First published: 01/05/05.

Ian Cade 2.5

Canterbury

Canterbury (Inscribed)

Canterbury by Ian Cade

The Cathedral is exceptional and is the pinnacle of the Church of England. The complex itself is huge and I easily spent a full afternoon walking around it. The Cathedral has been a place of pilgrimage for the last 800 years due to the murder/ martyring of former Archbishop Thomas Beckett and the areas associated with this are some of the most poignant I have ever borne witness to. The architecture is impressive as this was the first Gothic construction in the British Isles and there are plenty of additional aspects such as the Cloister which add to the building.

The other parts of the site are a bit further out from the centre both on the same road. The first is St Augustine's Abbey which was closed when I got there but I could see in and there seemed to be a reasonably large set of ruins to view. About 100m further on is St Martins church which was small and very pleasant with some nice views back to the Cathedral, it is also the oldest church in Britain alas this was closed as well as I spent so much time in the Cathedral itself.

The city of Canterbury is nice and due to its closeness to London and Dover has a lot of foreign tourists giving it a nice cosmopolitan feel. It is easy to reach the city with regular connections from London, the channel port of Dover and the Eurostar terminus at Ashford is only 20km away.

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