We hired a car yesterday and Matt drove us down to Dover.  We’ve been through Dover several times, leaving on the ferry to France, arriving back in the UK.  From a distance, we’d seen the white cliffs and the castle on the hill.

That was our first stop yesterday: Dover Castle.  And with English Heritage Membership, we managed to avoid the £10.30 entry fee.  The Dover Castle complex is vast.  It’s the site of a Roman lighthouse, a 1216 seige, a visit by Henry VIII, and – more recently, home to a set of underground tunnels, where they coordinated the evacuation of Allied troops from Dunkirk in World War II.

We could’ve spent a whole day, maybe more, at Dover Castle.  Since we only had a fraction of that time, we decided to focus on it’s wartime history.  There’s three layers of tunnels under the complex.  We joined a guided tour of the first two – one operating as a hospital; the other as a strategic headquarters for the military.  Apparently the one below was to be used in the 1960s in the event of a nuclear attack.  That level remains closed to the public, remains more of a secret.

England does it’s history well, I think.  It comes with audio guides and placards giving the important facts.  Or videos with old footage.  Or tours with the sights, sounds and smells of a World War II hospital.  A chance to stand inside a lookout and scan the horizon with binoculars, as others used to do, when the sight of an unknown ship had far more serious consequences. 

Being here has given me a whole new appreciation of what the past is. 

Tash