Discover the countryside: Kent

PLACE TO EXPLORE: Find peace beside the road in Kent

Andrea Griffiths, Director of CPRE Kent, recommends Ashenbank Wood in Gravesham and King’s Wood near Ashford, two ancient woodlands that sit remarkably close to busy roads.

Ashenbank’s oaks, hornbeams and sweet chestnuts stand beside surviving Second World War bunkers, seeming to blanket out the noise of the nearby A2. King’s Wood, with its sweet chestnut coppice, beech groves and spring bluebells, offers the same unexpected calm beside the M20.

LOCAL SECRET: Explore Kent’s hidden waterways

Away from its famous coastline, Kent is threaded with lesser-known wetlands. The Wantsum Channel, once a sea crossing separating the Isle of Thanet from the rest of Kent, is now reclaimed marshland criss-crossed by reed-lined waterways, while the Nethergong and Sarre Penn valley is home to beavers, water voles, nightingales and barn owls.

The Darent Valley, barely 20 miles from London, has scarcely changed in 50 years, its eastern chalk grasslands still home to rare adders and orchids.