We had received a few e-mails from people saying they would be coming on the Surrey Cycleway ride so I was expecting about 15 cyclists at Orpington station on Sunday morning, not the 30+ that were milling around at 10am. But then someone said actually there were 3 rides all meeting there so that explained it, the other rides departed leaving just the Wheelers – all 29 of us!

We left the station and our long procession took to the quieter roads out of town, leading soon to country lanes and the ascent of the North Downs. Leader Alex’s route was well researched and the route up was long but never gruelling. I was enjoying the role of back marker when the first of the day’s four punctures struck – and to the leader! I took over and led onwards for a while until we managed to get the group back together having also suffered puncture number 2. We certainly realised just how far we had climbed when we took in the extensive views away to the south, and then started the exhilarating (or slightly scary if you are a coward like me) descent towards Godstone, our lunch stop.

After some wiggling around major roadworks (“not there when I tested the route” said Alex), most headed in the direction of a pub for lunch and smaller group went to a nearby garden centre café. Shortly after leaving Godstone we joined the Surrey Cycleway proper and followed it through pleasant lanes and villages for a few miles. Puncture 3 split the group up with a posse of 4 staying to help out, but “mobile signposts” were on station at all the junctions until we eventually caught up with the main group at a garden centre loo stop near Reigate. Off we set again with approximately 50% of the riders promptly turning the wrong way! Rather than chase them down we went with the flow and took an alternative route through the houses to get back on track. At Brockham we all posed for a picture (hopefully to be posted here soon) beside the “Wheelers Lane” sign. From here we could see our next destination – Box Hill – looming high across the other side of the valley.

But we weren’t going directly up just yet, a few more wiggles of the lanes with some short but quite steep rises took us to the edge of Dorking. Here one person left us – apparently there was an important football match kicking off soon. The other 28 all carried on, including several who earlier had expressed their doubts about getting that far, and arrived at the bottom of the zigzag road that will feature on the Olympic Road Race route next year. It’s then just up, up, up until you arrive at the National Trust kiosk at the top where we all took a well deserved break for tea and cakes, and then went to the viewpoint to gaze down at where we had been only an hour ago.

Two more left here to go home via Dorking but the last 26 climbed the final few feet to the real summit of Box Hill (a total anti-climax, no view at all) before descending to Epsom. The “train journey home committee” held an impromptu meeting and decided (slightly unwisely as it turned out) that we could cycle on to Sutton and catch the East London Line, an attractive option for those of us living in Tower Hamlets and neighbouring boroughs. Others decided to opt for trains to Waterloo and Victoria.

We’ll say no more about the journey home except to mention that we had an unexpected bonus tour of Croydon “between stations” and that someone had to rescue a pannier left on a train. In spite of (or even because of?) the extra miles at the end of the day, everyone agreed it had been a great day out, and the weather having threatened rain stayed dry all day. Many thanks to Alex for researching and leading, and to the “mobile signposts” who kept us on track (you know who you are).

No need for me to give you the “vital statistics” of the ride – Alex’s magic computer kept track of all and it is published here. Some might say that this is not necessarily progress as we will no longer be able to round up 46 miles to “just under 50” in our reports!