Sheppey | Curious Coast

service bay
fine dining
trax
modern industry
low tide
get the point
hull(k)
laughing lobster
Barrett homes ?
secret church
loads of statues
for Buddah's sake
Mr Casey's Crew
showtime
rememberance bench
remove before driving
twice the Chapel
waiting for the sun

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CuriousCoast
Tim Baynes
Trevor Clapp
#CuriousCoast
info@curiouscoast

The offbeat, kiss-me-quick atmosphere of the East Anglian and Kent seaside and coast fascinates photographer, Trevor Clapp and watercolorist, Tim Baynes. This website records some of their trips to these extraordinary places.

This land on the north Kent coast is a reciprocal of the wonderful flat lands of south Essex, Canvey Island, Southend-on-Sea. It was a natural destination for Trevor and I to visit in our ‘Travels with my architect’ series’.

The main town, Sheerness, once a naval base as important as Portsmouth, is now kiss-me-quick and blessed with some exceptionally friendly people. It was a grey morning as we crossed over the bridge and onto the island.

For breakfast we’d recommend Casey’s Café and the ‘big breakfast’, which comes with good advice on what to see on Sheppey and how to get there.

Moments away in Blue Town there is the largest open-air store of garden statuary and garden ornaments in England - Whelan’s. The place is remarkable and people come to Whelan’s from the north of the country to buy Buddha’s, birdbaths, Greek gods, Chinese emperors. I bought a goddess and Trevor brought a crocodile.

We explored Sheppey with its view across to Essex and the rest of north Kent. Fields and marshes and farms. Curlews cry from the small estuaries that are part of this flat landscape.

Today’s Sheppey was historically known as the “Isles of Sheppey” which were Sheppey itself, the Isle of Harty and the Isle of Elmley. Over time the channels between the isles have silted up to make one continuous island.

We explored the pretty church at Harty before heading back into Kent proper. The Church has been here for over 900 years. There is much to admire inside and the Victorian restoration was not overwrought.
“Alas I shall have to console myself with memories of the Church in its splendid isolation, with sea birds wheeling by and the Thames so wide as to be open sea.
Wrote John Betjeman after his visit to Harty Church.