On the day of the equinox, which marks the start of longer days and shorter nights, the narrator was on vacation while Jools had half a day of work left. Her employers had paid for all the employees at her factory to go to a fancy place in Folkestone for lunch and drinks, which was a time for celebration. Despite being on vacation, the narrator drove Jools to work and had the car for the day. He had planned to drive to the far west of Kent and dropped Jools off in the town for a walk. The narrator then drove back home for breakfast, did some chores, and left on a mini-churchcrawl.
He drove up the A20 and then onto the motorway to Ashford, before turning down to the A road towards Mereworth. The road became windy and led him into Tonbridge, which was a sleepy village that had become a major junction after the railways came. The narrator drove down the wide High Street, over the river Medway, and up the hill on the other side until he reached the village of Penshurst, which was built around the outskirts of Penshurst Place. He parked the car and armed himself with two cameras and several lenses before walking to the church. The church was the Sidney Chapel where the great and good were buried and remembered, and it had colourful roof beams and heraldic shields. The narrator went around taking photographs and paid 5 pounds for the church before leaving for his next destination, Speldhurst.
He drove to Speldhurst, but there was no place to park near the church. He could see from his drive-by that the porch doors were closed, and he was convinced that they were locked and not worth checking. He went on to Groombridge, where there was a small chapel with fabulous glass. It was pouring with rain by then, and he missed the church on first pass before turning round. The church looked dark and was almost certainly locked, so he didn’t stop here either and went straight to Tunbridge Wells to revisit another church.
He drove into Tunbridge Wells, parked high up in the parking house, and walked down the hill leading to the station, over the bridge, and down the narrow streets lined with shops. The church was across the road from The Pantiles, but the narrator was there to visit the church. He observed a service, but he did not take communion. He was there to photograph the ceiling and other details that he failed to record when he was last there over a decade ago. A warden quizzed him strongly as to why he was doing this, but he had no answer other than he enjoyed it.
After getting his shots, he left and began the slog back up to the car, making a promise to a young man selling the Big Issue that he would come back and buy a copy. He gave the young man a fiver and didn’t take a copy, making the young man nearly burst into tears. By the time he got to the car park, it was raining hard again. He had two and a half hours to get to Folkestone to pick up Jools after her meal. Traffic into Tunbridge Wells from this was crazy, miles and miles of queues, so he was more than happy going the other way. He got back to the M20, stopped at Stop 24 services for a coffee and something to eat, and had 90 minutes to kill.
At quarter past four, he went to pick up Jools, stopping outside the factory where they all worked.