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This travel day had everyone heading for Medway Youth Hostel, Gillingham, where we were to meet for our evening meal and renew acquaintances.

Calum had taken the sleeper friday night from Inverness and did a solo ride taking in the Naval museum at Chatham Dockyard on the way.

Trevor had driven down friday night and stayed with Alan. They had a great cycle across London taking in some of the sights such as the Tower and Tower Bridge.

Sally and Bert drove up today.

Arthur and Andy got a train from Glasgow at 0830 then another at St Pancras at 1600, arriving at Strood the same time as Calum.

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Strood to Canterbury

The extra hour to GMT was welcome last night as we did not get to bed as early as we would have liked. Calum did the kitchen honours and produced a four course veggie extravaganza: tortillas and cheese, veggie meatballs and spaghetti, tiramisu , cheesecake and creme fraiche !

We set off at 930 with a 3 mile ride to join The Pilgrims Cycle Trail, this is part of a 200 mile trail from Canterbury to Glastonbury. The trail starts off (for us) as a quiet lane heading in a SE direction for Ashford some 25 miles away. This is a nice road with open views to the south for miles and passing some very old buildings with Oast towers attached. These old kiln buildings were used to dry the Hops which used to grow here but have been converted into houses with a bit of history attached. 

Sally suffered from a problem with her chain slipping but 'Scottish Cycle Doctor' Calum came to the rescue.

The trail soon became an off-road route and a bit muddy in places. However there are pleasant stretches with trees and shrubs forming a tunnel to cycle through. Time was wearing on and we had done 17 miles in 3 hours, so lunch was taken in a pub on the trail rather than going to Ashford which was still an hour away. This now meant we could bypass Ashford and save 6 miles.  Running out of daylight was an issue so this was agreed on. 

5pm and we have still got 5 miles to go, lights on now with 2 miles of road and 3 miles of cycle route.

We go first to the Cathedral which is impressive then stop at a Tesco express for food. The hostel is next, and it looks very nice.

39 miles for today.