Kent Downs National Landscape

'The Kent Downs AONB [Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty] covers 878 sq. km from the White Cliffs at Dover and Folkestone to the Surrey Border. The geology of the area defines the topography and landscape features that form the basis of the natural beauty for which it is nationally recognised. A large arch of chalk, shaped like an eyelid, sweeps across Kent. This creates a central ridge through the county, and forms the most important geological feature of the AONB. This chalk ridge is part of the same formation found in Sussex, Hampshire and Surrey, and it also reappears across the Strait of Dover in northern France. In addition, the highest areas of the Greensand ridge in Kent, together with a spit of ragstone escarpment above the Romney Marsh, are also within the Kent Downs AONB.'