Anke: Royal Tunbridge Wells

Follow that Arrow

Its amazing where a random choice can take you. On the way home from a circular walk to Pembury a small sign advertising a cup of tea took our eye. It was just a small arrow pointing down a country lane, so we took a diversion and followed the mysterious arrows direction.
A hundred yards down the lane some small signs appeared in the flower-filled verges, "Craft Store", hmmm we like crafty things. Further still, "Coffee Shop" turned into "Bedding Plants for Sale", which further on then turned into "Donkeys and Small Animals"!! Now our interest really was pricked.
Finally turning another corner we were greeted by a small farm in the grounds of what we discovered was a residential home for people with learning disabilities called Pepenbury. We wandered into the coffee shop for a well earned cuppa and was really warmly greeted. We purchased our tea, coffee, water and some biccies, paid the grand total of £2.50 and sat outside to relax. Yes you read that right, two pounds fifty!!
From the comfy seats with a great view we followed some more arrows around their advertised Bluebell Walk.
The walk began with rabbits, guinea pigs and lots of birds in pens and then ventured off into the woods. We met lots of the residents of the home on the walk, they seemed to be really enjoying the fresh air and were certainly pleased to see us.
The small circular walk was a real joy, beautiful bluebells and woodland flowers meandering through the forest with lots of carved wooden sculptures to ponder over.
The best thing of all when nearing the end of the walk is the Donkey Field, with five friendly donkeys for you to pet and awww over.
This really was a hidden gem that we lucked over just by following a small arrow, I really suggest you do the same and enjoy the tea and donkeys. I think we'll follow more arrows in future, you never know where you'll end up.

New T-Shirt Available

Well you asked for it! Due to popular request, okay just a couple actually, our famous slogan "a day away from Royal Tunbridge Wells is a day wasted" is now available on a t-shirt.
Just click here or click onto the shop icon at any time to pick up your favourite shirt for this summer and show everyone just how much you love Tunbridge Wells or indeed how much of a bad time you're having away on holiday.
If you have any requests for the shop or any ideas for new products just drop me a line and we'll try and accommodate you.

Flower Power

With life springing up everywhere in our town's green spaces, my wife and I decided to undertake a bit of a challenge. With such nice weather we attempted to see how many species of flowering plant we could find on the Common in one hour. With so much new growth happening on the Common it seemed an easy challenge, on paper that is. We rambled in zig-zags across all the paths, wandered off the beaten track into the undergrowth, trying to find the sunny un-trodden patches where flowers might dare to poke their heads out. The common is beginning to look really lovely now and this is a great way to explore parts of it you might not normally venture near. After a pleasurably frantic hour peering into all the nooks and crannies we could muster we finally managed a grand total of thirteen, which are listed below.

Cuckooflower (Cardamine pratens)
Elder (Sambucus)
Buttercup (Ranunculus)
Dog Violet (Viola riviniana)
Common Gorse (Ulex europaeus)
Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)
Daisy (Bellis perennis)
Bluebell (Hyacinthoides non-scripta)
White Bluebell (Hyacinthoides non-scripta alba)
Common Wood Sorrel (Oxalis acetosella)
Purple Dead Nettle (Lamium purpureum)
Green Alkanet (Pentaglottis sempervirens)
Primrose (Primula vulgaris)

How many can you find? Can you find any we didn't? Perhaps its something you could try in your lunch break this week, it's a great way to relax and get away from the hustle and bustle of work.

It's just not Cricket

Click image above for a larger version of this panoramic view looking out from the new pavillion.
With the local cricket season now upon us, it's a good time to celebrate the marvellous new pavillion we have had built on the Higher Cricket Ground on the Common.
Cricket has been played on the Common for over 230 years, the first game being played in 1782 between Groombridge and Tunbridge Wells. In 1876 Lewis Luck formed a club known as Tunbridge Wells Juniors near the Nevill Ground. In 1806, following the opening of the Linden Park estate the club moved to the Lower Ground on the Common and changed their name to Linden Park Cricket Club. In 1898 the club moved to the present location on the Higher Ground, where it remains today and has been described as one of the best proportioned and picturesque in England. In the early years the Higher ground pitch was infamous for its terrible playing condition and in a match between the England XI, captained by W G Grace, and Australia in 1882, in which the visiting side were bowled out for 49 runs, it was reported "that fencing is required to keep the cows out”.
The Ground has seen many good sides including the Australians, West Indies, North and South of England, and Kent County - and many famous players including W G Grace, Frank Woolley, Leslie Ames, and the Nawab of Patavai who played for the Club as a young schoolboy. Colin Cowdrey CBE was a Vice-President.
Most local residents will know that we sadly lost the original 130-year-old pavillion a couple of years ago to a fire, but how many of you know that it’s not the first time that one of our cricket pavillions has been raized to the ground? Back in 1913, to be precise April the 11th, the Nevill Ground's pavillion was burned to the ground by suffragettes. Or so the media of the time would tell us. For even though firemen found a photograph of Emmeline Pankhurst accompanied by a copy of a suffragette newspaper and an electric lamp lying on the turf in front of the burnt out building, and during that same year several substantial attacks were carried out on buildings and organisations that were seen to discriminate against women, the Police never actually found sufficient evidence to prosecute the movement. 1913 was the same year Emily Davidson threw herself under the King's horse during the Derby.
Indeed the attack had an effect on the town but not the one the suffragettes had intended. Local people reacted angrily and the National League for Opposing Women's Suffrage reported a boom in membership after the fire. Local resident Sir Arthur Conan Doyle called the perpetrators "female hooligans" and said the action was like "blowing up a blind man and his dog". Times, it seems, haven't really changed.
Lets all hope that this great new addition to the Common lasts for hundreds of years and watches over many summer afternoons of local people sitting on the grass watching and listening to the crack of leather on willow.
I think we'll revisit the subject of Cricket soon with a visit to the Nevill Ground and also maybe a look into the story of the cricket ball and its connection with the local area. Stay tuned for that.

Common Friends

This pretty image of the common looking over towards Wellington Rocks is for Jenny Blackburn, who after six years is resigning as chairman of the Friends of the Commons.
The Friends are also now looking for an editor to edit the Friends newsletter, Common Ground. Also, if you are as big a fan as my wife an I of the Common please consider donating to help its upkeep by becoming a Friend of the Common.
Come on, today looks like being a beautiful day, grab your lunch and have it on the Common with your work colleagues, then when you get back to the office fill out the application form to be a Friend, think how good you'll feel.

Oyez, Oyez, Oyez

Hear ye, hear ye! Tunbridge Wells town crier John Scholey has won the title of best dressed town crier at the Ancient and Honourable Guild of Town Criers Championship.
You've all no doubt seen John dressed in his trademark local purple and gold jacket with tricorne hat proudly swinging his bell around town. How many of you knew that John's wife is one of the lovely dippers who hands you your water at the Chalybeate Spring on the Pantiles?
Since medieval times, although John has only been doing it since 2006, town criers were the chief means of news communication with the people of the town since many could not read or write. Time and literacy rates have changed though and our crier was re-instated for our 400th anniversary celebrations for our pleasure and John has been crying ever since.
Interestingly, town criers are protected under old English law that they are not to be hindered or heckled while performing their duties and to injure or harm a town crier is seen as an act of treason against the ruling monarchy. So John is quite well protected. Another interesting point that I didn't know about town criers is they hold the position until they either want to retire or they are defeated in a cry-off, which sounds like great fun. Hmmm, anyone out there care to take John on? Get yourself down to the Spring for a few glugs of the local water and get those pipes warmed up. OYEZ! OYEZ!

April Snow...again

Does this scene seem familiar to anyone? Do you remember last April?

Tread the Boards of Camden Road

Broadway, 42nd Street, Sunset Boulevard and Camden Road. What do these roads have in common? Well as of this time next year all will be musicals! Currently in the early writing/production stages, producers are looking for material and actors to create the extravaganza that is Camden Road the Musical.
Together with Camden Road in Camera, the musical is being created to celebrate the history of this eclectic street. Provisionally based around the Camden Electric, a cinema that opened on the road in 1909 the musical could merge with film and the theatre to create a big singing and dancing production , it all sounds very interesting. So if you fancy contributing in some way, be it large or small, call 07847 723430 or e-mail john12oram@aol.com.
Meanwhile you can contribute straight away by participating in Camden Road in Camera. This is going to be an exhibition held outside on the street to celebrate the interesting history of the road and the organisers are after old photographs and film showing Camden Road through time to complete the project.
Fifty photographs will be displayed as huge posters hung from lampposts, shop fronts, walls, windows and gardens close to where the old photographs were taken. There will also be an exhibition wall where every picture donated will be displayed, so every contribution will be used. If you have an image to contribute call Cath Hylton on 07847 723430 or e-mail camdenroad@hylton9.wanadoo.co.uk. Also this collected material will be garnered together to inspire a professional playwright and musician to create the musical. I think you'll agree this is going to be something great to look forward to next year and will really inject some life into this rather overlooked part of town.

Strange Characters

Have you noticed that we have some wonderful characters here in Tunbridge Wells, but how many of you have met Petal? Petal can be seen standing outside on Monson Road on fine days watching the traffic and shoppers pass by, sometimes not moving all day. Oh, and she's a giraffe. Yes, the picture kind of gave it away. Petal is the guardian giraffe of M Saltmarsh the artist supply store, which at over 170 years old is the oldest surviving retail supplier of art materials in the entire country, and pretty noteworthy for any retailer in the town.
M Saltmarsh has changed position and ownership several times during the period of its existence. However descendants of the very first owner, John Saltmarsh, still survive and maintain a connection with the shop to this day.
The history begins during 1835 when a young man from Brighton came to Tunbridge Wells to open an art shop at 7 Edger Terrace, a long since lost row of buildings that stood at the bottom of Grove Hill Road. The young mans name was John Saltmarsh and he gave his business the family name.
The shop prospered and in 1837 John and his wife Elizabeth had a son, Mark, who was destined to take over the business and from whom the ‘M’ in M Saltmarsh derives. Sadly, the thriving new business was hit by a couple of disasters when in 1841, not long after opening his shop, John died from a psoas abscess. Also the business was forced to move from its Edger Terrace premises due to the coming of the railway, as the buildings sat where the tunnel now exits from the railway station. This was actually the first of several moves, occupying a couple of locations on the High Street over the next few years.
By 1950, the shop had passed from the Saltmarsh family, passing through many different owners and not really fulfilling its potential, until 1998 when the current owner Sue Luck purchased the whole kit and caboodle. In fact although a Saltmarsh didn't own the company, a Saltmarsh still worked there. Louisa Saltmarsh was, apparently, still working in the shop into her 90s, teaching drawing as a sideline.
Much of the old shop furniture has been retained and is still in used in the shop and makes for a fascinating rainy day peruse.
If the sun is out after your artistic dip and you fancy a walk, myself and another keen-eyed reader found another strange character gathering last week in Hanover Road. It seems a large party of jumbled characters are permanently embroiled in a mock field battle. Go take a walk, take a camera and check it out, let me know what you think.

Spring to your Feet

After a brief Easter break I'm back, and Spring is, I'm told, just around the corner too. There are signs everywhere around town if you look hard enough, and you don't have to wander into the farmland that surrounds us for baby lambs to find it. I'm betting that you can find the emergence of this, the most wonderful of the seasons, within one minute of your front door. I tried this morning and there poking out of the brickwork of a wall about fifty feet from my doorstep was the most beautiful blue of some forget-me-nots. Fair enough the rain began to tease the top of my head whilst I bent down for a closer look but the signs are there. Spring is trying to emerge, its not far away. It won't be long until we can walk into the woods to collect armfulls of wild garlic for glorious soups and salads. Come on everyone, take a walk and look for some signs of Spring.