hotel in dover
hotel in dover

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hotel in dover

hotel in dover

hotel in dover

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hotel in dover

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hotel in dover

a hotel in dover

A hotel, in a town like Dover, , is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis.

The provision of basic accommodation, in times past, consisting only of a room with a bed, a cupboard, a small table and a washstand has largely been replaced by rooms with modern facilities, including en-suite bathrooms and air conditioning or climate control.

Additional common features found in hotel rooms are a telephone, an alarm clock, a television, a safe, a mini-bar with snack foods and drinks, and facilities for making tea and coffee.

Luxury features include bathrobes and slippers, a pillow menu, twin-sink vanities, and jacuzzi bathtubs.

Larger hotels may provide additional guest facilities such as a restaurant, swimming pool, fitness center, business center, childcare, conference facilities and social function services.

Hotel rooms are usually numbered (or named in some smaller hotels and B&Bs) to allow guests to identify their room.

Some hotels offer meals as part of a room and board arrangement.

In the United Kingdom, in a town like Dover, , a hotel is required by law to serve food and drinks to all guests within certain stated hours.

In Japan, capsule hotels provide a minimized amount of room space and shared facilities.

The word hotel is derived from the French hotel (coming from hote meaning host), which referred to a French version of a townhouse or any other building seeing frequent visitors, rather than a place offering accommodation.

In contemporary French usage, hotel now has the same meaning as the English term, and hotel particulier is used for the old meaning.

The French spelling, with the circumflex, was also used in English, but is now rare.

The circumflex replaces the 's' found in the earlier hostel spelling, which over time took on a new, but closely related meaning.

Grammatically, hotels usually take the definite article - hence "The Astoria Hotel" or simply "The Astoria.

" Hotel operations in a hotel vary in size, function, and cost.

Most hotels and major hospitality companies that operate hotels have set widely accepted industry standards to classify hotel types.

General categories include the following; * Upscale Luxury.

o Examples include Conrad Hotels, InterContinental Hotels, Ritz-Carlton, Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, Dorchester Collection,and JW Marriott Hotels.

* Full Service.

o Examples include Hilton, Marriott, Hotel Indigo, Doubletree, and Hyatt.

* Select Service.

o Examples include Holiday Inn, Courtyard by Marriott and Hilton Garden Inn.

* Limited Service.

o Examples include Hampton Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Fairfield Inn, Days Inn, and La Quinta Inns & Suites.

* Extended Stay.

o Examples include Staybridge Suites, Homewood Suites by Hilton, Residence Inn by Marriott, and Extended Stay Hotels.

* Timeshare.

o Examples include Holiday Inn Club Vacations, Marriott Vacation Club International, Westgate Resorts, and Disney Vacation Club.

* Destination Club.

Hotel management is a significant career.

Larger hotels may operate with an extensive management structure consisting of a General Manager which serves as the head executive, department heads that oversee various departments, middle managers, administrative staff, and line-level supervisors.

Degree programs such as hospitality management studies, a business degree, and/or certification programs prepare hotel managers for industry practice.

Some hotels, a hotel in dover for instance, have gained their renown through tradition, by hosting significant events or persons, such as Schloss Cecilienhof in Potsdam, Germany, which derives its fame from the Potsdam Conference of the World War II allies Winston Churchill, Harry Truman and Joseph Stalin in 1945.

The Taj Mahal Palace & Tower in Mumbai is one of India's most famous and historic hotels because of its association with the Indian independence movement.

Some establishments have given name to a particular meal or beverage, as is the case with the Waldorf Astoria in New York City, United States where the Waldorf Salad was first created or the Hotel Sacher in Vienna, Austria, home of the Sachertorte.

Others have achieved fame by association with dishes or cocktails created on their premises, such as the Hotel de Paris where the crepe Suzette was invented or the Raffles Hotel in Singapore, where the Singapore Sling cocktail was devised.

A number of hotels have entered the public consciousness through popular culture, such as the Ritz Hotel in London, through its association with Irving Berlin's song, 'Puttin' on the Ritz'.

The Algonquin Hotel in New York City is famed as the meeting place of the literary group, the Algonquin Round Table, and Hotel Chelsea, also in New York City, has been the subject of a number of songs and the scene of the stabbing of Nancy Spungen (allegedly by her boyfriend Sid Vicious).

Many hotels can be considered destinations in themselves, by dint of unusual features of the lodging or its immediate environment: Boutique hotels are typically hotels like with a unique environment.

Some hotels are built with living trees as structural elements, for example the Costa Rica Tree House in the Gandoca-Manzanillo Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica; the Treetops Hotel in Aberdare National Park, Kenya; the Ariau Towers near Manaus, Brazil, on the Rio Negro in the Amazon; and Bayram's Tree Houses in Olympos, Turkey.

In Nax Mont-Noble, a little ski resort situated on 1300 metres in the Swiss Alps, construction for the Maya Guesthouse will start in September 2011.

It will be the first hotel in Europe built entirely with straw bales.

Due to the isolation values of the walls it will need no heating.

The Null Stern Hotel in Teufen, Appenzellerland, Switzerland and the Concrete Mushrooms in Albaniaare former nuclear bunkers transformed into hotels.

Shoe hotels are hotels built into a giant shoe.

The idea was inspired by the "Old Woman who lived in a shoe" myth.

The largest such hotel is currently in Hokkaido, Japan.

The most popular shoe hotels are modelled after a woman's platform dancing shoe.

The Cuevas Pedro Antonio de AlarcOn (named after the author) in Guadix, Spain, as well as several hotels in Cappadocia, Turkey, are notable for being built into natural cave formations, some with rooms underground.

The Desert Cave Hotel in Coober Pedy, South Australia is built into the remains of an opal mine.

Capsule hotels are a type of economical hotel that are found in Japan, where people sleep in stacks of rectangular containers.

The Ice Hotel in Jukkasjarvi, Sweden, and the Hotel de Glace in Duschenay, Canada, melt every spring and are rebuilt each winter; the Mammut Snow Hotel in Finland is located within the walls of the Kemi snow castle; and the Lainio Snow Hotel is part of a snow village near Yllas, Finland.

Garden hotels, famous for their gardens before they became hotels, include Gravetye Manor, the home of garden designer William Robinson, and Cliveden, designed by Charles Barry with a rose garden by Geoffrey Jellicoe.

Some hotels have accommodation underwater, such as Utter Inn in Lake Malaren, Sweden.

Hydropolis, project cancelled 2004 in Dubai, would have had suites on the bottom of the Persian Gulf, and Jules Undersea Lodge in Key Largo, Florida requires scuba diving to access its rooms.

Other unusual hotels - RMS Queen Mary, Long Beach, California, United States.

* The Library Hotel in New York City, is unique in that each of its ten floors is assigned one category from the Dewey Decimal System.

* The Burj al-Arab hotel in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, built on an artificial island, is structured in the shape of a boat's sail.

* The Jailhotel Lowengraben in Lucerne, Switzerland is a converted prison now used as a hotel.

* The Luxor, a hotel and casino on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, United States is unusual due to its pyramidal structure.

* The Liberty Hotel in Boston, used to be the Charles Street Jail.

* Built in Scotland and completed in 1936, The former ocean liner RMS Queen Mary in Long Beach, California, United States uses its first-class staterooms as a hotel, after retiring in 1967 from Transatlantic service.

* There are several hotels throughout the world built into converted airliners.

Some hotels are built specifically to create a captive trade, example at casinos and holiday resorts.

Though of course hotels have always been built in popular destinations, the defining characteristic of a resort hotel is that it exists purely to serve another attraction, the two having the same owners.

In Las Vegas there is a tradition of one-upmanship with luxurious and extravagant hotels in a concentrated area known as the Las Vegas Strip.

This trend now has extended to other resorts worldwide, but the concentration in Las Vegas is still the world's highest: nineteen of the world's twenty-five largest hotels by room count are on the Strip, with a total of over 67,000 rooms.

In Europe Center Parcs might be considered a chain of resort hotels, since the sites are largely man-made (though set in natural surroundings such as country parks) with captive trade, whereas holiday camps such as Butlins and Pontin's are probably not considered as resort hotels, since they are set at traditional holiday destinations which existed before the camps.

Frequently, expanding railway companies built grand hotels at their termini, such as the Midland Hotel, Manchester next to the former Manchester Central Station and in London the ones above St Pancras railway station and Charing Cross railway station also in London is the Chiltern Court Hotel above Baker Street tube station and Canada's grand railway hotels.

They are or were mostly, but not exclusively, used by those travelling by rail.

A motel (motor hotel) is a hotel which is for a short stay, usually for a night, for motorists on long journeys.

It has direct access from the room to the vehicle (for example a central parking lot around which the buildings are set), and is built conveniently close to major roads and intersections.

In 2006, Guinness World Records listed the First World Hotel in Genting Highlands, Malaysia as the world's largest hotel with a total of 6,118 rooms.

Similarly, the Venetian Palazzo Complex, in Las Vegas, has the most number of rooms.

It has 7,117 rooms followed by MGM Grand Hotel, which contains 6,852 rooms.

According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the oldest hotel still in operation is the Hoshi Ryokan, in the Awazu Onsen area of Komatsu, Japan which opened in 718.

The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong is the tallest building used exclusively as a hotel.

Located on the top of Hong Kong's tallest building, the 488 meter tall International Commerce Centre.

Some hotels sell individual rooms to investors.

Timeshare is an example of this kind of investment.

The buyer is allowed to stay in the room without charge or at a reduced rate for a given number of days each year.

The investor is paid a share of the takings for the room.

Rooms can be sold on a leasehold basis, sometimes on a 999 year lease.

Room owners are free to sell at any time.

A number of public figures have notably chosen to take up semi-permanent or permanent residence in hotels.

* Actor Richard Harris lived at the Savoy Hotel while in London.

Hotel archivist Susan Scott recounts an anecdote that when he was being taken out of the building on a stretcher shortly before his death he raised his hand and told the diners "it was the food.

" * Inventor Nikola Tesla lived the last 10 years of his life at the New Yorker Hotel until 1943 when he died in the hotel room.

* Millionaire Howard Hughes lived his last few years in a Las Vegas hotel.

* Egyptian actor Ahmad Zaki lived his last 15 years in Ramses Hilton Hotel - Cairo.

* Larry Fine (of the Three Stooges) and his family lived in hotels, due to his extravagant spending habits and his wife's dislike for housekeeping.

They first lived in the President Hotel in Atlantic City, New Jersey, where his daughter Phyllis was raised, then the Knickerbocker Hotel in Hollywood.

Not until the late 1940s did Larry buy a home in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles, California.

* General Douglas McArthur lived his last 14 years in the penthouse of the Waldorf Towers, a part of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.

* American actress Elaine Stritch lived in the Savoy Hotel in London for over a decade.

* Fashion designer Coco Chanel lived in the Hotel Ritz Paris on and off for more than 30 years.

* Vladimir Nabokov and his wife Vera lived in the Montreux Palace Hotel in Montreux, Switzerland from 1961 until his death in 1977.

* British entrepreneur Jack Lyons lived in the Hotel Mirador Kempinski in Switzerland for several years until his death in 2008.

Hotels, like a hotel in dover, have been used as the settings for television programmes such as the British situation comedies Fawlty Towers and I'm Alan Partridge, the British soap opera Crossroads, and in films such as the Bates Motel in Hitchcock's 1960 film Psycho and The Dolphin Hotel in 1408, a short story by Stephen King which was adapted into a 2007 film.

Another is Tipton Hotel, a fictitious hotel in Disney's "The Suite Life of Zack and Cody".

When the show later became a spinoff into "The Suite Life on Deck," the Tipton evolved into the SS Tipton, run by the same company.

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a hotel in dover

Dover’s name originated with its river – the River Dour, deriving from the Brythonic Dubrās ("the waters"), via its Latinized form of Dubris.

The cliffs also gave Britain its ancient name of Albion ("white").

The Romans called it ’’Porte Dubris’’; the modern name was in use at least by the time Shakespeare wrote 'King Lear' (between 1603 and 1606), in which the town and its cliffs play a prominent role.

Dover’s history, because of its proximity to France, has always been of great strategic importance to Britain.

Archaeological finds have shown that there were Stone Age people in the area; and that by the Bronze Age the maritime influence was already strong.

Some Iron Age finds exist also, but the coming of the Romans made Dover part of their communications network.

Like Lemanis (Lympne) and Rutupiae (Richborough) Dover was connected by road to Canterbury and Watling Street; and it became Portus Dubris, a fortified port.

Forts were built above the port; lighthouses were constructed to guide ships; and one of the best-preserved Roman villas in Britain is here.

Dover figured largely in the Domesday Book as an important borough.

It also served as a bastion against various attackers: notably the French during the Napoleonic Wars; and against Germany during World War II.

Dover is near the extreme south-east corner of Britain.

At South Foreland, the nearest point to the continent, Cap Gris Nez near Calais is 34 kilometres (21 mi) away, across the Strait of Dover.

The site of its original settlement lies in the valley of the River Dour, making it an ideal place for a port, sheltered from the prevailing south-westerly winds.

This led to the silting up of the river mouth by the action of longshore drift; the town was then forced into making artificial breakwaters to keep the port in being.

These breakwaters have been extended and adapted so that the port lies almost entirely on reclaimed land.

The higher land on either side of the valley – the Western Heights and the eastern high point on which Dover Castle stands – has been adapted to perform the function of protection against invaders.

The town has gradually extended up the river valley, encompassing several villages in doing so.

Little growth is possible along the coast, since the cliffs are on the sea’s edge.

The railway, being tunnelled and embanked, skirts the foot of the cliffs.

Dover has an oceanic climate (Koppen classification Cfb) similar to the rest of England and the United Kingdom with moderate temperatures year-round and light precipitation each month.

In 1800 Edward Hasted (1732–1812) reported that the town had a population of almost 10,000 people.

At the 2001 census, the town of Dover had 28,156 inhabitants, while the population of the whole urban area of Dover, as calculated by the Office for National Statistics, was 39,078 inhabitants.

With the expansion of Dover, many of the outlying ancient villages have been incorporated into the town.

Originally the parishes of Dover St Mary's and Dover St James, since 1836 Buckland and Charlton have become part Dover, and Maxton (a hamlet to the west), River, Kearsney, Temple Ewell, and Whitfield , all to the north of the town centre, are within its conurbation.

The Dover Harbour Board is the responsible authority for the running of the Port of Dover.

The English Channel, here at its narrowest point in the Straits of Dover, is the busiest shipping lane in the world.

Ferries crossing between here and the Continent have to negotiate their way through the constant stream of shipping crossing their path.

The Dover Strait Traffic Separation Scheme allots ships separate lanes when passing through the Strait.

The Scheme is controlled by the Channel Navigation Information Service based at Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre Dover.

MRCC Dover is also charged with co-ordination of civil maritime search and rescue within these waters.

The Port of Dover is also used by cruise ship passengers, and the old Dover Marine railway station building, together with a newly built one[clarification needed], cater for those passengers .

The ferry lines using the port are (number of daily sailings in parentheses): * to Calais: P&O Ferries (25) and Sea France (20);.

* to Dunkerque: DFDS Seaways (previously Norfolkline) (11).

These services have been cut in recent years: * P&O Ferries sailings to Boulogne (5 daily) were withdrawn in 1993 and Zeebrugge (4 daily) in 2002.

* SNCF withdrew their three train ferry sailings on the opening of the Channel Tunnel.

* Regie voor Maritiem Transport moved their Ostend service of three sailings daily to Ramsgate in 1994; the route now operates as TransEuropa Ferries * Stena Line merged their 20 Calais sailings into the current P&O operation in 1998.

* Hoverspeed ceased operations in 2005 and withdrew their 8 daily sailings.

* SpeedFerries ceased operations in 2008 and withdrew their 5 daily sailings.

* LD Lines ceased the Dover-Dieppe service on 29 June 2009 and Dover-Boulogne 5 September 2010.

The Dover lifeboat is a Severn class lifeboat based in the Western Docks and .

Transport Dover’s main communications artery, the A2 road replicates two former routes, connecting the town with Canterbury.

The Roman road was followed for centuries until, in the late 18th century, it became a toll road.

Stagecoaches were operating: one description stated that the journey took all day to reach London, from 4am to being “in time for supper”.

The other main roads, travelling west and east, are the A20 to Folkestone and thence to London and the A258 through Deal to Sandwich.

The railway reached Dover from two directions: the South Eastern Railway's main line connected with Folkestone in 1844, and the London, Chatham and Dover Railway opened its line from Canterbury in 1861.

A tram system operated in the town from 1897 to 1936.

Dover has two long distance footpaths: the Saxon Shore Way and the North Downs Way.

Two National Cycle Network routes begin their journey at the town .

Also, the ferry to Calais is a popular transport.

From Dover to Calais it usually take one and a half hours to cross the Strait of Dover.

The Strait of Dover is the stretch of water between Dover and Calais, and also the stretch of water the Dover-Calais and Calais-Dover ferries cross.

There are nine secondary level schools, 16 primary schools and two schools for special education.

Several of the state secondary schools now specialise: Astor College for the Arts; Dover Grammar School for Girls is a specialist Humanities College; Dover Grammar School for Boys, a Business and Enterprise College; St Edmund's Catholic College for the Performing Arts; and Dover Christ Church Academy, a specialist Maths, ICT and Music Academy.

The Duke of York's Royal Military School, England's only military boarding school for children of service personnel (co-ed ages 11–18), is also located in Dover, next to the military base.

Dover College, a public school was founded in 1871 by a group of local business men.

Dover has one hospital, Buckland Hospital located in a former Victorian workhouse on Coombe Valley Road.

The town once had four hospitals, Buckland, Royal Victoria, Isolation and the Eye Hospitals located at various points across the town.

Buckland Hospital is currently (2008) threatened with closure and various local organisations are trying to stop the cuts facing the hospital.

Dover was the home to television studios and production offices of Southern Television Ltd, the company which operated the ITV franchise for South and South East England from 1958-1981.

The studios were located on Russell Street and were home to programmes like 'Scene South East', 'Scene Midweek', 'Southern News', 'Farm Progress' and the nightly epilogue, 'Guideline'.

The studios were operated by TVS in 1982 and home to 'Coast to Coast', however they closed a year later when the company moved their operations to the newly complete Television Centre in Maidstone.

Dover has two paid for newspapers, the Dover Express (published by Kent Regional News and Media) and the Dover Mercury (published by the KM Group) - also .

Free newspapers for the town include the Dover and Deal Extra, part of the KM Group; and yourdover, part of KOS Media.

Dover has one local commercial radio station, KMFM Shepway and White Cliffs Country, broadcasting to Dover on 106FM.

The station was founded in Dover as Neptune Radio in September 1997 but moved to Folkestone in 2003 and was consequently rebranded after a takeover by the KM Group.

Dover is also served by the county-wide stations Heart, Gold and BBC Radio Kent.

The Gateway Hospital Broadcasting Service, in Buckland Hospital radio, closed at the end of 2006.

It was the oldest hospital radio station in East Kent being founded in 1968.

Dover Community Radio (DCR) currently offer podcasts on local events and organisations on their website.

They are also launching an online community radio station via their website for the town and district on March 28, 2011.

There are three museums: the main Dover Museum, the Dover Transport Museum, and the Roman Painted House.

Dover has three twin towns: * France Calais, France.

* United States Huber Heights, Ohio, USA.

* Croatia Split, Croatia.

The Vista Leisure Centre, catering for a wide range of sports and activities, is on Townwall Street.

There are sports clubs catering for the usual range of sports, among them football (Dover Athletic FC); rugby; rowing; swimming; water polo and netball (Dover and District Netball League).

One event which gets media attention is that of swimming the English Channel.

Sea fishing, from the beach, pier or out at sea, is carried out here.

The so-called Dover sole (solea solea) is found all over European waters.

The White Cliffs of Dover are cliffs which form part of the British coastline facing the Strait of Dover and France.

The cliffs are part of the North Downs formation.

The cliff face, which reaches up to 107 metres (351 ft), owes its striking façade to its composition of chalk (pure white calcium carbonate) accentuated by streaks of black flint.

The cliffs spread east and west from the town of Dover in the county of Kent, an ancient and still important English port.

The cliffs have great symbolic value for Britain because they face towards Continental Europe across the narrowest part of the English Channel, where invasions have historically threatened and against which the cliffs form a symbolic guard.

Because crossing at Dover was the primary route to the continent before air travel, the white line of cliffs also formed the first or last sight of the UK for travellers.

The cliffs are located along the coastline between approximately: Latitude 51°06'N, Longitude 1°14'E and Latitude 51°12'N, Longitude 1°24'E.

Shakespeare Cliff marks the point where Great Britain most closely approaches continental Europe.

On a clear day, the cliffs are easily visible from the French coast.

The cliffs are composed mainly of soft, white chalk with a very fine-grained texture, composed primarily of coccoliths, plates of calcium carbonate formed by coccolithophores, single-celled planktonic algae whose skeletal remains sank to the bottom of the ocean and, together with the remains of bottom-living creatures, formed sediments.

Flint and quartz are also found in the chalk.

White cliffs like those of Dover are also found on the Danish islands of Møn and Langeland or the coasts of the island of Rügen in Germany.

The cliff face continues to weather at an average rate of 1 centimetre per year, although occasionally large pieces will fall.

This most recently occurred in 2001, when a large chunk of the edge, as large as a football pitch, fell into the channel.

Visitors are, therefore, urged to remain well away from the cliff edge.

Several species of cliff nesting birds nest on the cliff face, including fulmar and colonies of Black-legged Kittiwake.

However, contrary to the words of the famous song ("There'll be bluebirds over the white cliffs of Dover"), bluebirds are an American species not found in the UK.

* In Shakespeare's "King Lear," Gloucester, blinded and despairing, asks to be led to the edge of the cliffs of Dover.

He wants to commit suicide by leaping over the edge.

His disguised son, Edgar, tells him that he is at the edge when they are nowhere near, and, once he steps forward and falls down, tells him that he has miraculously survived a fall from the top of the cliffs onto the beach.

Confused at first but eventually believing him, Gloucester swears he will not consider suicide again.

* In Matthew Arnold's 1867 poem "Dover Beach", the cliffs are a sign of reassuring strength.

* Rudyard Kipling's 1902 poem "The Broken Men" ends with the lines "How stands the old Lord Warden? Are Dover's cliffs still white?" to represent the English exiles' homesickness.

* The cliffs were referenced in the popular World War II song "(There'll Be Bluebirds Over) The White Cliffs of Dover".

The song was originally performed by Vera Lynn and has been covered by many artists.

* Other poetry includes Alice Duer Miller's "The White Cliffs", on which the 1944 film The White Cliffs of Dover was based.

* In Ian Fleming's third James Bond novel, Moonraker, a chapter is set at the cliffs.

The villain attempts to assassinate Bond and Gala Brand by bombing the cliff so they are showered in debris.

* In the 1991 film Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, starring Kevin Costner, the cliffs are the landing point of Robin of Locksley's water craft; a welcoming sign of home for the returning prisoner of war.

* In a 2005 poll of Radio Times readers, the cliffs were named as the third greatest natural wonder in Britain.

* 28 days before it was released, a biohazard sign was projected on the cliffs to promote the 2007 film 28 Weeks Later.

* Jamaica Kincaid references the white cliffs of Dover in her essay "On Seeing England for the First Time.

" * On the album Parklife by Blur, the cliffs are the subject of the song "Clover Over Dover".

* On the 2005 album Picaresque by the Decemberists, the cliffs are the setting for a suicide pact in the ballad "We Both Go Down Together".

* Grammy Award-winning guitarist Eric Johnson's critically acclaimed, platinum-selling 1990 recording Ah Via Musicom produced the single "Cliffs of Dover (song)", for which Johnson won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance.

* The cliffs were referenced in the song, 'many Rivers To cross' by Reggae artist Jimmy Cliff.

The song was featured on the album "The Harder They Come" which was a soundtrack for the film of the same name.

* In 2010, girl group Girls Can't Catch filmed their music video for Echo on top of the cliffs.

Dover Castle is a medieval castle in the town of the same name in the English county of Kent.

It was founded in the 12th century and has been described as the "Key to England" due to its defensive significance throughout history.

It is the largest castle in England.

Originally the site may have been fortified with earthworks in the Iron Age or earlier, before the Romans invaded in AD43.

This is suggested on the basis of the unusual pattern of the earthworks which does not seem to be a perfect fit for the medieval castle, although archaeological excavation at the Castle has found no evidence of prehistoric activity.

The site also contained one of Dover's two 80-foot (24 m) Roman lighthouses (or Pharoses), one of which still survives.

On the site is a classic montrol (campsite) where the Normans landed after their victorious conquest.

After the Battle of Hastings in October 1066, William the Conqueror and his forces marched to Westminster Abbey for his coronation.

They took a roundabout route via Romney, Dover, Canterbury, Surrey and Berkshire.

From the Cinque Ports foundation in 1050, Dover has always been a chief member - it may also have been this that first attracted William's attention, and got Kent the motto of Invicta.

In the words of William of Poitiers: Then he marched to Dover, which had been reported impregnable and held by a large force.

The English, stricken with fear at his approach had confidence neither in their ramparts nor in the numbers of their troops .

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While the inhabitants were preparing to surrender unconditionally, [the Normans], greedy for money, set the castle on fire and the great part of it was soon enveloped in flames [William then paid for the repair and] having taken possession of the castle, the Duke spent eight days adding new fortifications to it'.

The Castle was first built, entirely out of clay.

It collapsed to the ground and the clay was then used as the flooring for many of the ground-floor rooms.

This may have been repairs and improvements to an existing Saxon fort or burgh, centred on the Saxon church of St Mary de Castro, although archaeological evidence suggests that it was actually a new motte and bailey design castle built from scratch nearby.

It was during the reign of Henry II that the castle began to take recognisable shape.

The inner and outer baileys and the great Keep belong to this time.

Maurice the Engineer was responsible for building the keep, one of the last rectangular keeps ever built.

In 1216, a group of rebel barons invited Louis VIII of France to come and take the English crown.

He had some success breaching the walls but was unable ultimately to take the castle (see The First Barons' War).

The vulnerable north gate that had been breached in the siege was converted into an underground forward-defence complex (including St John's Tower), and new gates built into the outer curtain wall on the western (Fitzwilliam's Gate) and eastern (Constable's Gate) sides.

During the siege, the English defenders tunnelled outwards and attacked the French, thus creating the only counter tunnel in the world.

This can still be seen in the medieval works.

By the Tudor age, the defences themselves had been superseded by gunpowder.

They were improved by Henry VIII, who made a personal visit, and added to it with the Moat Bulwark.

During the English Civil War it was held for the king but then taken by a Parliamentarian trick without a shot being fired (hence it avoided being ravaged and survives far better than most castles) in 1642.

Massive rebuilding took place at the end of the 18th century during the Napoleonic Wars.

William Twiss, the Commanding Engineer of the Southern District, as part of his brief to improve the town's defences, completed the remodelling of the outer defences of Dover Castle adding the huge Horseshoe, Hudson's, East Arrow and East Demi-Bastions to provide extra gun positions on the eastern side, and constructing the Constable's Bastion for additional protection on the west.

Twiss further strengthened the Spur at the northern end of the castle, adding a redan, or raised gun platform.

By taking the roof off the keep and replacing it with massive brick vaults he was able to mount heavy artillery on the top.

Twiss also constructed Canon's Gateway to link the defences of the castle with those of the town.

With Dover becoming a garrison town, there was a need for barracks and storerooms for the additional troops and their equipment.

The solution adopted by Twiss and the Royal Engineers was to create a complex of barracks tunnels about 15 metres below the cliff top and the first troops were accommodated in 1803.

At the height of the Napoleonic Wars, the tunnels housed more than 2,000 men and to date are the only underground barracks ever built in Britain.

At the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the tunnels were partly converted and used by the Coast Blockade Service to combat smuggling.

This was a short-term endeavour though, and in 1826 the headquarters were moved closer to shore.

The tunnels then remained abandoned for more than a century.

The outbreak of the Second World War in 1939 saw the tunnels converted first into an air-raid shelter and then later into a military command centre and underground hospital.

In May 1940, Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsey directed the evacuation of French and British soldiers from Dunkirk, code-named Operation Dynamo, from his headquarters in the cliff tunnels.

A military telephone exchange was installed in 1941 and served the underground headquarters.

The switchboards were constantly in use and had to have a new tunnel created alongside it to house the batteries and chargers necessary to keep them functioning.

The navy used the exchange to enable direct communication with vessels, as well as using it to direct air-sea rescue craft to pick up pilots shot down in the Straits of Dover.

Later the tunnels were to be used as a shelter for the Regional Seats of Government in the event of a nuclear attack.

This plan was abandoned for various reasons, including the realisation that the chalk of the cliffs would not provide significant protection from radiation, and because of the inconvenient form of the tunnels and their generally poor condition.

Tunnel levels are denoted as A - Annexe, B - Bastion, C - Casemate, D - DUMPY and E - Esplanade.

Annexe and Casemate levels are open to the public, Bastion is 'lost' but investigations continue to gain access, DUMPY (converted from Second World War use to serve as a Regional Seat of Government in event of an atomic war) is closed, as is Esplanade (last used as an air raid shelter in the Second World War).

DUMPY is an acronym for Deep Underground Military Position Yellow.

A statue of Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay was erected in November 2000 outside the tunnels in honour of his work on the Dunkirk evacuation and protecting Dover during the Second World War.

If they were being attacked they would have to move quickly as the enemies were just nine minutes away from Dover by plane.

There are over three miles of these Tunnels going deep down into the chalky cliffs, some still undiscovered.

There are tunnels that are far too dangerous to walk down.

Dover Castle is a Scheduled Monument, which means it is a "nationally important" historic building and archaeological site that has been given protection against unauthorised change.

It is also a Grade I listed building, and recognised as an internationally important structure.

The castle, secret tunnels, and surrounding land are now owned by English Heritage and the site is a major tourist attraction.

The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports is officially head of the castle, in his conjoint position of Constable of Dover Castle, and the Deputy Constable has his residence in Constable's Gate.

The Princess of Wales's Royal Regiment Museum is located in the castle.

Between 2007 and 2009, English Heritage spent £3 million on recreating the castle's interior.

According to figures released by the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions, nearly 350,000 people visited Dover Castle in 2010.

With millions of passengers, cars, trucks, motorcycles and buses passing through the Port of Dover on cross channel ferries each year, it's no wonder we're known as the 'gateway to Europe'.

As a result of huge and continued investment, the Port now boasts state-of-the-art facilities, excellent transport links and award-winning customer service.

Cars on cross channel ferries There's a cross channel ferry departure on average every 30 minutes from Dover, when taken across all operator schedules.

Foot passengers Foot passenger services at the Ferry Terminal operate between 06hrs and 19hrs.

Again, cross channel ferry departures occur about every 30 minutes when taken across all operator schedules.

For more information on sailing times for cross channel ferries, please see our Ferry Timetables.

Coach Transport Contacts There are a number of Coach companies that provide scheduled services for travel to the Port of Dover and beyond.

Please see further details in our Ferry Port Passenger Guide.

The Port of Dover includes facilities for people with special needs to ensure as smooth a journey as possible.

Dover ferry port operators Three ferry companies, DFDS Seaways, P&O Ferries and Sea France currently operate from the Port of Dover connecting to Calais and Dunkerque to provide fast and convenient sea crossings to France.

Visit the cross channel ferry facilities at Dover Port If you have time to spare, the Port of Dover provides a range of refreshment and shopping facilities at the Passenger Services Buildings in the Eastern Docks Ferry Port including a Bureau de Change, Cafe Ritazza, Burger King and other retail outlets.

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Last Updated: 2012/05/18