Tour de Kent

If you didn't know already, the Tour de France came to the UK this year, with the start of the race - the Prologue - being held in the London, and the first stage being a 203km ride from London to Canterbury in Kent. We all decided that it would be a good idea to watch the stage somewhere out in Kent - and for some of us, ride along part of the stage the day before. So avoiding the chaos that would have beset inner-city London with the prologue on the Saturday, six of us (myself, Jabs, Rich, Brad, Si & Tarns) met up early - OK, not that early - on Saturday morning to embark on our way along the route that the 'real' riders would be taking the next day.

Biking out towards Kent, we certainly saw some of the more 'interesting' parts of Eastern London, but the roads were good and the sun was out. In fact, the roads were pretty good on much of the route we took - we assumed they either picked the roads because of this or had smartened them up in the last year or so. And the sun being out was not being taken for granted, considering that the 'summer' in the UK has so far been pretty miserable (I had only on the Tuesday had to ride through a 'lake' that had previously been a road after a freak - but all too common - storm had passed over London). Passing outside the city limits of London, we hit some pretty enjoyable Kent countryside, passing through some nice looking towns and villages. The pick of the bunch was Rochester, where the first Sprint of the tour was staged, with the route going through narrow streets, including a cobble-stoned stretch with the impressive Rochester Castle on the right and the picturesque Rochester Cathedral on the left.

It was from Rochester that we turned south into the heart of Kent and some interesting mix of terrain. After a long stretch through winding lanes in the countryside, we suddenly followed the route onto a very fast two lane highway for a stretch. We were now getting on past midday, and with our pub lunch ahead of us at the 85km mark, we had something to aim for. It was with many tired legs, grumbling stomachs and thirsty lips that we finally rolled into West Peckham and the Swan on the Green brewpub. It was here that near disaster was only just avoided, as we found out that the kitchen was due to close in 15 minutes. Two courses were quickly ordered, along with a round of pints and jugs of water, and we took ourselves outside the pub overlooking the green - where, by chance, the village fete was being held. The food was good (the significant bread portions were most welcome), the beer was OK - with the Swan Cygnet easily being the pick of the bunch - and the chance to relax was welcome by all (both legs and from Rich's moaning about "hills" every time the road inclined by more than two metres).

Three pints later, we inevitably had to get back on the bike - some a little gingerly - and bike the remaining 40km (as it turned out) to meet up with the girls at our camp site. With energy levels restored though, everyone was in much better spirits and we made pretty good work of the remaining distance. And we finally got ourselves one of those "hills" - the first King of the Mountain stage of that year's tour actually (and where we went to watch the race the next day). In fact, it wasn't really that much of a hill, probably just 100 metres over a gradient of only 4% (not really comparable to Col d'Aubisque of 1800 metres and 10% fame that Jabs, Tarns and I did a couple of years back). From there it was a comfortable cruise down to our camp site and the end of a successful day's ride. (Special mention has to be made for Si who completed the whole 125km on his mountain bike. Watching him go up some of those inclines I was feeling the pain for him - Si having to do nearly 3 rotations to my 1 and having to push a bike probably three times as heavy as mine. It really was a great effort.)

Arriving at our camp site it was good to have a hot shower and a change of clothes. But there was something missing - the girls! Word had it that after putting up (some of) the tents and dropping the gear off, they had walked down to a local country pub and set themselves up there. Girls x no sun cream x wine = very drunk and very sunburnt girls. As we found out after a couple of phone calls - well one half was a phone call, the other half wavered between slurring and giggling. Fortunately we had had the foresight to book ourselves in for dinner at another country pub nearby and we agreed to meet them there. Unfortunately, the walk didn't seem to do them any good as they were still a pack of giggling Gertruds' by the time we caught up with them and I don't think we were the most welcome patrons at the pub that night (though this was all in form for the girls, as apparently they had been scaring away the customers from their pub all day). But an enjoyable night we had, and the bikers even found the legs for some late night country lane rambling after dinner.

Waking up in the morning to the scourge of all campers - dew, but also glorious sunshine, we quickly packed everything up and headed out to our point to watch the Tour go past. While the girls manage to get a lift from the crazy owner of our camp site, we bikers put the legs back over the bike and cycled the 20km or to our meeting point - dodging road closures and policeman trying to tell us that we should be pushing our bikes (as if). We all arrived just in time to catch the caravan of sponsors and all the waving back and forth. Though it seemed that the French sponsors weren't so willing to give away as many of the goodies in the UK and the waving proved pretty useless. Some good crowds had turned out to watch the stage - this had been a feature of both days in the UK and apparently organisers are keen for the Tour to return to London soon. The riders finally came through around 1pm, making light work of such a small climb. A bunch of 5 riders had a 5 minute break on the rest of the Peloton and an English rider actually took the King of the Mountain points on the hill (and the jersey at the end of the day). The sight of the 180-strong Peloton cruising past was pretty cool, but as is the case with being a spectator along the Tour - it was all over as quickly as it begun. But there is no substitute for seeing these supreme athletes up close and personal, and for us bike geeks, checking out their gear.

The final chapter (if you've got this far) of our weekend away was the train ride back into London. In the spirit of the Tour, in a way that only a British Train Company could engineer, they had in all their wisdom decided that no bikes could be taking on their trains that day - on a day when plenty of people were riding along the stage and would be wanting to get back to London! However, we were able to call their bluff when the girls - who had jumped on a train rather than wait with us until later that day - rang us up and informed us that their train was nearly empty. Armed with this knowledge and the motivation to find at least one train guard with more common sense than the need for an ego trip, we finally prevailed and comfortably boarded the next train to London. All in all, a good weekend had out in the sun.

Plenty more pics from the weekend away here.