I was running out of new places to visit in east Sussex, so this weekend I decided to push further afield in Kent.   I chose to visit the countryside around the village of Brenchley on the edge of high weald.

Brenchley Walking Guide

I got the idea for the walk around Brenchley out of the AA’s guide to 50 walks in Kent.
From a landscape photography point of view Brenchley looked interesting as it sat on the edge of the high weald.  Brenchley was a bit further along than goudhurst and Bewl water also on the high weald that I had visited previously and enjoyed walking and photographing the many views there.

On arrival I took a walk around the the grounds of the 11th century church there with ancient yew trees.  Old Churches and graveyards can be very photogenic, just handholding the camera I was warming up.

Hill Top

I then made my way through some apple orchards to a green expanse called hill top.

Using OS maps online it had this area marked as a golf course, but this was not true. I dont know if it was a golf course or is going to be one, hope not.  It nearly put me off visiting.


As I walked down the green footpaths of the hilltop areas views across the high weald opened up and time to take some landscape photographs.  It was bright enough to handhold but prefer to fix my camera to the tripod.

The weather forecast for this day was cloudy, but often on cloudy days there will be many breaks in the clouds where the sun will shine through.  This was true for the first couple of hours of this 8 mile walk around Brenchley.  Broken clouds add alot of interest to the sky, ideally there will be around 40-60% coverage.

I make it a habit now when I am out on a photo walk to take some telephoto landscape images.  For the one above the focal point was Kent’s iconic Oast houses, its all about zooming in on some detail.

For the first part of this walk around Brenchley I was already taking alot of landscape photographs and had a long way to go yet.  I hope this beautiful expanse of countryside never becomes a golf course.

As the day and the walk wore on, landscape photography opportunities became less as the countryside became more flat, also more thick cloud began to move in until the sun was completely blocked out.

I took a detour to a viewpoint marked on the map just down the road from Castle Hill which marks the end of the high weald and sweeping views north.  But by this time it was beginning to rain and visibility was not good anymore.

I enjoyed my walk around Brenchley on the high weald, finally stopping in the little bull for a beer and a sausage roll which they had on sale there.  The plan was to do more walks around Kent in the coming weeks.