Pilgrimage Opening
Join us for the opening of the River Medway Pilgrimage; a day of ceremony, walking, food, creativity, and connection.
📍 Meeting Point: Weir Wood Reservoir Sports Club, RH18 5HT | What3Words: ///incomes.servicing.exhales
🛤️ Route: Weir Wood Reservoir, Forest Row → Tablehurst Farm, Forest Row
⏰ Meet Time: 2pm | Departure Time: 4pm
👣 Estimated Walking Time: 1.5 to 2 hours
Join us as we open the River Medway Pilgrimage; a multi-day journey of walking alongside the river, and for the river.
This opening day marks the first steps of our shared journey: a gathering of pilgrims, river companions, and all those who feel called to spend time in relationship with this living landscape. Through ceremony, conversation, walking, food, and storytelling, we will begin to explore what it means to become friends, protectors, and guardians of the River Medway, planting the seeds for the journey ahead.
Moving from Weir Wood Reservoir to Tablehurst Farm, we will walk into the rhythm of pilgrimage: slowing down, paying attention, and allowing the river and landscape to reveal their stories.
Whether you are joining for a few hours or beginning the full pilgrimage journey, you are warmly welcome.
Programme
2:00pm -3:00pm | Opening of the Pilgrimage
We will begin with a series of short talks - including stories from last year's journeys -and shared intentions, openning the space for the journey ahead.
3:00pm - 4:00pm | Opening Ceremony with JM Julia
A moment of welcome, recognition, and connection as we officially begin. Pilgrims will receive their badges and be welcomed into the journey marking our first steps together.
4:00pm - 6:00pm | Walking with the River: Weir Wood Reservoir to Tablehurst Farm
Our first walk together. A gentle beginning as we settle into the pace of pilgrimage, moving through the landscape, noticing the waters, pathways, and places that shape the River Medway’s story.
6:00pm - 7:00pm | Community Dinner at Tablehurst Farm
As the day draws to a close, we will gather around a shared table for a donation-based community dinner. A simple, nourishing vegetarian meal will be prepared with seasonal produce grown within the River Medway catchment, celebrating the land, the farmers, and the communities that care for this place.
Please select the Dinner Ticket option when booking if you would like to join the meal. All contributions go towards supporting this shared offering.
7:00pm - 8:00pm | River Stories and a Letter to the River
As evening falls, local storytellers will share myths, memories, and reflections on rivers, exploring the origins of water and the stories that have shaped our relationship with the living landscape. We will then turn inward and begin our own creative offering to the river: writing a Letter to the River. Inspired by the Letters to the Earth model, this is an invitation to share our hopes, questions, gratitude, and intentions at the beginning of our journey. These letters will become a thread woven through the pilgrimage; used as a reference point for our intentions, and something we return to at the end.