I recently took a day trip to Dover, the English coastal city known for its white cliffs, wartime history, and ferries to France.
Day Trip to Dover
The weather forecast–an increasingly important part of my expat life in London–called for blue skies over the white cliffs of Dover, so I set off on my day trip to Dover hoping for a nice day by the sea.
How to Get to Dover
It was easy to get to Dover by train from London. I hopped on a service at St Pancras station and arrived in Kent in just over an hour and 15 minutes.
The rain started right after I got off the train.
Dover Castle
Umbrella overhead, I trudged up the hill to Dover Castle feeling like I was climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. When I got to the top I stopped for a minute to acclimatize to the high altitude and chastise myself for forgetting my oxygen tank.
Steadied, I took in the castle. Established in the 11th century, Dover Castle has played an important role in England’s defense for centuries. Hidden tunnels beneath it were even used as a command center in World War II.
I walked to the ticket booth where the wizened old man at the counter told me that it would take at least two-and-a-half hours to see the whole castle.
He then booked me on a tour of the famous Secret Wartime Tunnels at Dover Castle in the late afternoon. Apparently the castle visit would take up most of my day trip to Dover.
Forty-five minutes later I had seen all there was to see.
I ran from the Dover Castle walls to the cafeteria, dodging raindrops like flaming arrows of enemy invaders.
Fortified by a strong cup of English Breakfast tea, I walked down to the Secret Wartime Tunnels to try my luck at getting on an earlier tour.
It must have been the high altitude that made me forget that the English have an extra gene: the queuing chromosome.
Combine that with an attitude toward fairness that could stand strong in the face of the fiercest Scottish highlander, and I was in for a challenge.
I talked with three different people, all of whom weren’t sure what the protocol was when some [rude] American wanted to effectively jump the queue.
Then I awoke from my altitude-induced stupor and remembered that the English weren’t the only ones with an extra gene.
Somewhere along that Mayflower voyage we Americans developed a special chromosome of our own: the better-to-ask-forgiveness-than-permission one.
And just like that, I slipped past the legion of confused Guardians of the Queue and stepped into the very next tour.
I had an informative viewing of the Secret Wartime Tunnels from which Operation Dynamo, the Dunkirk evacuation, was directed in World War II.
I enjoyed it even more as a result of the adrenaline rush that accompanies the daring feat of queue jumping.
White Cliffs of Dover
But the highlight of my day trip to Dover wasn’t in the tunnels, but outside of them. After repelling down Mount Kilimandover, I walked around the waterfront for a while to get a look at the white cliffs for which Dover is so famous.
The cliffs, which lie on both sides of Dover, stretch for 8 miles (13 kilometers) along the coast in Kent. Comprised of chalk punctuated by black flint steaks, they’re stunning to see from Dover or on a walk along the coast.
As if the weather gods knew how much I had suffered for the previous few hours, the clouds suddenly parted, leaving me with the beautiful blue skies I had been promised by their Sisyphean mortals, the weather forecasters.
Day Trip to Dover and Beyond
The white cliffs shone in all their chalky splendor and sent me home from my day trip to Dover in a state of ‘joy and laughter and peace ever after’. Until the next rainy spell, that is.
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