the night sky above and beyond us.
Finally the time came for our pub to get started. You’ll remember we’d been asked to move for our own protection? Right where we’d been sitting was right where they intended to set off the fireworks. By the way we’d only been asked to move about five metres. As I watched the guy with the lit fuse I was pretty sure our “health and safety” was still reasonably compromised. Back home in Canada there would have been a buffer of hundreds of metres between the viewing public and the fireworks. Notwithstanding participant safety the display was fun and the crowd ohh’d and ahh’d as we do at home and as always with fireworks displays it was all over too quickly.
Being in England for Guy Fawkes Night had been a big part of my trip planning and it turned out well worth taking part in this solely English celebration.