The most beautiful places in Kent: See our 10 favourites here
Kent is a real all-rounder – a place of on-the-up, foodie-friendly seaside hangouts, but also ancient woodlands, wineries and medieval market towns, with a county-wide obsession with provenance. While Londoners often assume that you have to head for East Anglia or the Southwest for really wild beaches, or to the Cotswolds for the perfect village pub, Kent has excellent versions closer to hand. Here are 10 of its most beautiful spots.
AlamyDungeness
It isn’t really garden-of-England pretty – a wind-snarled promontory on the edge of the Romney Marsh, with a hulking nuclear power station and a series of weather-beaten dwellings and old boats that seem to have been left to decay on the shingle. But for wildlife and a certain brooding atmosphere, there are few places like it: a nature reserve home to uncommon plants, insects and migratory birds, Dungeness has also fostered a sort of knockabout creativity, from the house and garden of the late Derek Jarman to new design-focused stays such as The Pump Station and Shingle House.
AlamyChilham
On the Kent Downs west of Canterbury, Chilham is olde England at its most chocolate boxy – so much so that Miss Marple and Jane Austen’s Emma have been among the fictional characters to have their close-ups among its half-timbered medieval buildings. This is a village for afternoon tea at Shelly’s Tea Rooms, or a burger and a pint at the 14th-century White Horse inn – which is positively contemporary compared to the Norman keep at nearby Chilham Castle, built for Henry II in 1174.
AlamyBotany Bay
Arguably the most stunning portion of the Margate-Broadstairs area is the coastline between the two towns – especially the thrillingly wild Botany Bay, backed by cliffs, with its stacks, picnic-ready caves, fossil-hunter’s rockpools and wide stretches of sand strewn with crumbly chalk. So named because smugglers caught here were deported to the Australian version, it’s best explored on a walk or cycle from Margate, also taking in the similarly lovely Kingsgate Bay and surf-friendly Joss Bay on the way to Broadstairs – and ideally fritto misto in a cone from harbourside seafood counter Flotsam & Jetsam.
AlamyFordwich
Its claim to fame is that it is Britain’s smallest town, but this spot west of Canterbury is also one of the prettiest in Kent. With its winding alleyways and bridge over a particularly lush portion of the River Stour, Fordwich also has that most crucial ingredient: a good pub. A few years ago, the wood-panelled riverside Fordwich Arms was taken over by Daniel and Natasha Smith, alums of Shoreditch’s Clove Club who have already earned the place its own Michelin star on the back of theatrical dishes such as duck hearts served in a bell jar of Kentish applewood smoke.
AlamyEastwell Manor
Kent has some lovely castles and stately homes – from Leeds Castle, surrounded by a lake, to the fairytale-worthy Scotney Castle amid 770 acres of woodland. But to stay the night, there are few grander spots in the county than Eastwell Manor, a Neo-Elizabethan manor house near Ashford where Queen Victoria’s son Prince Alfred lived in the late 19th century, roaming the topiaries and gazing over seemingly endless Kentish fields. Today, it’s a Champneys hotel and spa, with cottages in the grounds, a hydrotherapy spa, and croquet and pétanque among the civilised garden games.
AlamyElmley, Isle of Sheppey
The Elmley National Nature Reserve is barely an hour east of London but feels a world away, with its shepherd’s huts overlooking bleakly beautiful salt marshes and mudflats on the low-lying Isle of Sheppey. The solar-powered 3,300-acre estate, an important breeding site for wading birds, is the only family-owned nature reserve in the UK and offers opportunities to stay overnight – either in a restored farmhouse building or one of the eco huts dotted around, such as the driftwood Saltbox, with hot-water bottles and Romney Marsh wool throws in case you’re chilly after an al fresco shower.
Port Lympne Nature Reserve
An overnight stay in a Kentish safari park sounds potentially purgatorial – but with more far-flung trips postponed this year, the Port Lympne Hotel and Reserve is well worth a visit, especially with kids. The reserve’s Western lowland gorillas, Eastern black rhinos and Chapman’s zebras live in a particularly bucolic corner of southern Kent, its forests and rolling fields impeccably managed by conservation charity The Aspinall Foundation. The hotel in the Grade II-listed Port Lympne House is surprisingly elegant, with understated safari vibes and cool additions such as the loft-style Lion Lodge, with actual lions eyeballing you through floor-to-ceiling windows. Next year, a 15th-century stately home on the reserve is set to open as the Giraffe Hall, with Rothschild giraffes peering into elegant drawing rooms.
AlamyDeal seafront
Kent has a lot of pretty oceanfronts, including Whitstable and Broadstairs – but Deal is one of the more picture-perfect, with views from the county’s last remaining leisure pier back towards a great row of colourful fishermen’s cottages. There’s a cycle-friendly path right along the edge of the pebble beach, passing wooden fishing boats and nets – ideally followed by a pint at the planter-festooned King’s Head, or local seafood cooked the classic way at the Frog and Scot, whose owners (he’s French, she’s Scottish) also run the lovely Le Pinardier wine bar a few doors down the High Street.
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AlamyThe Crab and Winkle Way
This 7.6-mile bike path between Canterbury and Whitstable takes its name from the old railway line that ran between the two places and forms the basis for the route. From Canterbury, the mostly traffic-free track passes the Winding Pond picnic spot and meanders through Blean Woods, an ancient forest home to woodpeckers and rare heath fritillary butterflies, before climbing towards some of the prettiest views across Whitstable. In the seaside town, crab-walk through Squeeze Gut Alley for oysters at the Whitstable Oyster Company, best eaten on the pebble beach.
Getty ImagesSt Margaret’s Bay
Bond author Ian Fleming had country homes across England, but his first was the whitewashed White Cliffs Cottage at St Margaret’s Bay, east of Dover – known as ‘the first house in England’, because St Margaret’s Bay is the closest point in the UK to France (Channel swimmers leave from here, and mobile phones often think they’re in France). It’s not hard to see why Fleming chose this spot, a crescent of beach surrounded by some of the most dramatic of the cliffs. While the Coastguard pub isn’t quite as good these days under new pubco ownership, it’s still a lovely place for a pint while watching the ferries roll in.
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