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Hoo Peninsular Ride
14th February 2016
We will take the 09.32 train from Stratford International to Gravesend (arriving 09.47).  The train fare is £16.30 return, but the group discount should reduce this by £5.50 per ticket.  Cycle policy on the train is generally positive, but at the discretion of the conductor.
Please make sure you arrive at Stratford International by 09.15 to allow purchase of group tickets etc.
We will return on the 16.42 from Gravesend – this should allow plenty of time for breaks.
The route is 33 miles
Garmin details:Â https://connect.garmin.com/modern/course/5877736
Steve has found some interesting literary commentary on this remote part of the Thames estuary, although we will stay on roads apart from the cycle track into Gravesend.  We will not venture into the marshes…..
This difficulty in traversing the marshes is highlighted by Dickens in Great Expectations where his protagonist Pip, native to the marshland, heads onto the marshes at night:
‘A stranger would have found them insupportable, and even to me they were so oppressive that I hesitated, half inclined to go back. But I knew them well, and could have found my way on a far darker night’ (Dickens 1861 (2010 repr), 459).
More recent commentary is no less ominous
‘And it is wild – or, rather, it has traces of wildness about it. This is not the wilderness of nature, but the wildness of desolation. It is not a human place. You can walk along the river wall of the Hundred of Hoo for miles, between the river and the grass, without encountering anyone at all.’
(Ackroyd 2007, 396-7).
Hopefully this will not put riders off, is is an interesting place and commentary from the previous rides makes interesting reading.
Please make sure if you are travelling from Stratford that you are at Stratford INTERNATIONAL station by 09.15 to allow time for purchase of group tickets.
Hello,
I am interested in joining this ride. What is the pace for the ride?
Kind regards
Hi. I’ve checked with Steve and the speed will be 11-12mph.
Ok thank you Kerena, that speed is fine.
I will join the group at Stratford International station.
Kind regards
Primrose
Sorry you didn’t manage to join us Primrose – it was a great ride (see the report). Hopefully next time!
I think there may be some people who will want to join this ride by using the train which leaves London Charing Cross at 08.39 and gets into Gravesend at 09.37. This train can pick people up from Lewisham, Bexleyheath and Dartford and will be much cheaper for those that have a Zone 6 season ticket or a Freedom Pass.
That’s fine as long as people are arriving at Gravesend at around the same time as Steve’s planned arrival of 09.47.
I know of 4 people who have expressed an interested in this ride – one from Stratford, one from Hornchurch, one from Bexleyheath and one from Camden.
That would be fine. Do you know how many people? We’re trying to get an idea of numbers. I’m just about to put details of timings etc up but looks like we’ll be arriving at Gravesend at 09.47.
I know several cyclists who would like to join this ride. This was a Barry Mason ride and I know the rides he organised were all very interesting (
http://www.hampsteadhorticulturalsociety.org.uk/greenwichcyclists-old/reports/hoo.html http://www.hampsteadhorticulturalsociety.org.uk/greenwichcyclists-old/reports/070203.html ). Can we meet at Gravesend Station to join this ride?