Rye

I had read somewhere that Rye, which is bit northeast of Brighton, was a very lovely town with a lot of older buildings.  So I got up on Monday morning, went to the train station and bought a ticket.

Even the first impression was good.  A sign across from the train station in Rye welcomes visitors and gives some of the history and lore of the city.

Right away you are introduced to the concept of the Cinque Ports, five coastal cities that were the prime defense against the French and as a result did not have to pay taxes.  Ironically, Rye was not one of those five towns, but was one of the two "ancient towns" that were also part of the defenses.

At the time when England needed defending by these ports--the twelfth and thirteenth century--Rye was very close to the sea--it was a bustling port where ships could deliver and pick up their goods when the tide came in.  But a storm in the 13th century redirected the River Rother and the subsequent silt buildup meant Rye was actually a few miles inland.

Entering the city, you see this big gate, started in 1329.  There were others like it in Rye and surrounding towns, but this is the only one that survives.

A shop very nearby takes full advantage of the location.

The main drag is High Street, with a lot of lovely shops and restaurants.

Although from a short acquaintance with the town, I wonder how much of a call there is for this type of item.

I stopped in the tourist office and got a walking tour (for a pound!) and started the tour at the River Tillingham marina.  Once again, low tide had boats stranded in the sand.

I had picked up a piece of pizza, which was more like a very elaborate Brioche for lunch and sat down by the river to eat.  By the time I had finished and was ready to restart my tour, I found that my camera was gone.  I looked all over the marina, stopped in a few shops and finally went to the nearby "heritage centre" where someone had turned it in.  Quite a scare.  That certainly would have been the end of this blog.

The tour took me past this weaving shop, with a wool sheep on the side of the building...

past the mint, that made coins during the reign of King Steven (12th century)...

and on to the Mermaid Inn, probably the most famous building in the town.

Smuggling was the most common occupation of the Rye inhabitants during the 18th century, and the Mermaid Inn was the headquarters.  It is said that gang members drank at the Inn with guns in their laps.

The Inn was so well known, one might say notorious, that the house across the street on Mermaid Lane is simply referred to as "The House Opposite."

The Mermaid Inn is very old but a sign outside indicates that it was rebuilt in the 15th century.

A lot of the houses in Rye are only identified by name rather than street address.  Here's the Lamb House, once the home of author Henry James.

And the Thomas House from the 14th century. 

 There are so many beautiful homes in Rye, it was hard not to take pictures of every one. 

And just how did they manage to create this?

St. Mary's Church in the center of town has an unusual feature--quarterboys--figures on the front of the church that ring out the quarter hours.

The church also allows people--by which I mean charges them--to climb the steeple to get a good view of the town.  I decided to try it out.  The first part of the climb is fine--up a very narrow staircase--but then you go through a hallway that is so narrow I had to turn sideways and then up three flights of glorified ladders.  When you do get to the top, you are stepping on wood planks in a very narrow passage around the steeple.  (You can see somebody on the path in the picture above.)  It is very scary.  And after a little while I started to feel a little woozy, so I decided to go down--an even scarier journey than the one up.  In any case, I did get some pictures.  I had to look at them in my camera later to recall what I had seen since I was too petrified when I was up there to really pay attention.   And no I am not afraid of heights and I don't have claustrophobia.  It was just really scary.

As you can see, Rye is not that big, just packed with interesting places.

Nearby the church was this delightful home, the old vicarage.

The graveyard was very spooky, especially since a dove or owl or some other bird was making a very mournful sound while I was there.  As soon as I tried to capture it on my camera with a video, it stopped.

Nearby is the oldest building in Rye, started as a monastery, disbanded by the pope because it housed men and women together. 

And this is the inside of the Catholic Church in town, St. Anthony of Padua.

Then it was down Tradders Passage back to the start of the tour.

Just a lovely, lovely village, well worth the visit.