Start Panning Your Walk For This Year!

The Five Church Walk Committee (one from each parish) met on 23th February for the first time to make detailed plans for this year’s big fundraising event. Ten or twenty years ago it would have been necessary to have previous meetings to discuss how it could be improved, but for the past five years the motto has been “if it isn’t broken, don’t try to fix it”. As it had already been decided & been published on our website that the signposted route would as customary be the reverse of the previous year, the meeting only had to double check on prior arrangements.

This year’s walk is six days later, as the Bank Holiday Monday is on 7th May 2018, so please make a note in your diary now!

Looking at the map of the route between churches on the home page of our website www.thefivechurchwalk.co.uk , it travels anti-clockwise: Chilham, Molash, Challock, Boughton Aluph & Godmersham back to Chilham. Of course you can start at any church, either completing the 16 mile circuit but more probably signing off after two or three churches. If familiar with the area you can walk clockwise as last year but there will be no arrows. One option is to park at Godmersham, walk to lunch at Chilham, & return; it is undemanding for the less active or young children.

I have recently added a number of photos I took on my circuit last year to the many I added after the 2016 walk to the route page between each pair of churches on our website. Please visit this to see the wide variety of scenery on each section of the route, some of which near Chilham & Godmersham is not a public right of way but kindly opened for us by the landowners.

Turn up at a church after 10.am to complete a simple entry form with boxes to tick for donations to any churches and/or Pilgrims Hospices or Kent Air Ambulance. We suggest a fiver (or more) for each adult in any group; donations (which can be gift aided) will meet expenditure at each of the churches and the charities. In addition the proceeds of homemade refreshments served by volunteers at each church will go to that church’s expenses.

Chris Godfrey