From A26 to Wrotham Heath on circuit from West Peckham

We visit Richard's parents' house every few weeks (hoping it will sell soon) and so were surprised to discover that we hadn't been walking on the Wealdway since the end of June - and very pleased to be back. In addition to the very hot weather over the summer, Richard's Mum had been in hospital a couple of times, but her health seemed a bit better now (and the very hot weather seemed to be over), so we were heading to Hartfield for the weekend. I'd been away at a conference until the previous evening so didn't want to leave home at the crack of dawn, but we left at a reasonable time and had a straightforward journey, so we were walking before 10.15. It remained dry until we were within yards of the car at the end of the walk, and the sun came out intermittently i.e. it was pretty good walking weather!

We had planned a route which formed a figure of eight centred on the village of West Peckham and using the Wealdway, the Greensand Way and other footpaths. The Greensand Way is not to be confused with the Greensand Ridge Path, which is mostly in Bedfordshire and which we walked a couple of years ago. However, greensand ridges do tend to accompany chalk ridges (being part of the same large-scale geological feature with the softer parts worn away by erosion) hence these two paths along greensand ridges are both relatively close to paths along chalk ridges (the North Downs Way and the Ridgeway respectively).

The parking we had found on Google Maps at TQ646526 turned out to be perfect, and we were soon walking along the Greensand Way towards the church we had seen up on the ridge on the previous leg of the walk; we know now that this is East Peckham Church (St Michael's), though it is nowhere near to the modern village of East Peckham. After a very short stretch along the road we took a path that led down to a sunken track. We met a woman out dog-walking at about the same moment as we realised that we were not on the right route and retraced our steps slightly then cut across the fields with good views back to Duke's Place. We passed Forge Farm and crossed the A26 then, a slight distance further on, we crossed the A228 and continued on a minor road through woods to the Church.

There are superb views from the churchyard over the flatter land to the south and we weren't in a rush so we went into the church, now in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust. Much to our surprise, there were several links to our home county of Norfolk, in particular, Elizabeth Whetenhall, second wife of Thomas Whetenhall of East Peckham, was the eldest daughter of Henry Bedingfield of Oxburgh Hall (our "local" National Trust house in Norfolk). We left the Church and the route of the Greensand Way behind us and descended on a minor road back to the A228.

After crossing the road we took a path past polytunnels where strawberries were crossing, and we soon rejoined the route we had followed last time we were here (now back on the Wealdway). We passed what looked like a field of metal stakes; we think these form the structure on which the polytunnels are erected. We continued past the tree where we had our lunch last time, and across the A26. The next little secton (close to fishing lakes, but we couldn't see them) was perhaps the least attractive of the day, but we were soon back in West Peckham, walking past our car. We stopped for an early lunch by West Peckham Church. a pretty place on an attractive green, also abutting oast houses and a pub.

We continued on both the Weadway and the Greensand Way (complete with occasional joint signposts) to the west of West Peckham, past apple orchards, then we turned right (now just on the Wealdway) and climbed past more rows of polytunnels, this time growing raspberries.

We crossed a road and took a delightful wooded track opposite, with National Trust signposting indicating that this is Gover Hill. We continued to climb and at one stage took a slight diversion to a viewing point. Across another road the track became a rather boring concrete effort, through Shipbourne Forest. Fortunately the concrete track didn't go on for too long. It took us a little while to work out what the trees were and we think we identified them as coppiced sweet chestnut; sweet chestnut used to be coppiced for hop poles and is still used for fencing. The forest is quite extensive and in places the coppicing was well overdue, possibly because of the reduced demand for hop poles.

Eventually, as we emerged from the forest on the approach to St Mary's Platt (commonly just known as Platt) we passed another mystery crop, which we identified to be cob nut trees. Platt is a lovely place with scattered houses amongst the trees, though the signposting of the route in this area left a little to be desired. We crossed Platt Common and started to descend towards Wrotham Heath, accidentally taking an undulating though very attractive route across Wrotham Heath Golf Course rather than the more direct route.

After rejoining the main route it was only a short distance to the railway, which we passed underneath, then an even shorter distance to the A20 at Wrotham Heath. This was our destination for today so we sat on a wall near the Beefeater/Premier Inn and ate apples, watching someone leave the adjacent chinese restaurant and a family who had been visiting a new house that's for sale. It's not a particularly attractive place, but it is close to some delightful locations.