We met at 10:30 at Bromley South as planned. Ride leader, Lord Fergar looking a bit worse for wear after a night on the Fullers ESB at a ride planning meeting the night before. That said, he manned up and did a sterling job of dragging us around the country lanes of North West Kent.

The ride preview predicted a few hills and we were not disappointed, with several climbs introduced along the way.

Initially the weather was very kind to us, with only the wind coming into play and impeding our progress however after lunch it all turned a bit nasty.

Just before Halstead we were met with a fallen tree blocking our path. A bit too much for the two lovely young ladies on their horses, who turned back, but not serious enough for the hard five who managed to sneak underneath said tree and allowed us to progress to our lunch stop at The Cock Inn at Halstead.

Fine beer (Wainwrights and London Pride) were on tap and the sandwiches and Jacket Potato were top drawer. No beer for our ride leader, or Trevor who drowned their sorrows in J2O and Diet Coke!

Happy Cyclists!

On leaving the pub we all agreed that due to the downpour that had decided to empty over Halstead we would take the quick route home, so back to the A21 pronto and we went our separate ways.

My thanks to Andrew (who did a great job on his Mountain Bike albeit I expected him to wheelie over the fallen tree!), Mike from Pollards Hill Cyclists, Lord Andrew and Capt Trevor who all made the ride very enjoyable and were great company.