KENT: ISLE OF GRAIN: FORTIFIED

Our breakfast host!  Dear Mr Ramos

The village of Grain squats at the easternmost point of the Hoo Peninsula within the district of Medway in Kent. The Isle of Grain is almost all marshland.

It was pouring with rain on arrival . So we were forced back inland into the delights of Chatham town. We fell into the arms of Ramos’s Restaurant for a wonderful breakfast and followed by a small fruit plate to round it off!

Post-Ramos we drove back to Grain.

POWER PLAYS

At the southern of the ‘Isle’ is an industrial area. Until 1982 this was home to a major BP oil refinery, which devastated by the floods of 1953. In the 1990s the refinery site was chosen for a purpose-built facility to make the concrete lining segments for the Channel Tunnel. Moments away is Thamesport, the UK's third largest container point gobbles up the land. 

A Kentish landscape  

Across the estuary to Sheppy

Wherever you look Grain Power Station seems to wink at you. It was built in the 1970s, mothballed in 2003, and reopened in 2006! Then more bash and build: the oil-fired power station was demolished in 2015 and a shinny new gas-fired station put up in its place. 

FORT AND TOWER 

The Isle of Grain was the site of Grain Fort, built in the 1860s and used for coastal defence until the 1950s. The fort was almost completely demolished about 1960. Grain Tower dozes offshore and is a wild camping venue at low tide.

CHANGE WEATHER AND LANDSCAPE

Grain Tower dozes offshore

This is a land of change; the Bethel Chapel (Built 1895) is now Grain Library. Amazon opened up in 2018 down the road at Thamesport, 34,000 square foot of sorting centre creating 200 jobs.

In front gardens the Cross of St George ruffles proudly and in one garden plot, forever England, flies the Royal Standard of England.

Immediately behind the sea wall there is pockmarked heathland with sullen estuaries; they are resting places for upturned supermarket trollies. 

National Gridlands, pylons march across the landscape in every direction. Looking due east we can see where we went in April 2016, to the Isle of Sheppey, the sister peninsular to Grain. 

The sun breaks through again and the wet sea wall concrete now turns bronze, all is gold and silver on the mashes. 

This land of forts, towers and pylons really fortifies. 

Full picture story please click here