Your next escape is closer than you think. This is Kent. Not the one you imagined. The real one. And it's been waiting for you to arrive.
Kent has been keeping secrets. Rows of vines heavy with the grapes that make England's most-awarded sparkling wine, golden in the afternoon sun. A castle rising from its manicured gardens in the Kentish countryside. The chance to stay in a National Nature Reserve, with gorgeous views and the chance to finally switch off, and a magnificent manor house, astonishing collection and beautiful gardens made for family adventures. All of it within an hour. None of it what you expected. Kent has been here the whole time, quietly extraordinary, waiting for you to finally arrive.
Breathe, taste, wander, play and stay - it's Kent, rediscovered.
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Kent is home to a quarter of all UK wine producers, and the reason is no accident. The county shares the same chalk seam as the Champagne region of northern France, free-draining, mineral-rich, extraordinary for growing vines, and benefits from more sunshine hours and less rainfall than anywhere else in the country. Climate, soil and talent have converged here to produce something that the wine world is only just beginning to take seriously, despite the fact that Kent's sparkling wines have been beating Champagne in blind tastings since the mid-nineties.
The Wine Garden of England spans estates as different in character as they are in style - from Gusbourne near the coast, where sea breezes keep the fruit healthy and estate tours end with a three-course lunch overlooking the vines, to Squerryes near Westerham, the highest vineyard in Kent, sitting just off the M25 with a restaurant and deli beside it. Domaine Evremond near Canterbury is owned by the Taittinger family, its winery built directly into the chalk landscape. Balfour in Staplehurst is open every day of the year. Biddenden has been growing vines since 1969. Westwell, on the Pilgrims Way, hosts pizza and DJ nights worth booking a hotel for. An hour from London, the finest wine country in England has been here all along. It just didn't make a fuss about it. Kent, rediscovered.
Hever Castle has a moat, a drawbridge, a Tudor gatehouse and a childhood so extraordinary it shaped the course of English history - Anne Boleyn grew up within these walls, and you can feel the weight of that the moment you step inside. Outside, the grounds are equally remarkable - one of the finest gardens in England, a lake, a yew maze, water gardens, a miniature model house village and a calendar of events that gives families a reason to come back in every season.
The castle itself is intimate enough to feel genuinely discovered rather than visited - small rooms, ancient stone, stories in every corner - while the gardens are vast enough to spend an entire afternoon in without seeing everything. History you can walk straight into. Kent, rediscovered.
Driving out across the marshes of the Isle of Sheppey, the landscape opens up in a way that is difficult to prepare for - vast, flat, alive with birds and light and a silence so complete it feels almost deliberate. Elmley National Nature Reserve is one of the most important wetland habitats in the country, home to marsh harriers, lapwings, avocets and redshanks.
Stay in this magnificent landscape in the site's shepherd's huts and farmhouse and you'll wake to a dawn view that very few people in England ever get to see. This is not a hotel with a countryside view. This is the countryside, and you are sleeping in the middle of it. Come for a night and leave wondering how you spent so long without this kind of quiet.
Trust us with gardens of explore, collections to uncover and plenty of historic tales to be told, you'll need the whole day for a visit to Quex House & Gardens, home of The Powell-Cotton Museum. The house itself is Georgian, handsome and full of stories, set within acres of gardens that move through walled gardens, woodland walks and open lawns - the kind of place where children can roam freely and curious minds of every age find something to stop and wonder at.
And then there is the museum. Major Percy Powell-Cotton spent a lifetime travelling, and the world he brought back to this manor house in Birchington has been astonishing visitors, young and old, ever since. Life-sized natural history dioramas, incredible displays and fascinating cultural collections turn what might sound like a quiet afternoon into something genuinely adventurous: the sort of visit that sparks questions on the drive home and lingers in the imagination long after.
