Circumnavigating the Isle of Thanet Not since the times when Hengest and Horsa landed on Thanet had the isle seen the likes of the Lympne cycling diaspora arriving along the Wantsum channel. Parking in St Nicholas at Wade the group welcomed Juliette on her first ride. Accompanied by John (Dad), Judith, Ruth and Peter she slithered along the route to the sea wall. After a few miles Ruth uttered the thought in everyone's mind: "where are we?". Well, ...

Chillenden : Nov 4th 2009 A great ride and a gruff greeting at the Griffin………. It's a glorious crisp November morning as John pulls into Ruth and Robert's drive. Robert has to work, the rest of the group are dispersed in France, Scotland and in the blue skies above, so its just Ruth and John (lucky chap) heading off down the old road to Eastry as the traffic hurtles past on the adjacent 'by-pass'. Eastry was built on the Roman road from Richborough...

Hythe, Saltwood, Etchinghill, Stowting Monks Horton Often in our sheltered south east corner of England we escape the full ravages of the English weather and have developed a disregard for weather forecasts - they are for everywhere else! On this occasion the forecast of heavy and prolonged rain was spot on - no it was buckets-full on. Nevertheless, the three toughest members of the group were not daunted. We rode to Hythe and then climbed a zig-zag route up ...

The official start and meeting point was Wye. Three group members left Lympne by bike amid great clunking of gears as Martin, our newest member, learnt what the levers on the handlebars did. Resplendent on borrowed bike with borrowed hat and gloves, Martin had not been on a bike since gears were invented. He had decided that to borrow padded shorts was a step too far, a decision he may have regretted later. As Martin zoomed off to start, Peter and Judith excha...

Elham 3 Elham's attraction is the splendid collection of Pubs. This time we ate at the King's Arms - a splendid OAP's lunch (except for Alex who had a top-of-the-range T-bone steak) after a fast dash over the North Downs (southern part) from Folkestone. Earlier we had started at Lympne and taken a somewhat circuitous route via Aldington in order to look at the various wildlife from the canal path. We saw swans, giraffe, ostrich and a speedy deer that we were ...