FEATURED ENTRY
Day 1, Friday 22nd November 2024
My train to Brighton from Blackfriars Station was at 9.39. I was ready to go quite early so I walked alongside the Thames to the station from home. The main line station straddles the bridge over the Thames. It's spectacular but still contrives to be a cheerless place. There's nowhere to sit until one's ticket allows one through the barrier to sit on the platform. Toilets were closed apart from a few cubicles available to both sexes. Trains arrived every few minutes mostly heading for the south east.
It was a day of brilliant sunlight and freezing cold. I walked from Brighton Station down to Palace Pier so as to start from the coast and from the same spot as Around Britain. From there I headed north past Brighton Pavilion looking strikingly exotic among more conventional architecture. I reached a large church with a tower where the main roads turned east and west. I turned left (west) to pass under a high viaduct carrying the railway. I'd imagined walking to Hassocks Station but this thought dissolved as I neared the decision point. In residential streets climbing above the city behind me I crossed the A23 to reach Preston Park Station. It was a start albeit a modest one. To reach Hassocks over the Downs near their highest point becomes more manageable now in these short daylight hours.
Distance 2.73 miles.