I’m sure even those of you who live in foreign places have heard of the white cliffs of Dover, the famous chalk cliffs that you see when you sail across the English Channel from France, the cliffs that have been immortalised in rhyme, prose and song lyrics, photographs and paintings. Well, forget them, because they are nowhere near as impressive as the Seven Sisters, the chalk cliffs that form part of the coastline between Eastbourne and Seaford, in East Sussex.

Yes, I’ve been away again, stayed for a week at a hotel in Eastbourne from where I explored, walking a lot of miles, mostly birding, the area along this coast.

It had been seven years since I’d last been to East Sussex; before Covid, I used to visit the area quite regularly as I had a friend who lived locally, but I hadn’t been there since those dark days of 2019-2020. And this is such a stunning location, one of my favourite places in Britain, that a return visit was definitely long overdue.

Today’s blog, then, doesn’t focus on one particular species of flora or fauna; it’s more about scene setting, about showing you some of the spectacular landscapes in this area.

First up is the Seven Sisters Country Park, an area of just under 700 acres (280 hectares) of grassland, the meandering Cuckmere River, saltmarsh, and those chalk cliffs that give the park its name – there are seven peaks or high points in the cliffs that undulate in an easterly direction from the Cuckmere to Birling Gap.

You can walk out to the sea from the roadside visitor centre on both sides of the Cuckmere River, alongside the river itself and along paths that hug the edges of the valley on both sides. I walked all these paths last week, twice, because each gives different views and, for me, the opportunity to see a wide range of birds, from the waders that prefer the watery channels to the ducks and geese that graze in the fields.

One of my visits was on a day of blue skies and bright sunshine and, as it was a Sunday, the park was very busy with both locals and tourists – not my favourite situation but I went early in the morning so avoided the worst of the crowds. My second visit was during the week, on a day of big scudding clouds and strong cool winds – common here, as you can tell from the sideways-leaning trees and stunted growth of some plants. Both days were glorious, reminding me that I really must visit this beautiful area more often.