New Romney

New Romney is a Cinque Port that lost the sea in the storm of 1287 and has spent the seven centuries since acting as if it meant to. The flood left so much silt behind that you still step down into the church, and nobody has been in a hurry to dig anything out since. The town's proudest railway is built at a third of full size and ridden mostly by adults who should know better, while the real station shut decades ago and was replaced by a bus. Buyers come for the sea and end up in a bungalow a mile and a half from it, which is the town's own history repeated one mortgage at a time.