River Rother: Source to Sea

You know I love following rivers, so it probably won’t surprise you to learn I’ve been meaning to follow my local River Rother from source to sea for a long time.

I've decided to do a multi-day walk every week these summer holidays, and I realised it would be a good chance to finally go exploring along the Rother. I recorded the river as I went along, from the first time I encountered it as a small trickle across a bridleway to the windy harbour arm where it meets the English Channel. Have a listen as you read on (notes at the end of the post).

The East Sussex/Kent Rother (there’s another one in West Sussex) rises near the village of Rotherfield and flows east and south about 55km (35mi) to the sea near Rye. There are long sections of the river that don’t have public rights of way alongside them, so the best you can do as a moderately law-abiding walker is follow the valley, sometimes by the water, sometimes in the fields or on the hills and ridges above. The route I planned out was about 70km (44mi).

I’ve never been quite sure how to go about this walk. Should I do it all in one go, wild camping on the way? Should I use public transport as much as possible to come home each night? How many days would I be walking - three or four, maybe?

As it happens, Dan didn’t feel like coming on the walk, so he kindly ferried me back and forth when needed. I had some pretty extreme weather, too, which meant I was glad to not be camping out. Due to the heat on the first day and the wild wind and rain on the third day, I ended up walking for four days rather than the three I initially planned.

I tweeted about the walk, and you can find the threads and lots more photos here:

• Day 1 (Rotherfield to Stonegate, ~18km)
• Day 2 (Stonegate to Robertsbridge, ~13km)
• Day 3 (Robertsbridge to Newenden ~15km)
• Day 4 (Newenden to Camber ~24km)

Overall, I had a great time. I enjoyed getting a sense of progression as the scenery changed from the steepish hills and small streams at the beginning to the widening floodplain and braided watercourses in the middle to the levels and tidal stretches of river at the end. There are sections I would definitely walk again. I had fun exploring somewhere quite local to me and getting a bit of an insight into land use along the valley, smelling the hay bales and hearing the hoots of the steam train around Bodiam and Newenden. For the most part, the weather was pretty good.

I saw loads of birds: buzzards and kestrels, magpies and jays, LBJs (little brown jobbies), goldfinches, herons and egrets, crows and jackdaws, wagtails, swallows, swans and ducks and geese, a few varieties of gull, oystercatchers and something that I thought was a mudlark/magpie lark, except that they’re Australian. I spotted some interesting beetles, lots of butterflies (gatekeepers, peacocks, common blues and red admirals among others), and dragon- and damselflies in bright colours. And of course, many sheep and cows, along with several horses, a few donkeys, some chooks, domestic ducks and a goat.

That’s not to say there weren’t challenges. I had to go doorknocking for water on the first and last days, and the heat and humidity made me a bit ill. The blasting wind and rain on the third day made for an unpleasant last hour or so, as my boots filled with water (running off the long grass onto my legs and down through my socks). I had to cross a few fields with nervous cows, but it was actually the frisky horses in the rain that made me most wary. Probably most annoyingly, though, I encountered a lot of difficult or impassable paths - mainly due to undergrowth of long grasses and nettles, but also a few poorly waymarked paths, locked gates and broken stiles. I got a few scratches from barbed wire and brambles and some small holes in my new shorts from an overgrown stile which could have been avoided with proper maintenance from the landholders.

Still, every day I felt so grateful to be able to do this - that I have the time off for walking, the access to the countryside, the physical capacity to do it and a wonderful partner who is happy to act as a taxi service! First walk of summer: done.

The recordings in the piece above, in order, with about 10 seconds of each:

1. The first crossing of the Rother, down an unwaymarked bridleway near Rotherfield
2. The river running through a culvert under a road after passing through someone's garden
3. An almost silent Rother in the heat of the day under St Dunstan's Bridge
4. Water under a concrete farm bridge, almost tempting me to jump in, near Moat Mill Farm
5. On the second day, at Wreckery Bridge down through the wheat fields from the railway line
6. Very faint sounds of water and midday insects just outside Etchingham
7. Upstream of Robertsbridge, one thread of the Rother collects in an old mill pond before continuing
8. Under my umbrella in the rain of the third day on the river bank near Robertsbridge Abbey
9. Watery white noise at the small weir at Udiam, as rain still falls
   
10. The hum of traffic and wind around the boats near Newenden Bridge
11. Geese fly overhead and swallows dart above the Rother while I eat lunch near Blackwall Bridge
12. Hunkering down behind the harbour arm, trying to collect some non-wind-distorted audio

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For more river-length adventures: Snowy River, Cuckmere and River Otter. For more Rother walks: Royal Military Canal, Bodiam Castle and Northiam.

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