Today, as the weather, if not brilliant, seems reasonably warm and dry, we are making a trip to the Kentish seaside town of Margate.

Black Sheep Coffee

We walked down towards the railway station and stopped off, as we usually do, for coffee at Black Sheep.

St Pancras Station

The handsome St Pancras Station shone brightly in the sunshine. As it was a fine weekend day, the area was busy with people making a break for the seaside.

Eurostar departures

In St Pancras Station, we passed through the hall containing Eurostar departures. During the pandemic, it had been silent and empty but now, with the lifting of restrictions, life is returning to it.

Aboard the HS1

We bought tickets for the HS1, the high-speed train serving the south-east. The train soon became fairly full, as is only to be expected in the circumstances. This is the first trip of this kind that we have made for a long time and yet it all seemed very familiar and usual.

Random station view (Strood)

We stopped at several stations along the way, including this one which is Strood, chosen as a random example.

Green countryside

Here we are passing through green countryside as we approach Faversham.

Arriving at Margate

We arrived at Margate Station and exited the train among a crowd of people anxious to head for the beach.

Margate Station

Margate’s railway station is familiar to us and seeing it, it’s hard to remember how long ago was our last visit.

Margate beach

One of the attractions of Margate’s beach is the extensive spread of sand, much of which is brought by the tides from the Goodwin Sands.

The clock tower

The fine Victorian clock tower is one of my favourite features of the town.

Chips and mushy peas

We had chips for lunch (and I had a serving of mushy peas with mine), sitting on stone seats on the seafront near the Turner Contemporary art gallery.

The Turner

Tigger had booked us into the gallery for a visit at 1:30 pm.

The gallery cafe

We were a little early, so we went first to the gallery cafe for coffee and cake.

The gallery shop

We paid the obligatory visit to the gallery shop (and again before leaving) but without buying anything.

Sea view from the gallery

The gallery has lovely big windows looking over the bay. If you can see a small brown dot in the sea on the right, it is an iron man standing where it is alternately covered and uncovered by the sea. It is a sculpture called Another Time and is by Anthony Gormley.

One of the rooms

I’m sorry (but not surprised) to say that the exhibited artworks did nothing for me. Most were not anything I would care to call “art”. That possibly says more about me than it does about the “art” but that’s my honest opinion. People may disagree, if they wish.

The New Moon
J M W Turner

There were a few pieces of “proper art” on show, happily, such as this painting by Turner.

The pier and old custom house

After the gallery visit, we went for a stroll along the pier which also serves as the harbour arm. Margate also had a more conventional pier, confusingly called The Jetty, but it was destroyed by a storm. The white building on the right is the old Custom House, now the tourist information shop.

Walking along the pier

The pier has upper and lower levels. On the outward walk, we followed the upper level.

Better than art – a live gull

Here, I photographed a gull which I think is better than any art.

The lighthouse

At the end of the pier is a small but important lighthouse.

Artists at work

We walked back along the lower level and encountered a number of artists at work. Were they perhaps thinking of J M W Turner as they worked? Turned visited Margate often to paint the sea and sky, appreciating the quality of the light.

We now started to walk back along the seafront to the station. This is quite a long walk – or felt so in the muggy heat – and I was glad when the station finally hove into view.

Waiting on platform 4

Our next train for St Pancras would depart from platform 4 and thither we went. The only bench was in full sunlight but we were tired and it had to do, Happily, we did not have long to wait for our train.

Aboard the St Pancras train

Here we are aboard the HS1, ready to depart.

A view from the window

The countryside rushes past our window.

The train ride was uneventful and the high-speed train does reduce the journey time by an appreciable amount. At St Pancras, we worked our way through the jostling crowds and made for the bus stop where we could catch a 214 for home.

Aboard the 214

The 214 soon came and carried us up the road to home. For me, going away brings the pleasure of coming home again!

Composed “on the hoof” during our trip to Margate.