St Pancras station was buzzing with cyclists on Sunday 19th when this re-scheduled ride went ahead. Not all were Wheelers - a CTC ride group were off to Kent, and when Richard went to seek “Go Dutch” petition signatures, they expressed some doubt that we could possibly be going to the Chilterns for the day given our starting point and the fact that we were not intending to cycle 80 miles or more.  But they were wrong of course, our ride leader Alex had selected Harpenden as a suitable place to commence our exploration of the eastern end of the Chiltern hills, with frequent and reasonably bike friendly trains to and from London.

Our first goal on leaving the station was to find the traffic free Nickey Line trail – a typical old railway line route, part of NCN 57. It wasn’t one of the best surfaced Sustrans routes but provided a low stress way to go with the bonus of some amazingly cute piglets in a neighbouring field. We swung off the trail at the attractive village of Redbourn and from then onwards it was country lanes all the way to Berkhamsted. By now it definitely was the Chilterns and there were some significant ups, with a good proportion of the group electing to exercise their walking muscles instead of their cycling ones. With no major problems or delays we arrived at our lunch stop early – not a bad thing though as most were hungry by then and we got a headstart on everyone else for food orders. Most chose to go to the pub by the canal but a splinter group found what must be Berkhamsted’s busiest café – and for good reason with excellent value and tasty food.

After lunch we split into two groups with the “longer route on road up a big hill and then down again” faction led by Alex and the “shorter flat route pottering along the canal” pack led by Caroline. The canal towpath was not fast but full of interest with lots of moored boats, one of which had a chicken coop set out on the towpath. In one of those nice timing occurrences as we approached the bridge where we were to leave the towpath we saw a group of familiar looking cyclists sweep along the road over it and the two groups re-joined. Next was picturesque Aldbury where we stopped for “cyclists posing in front of village duck pond” photos, slightly marred by an excess of traffic cones around us. What was probably the biggest climb of the day followed, up the escarpment to the Ashridge estate.

(photos from Ian)

A few miles later we were hopeful of a cup of tea at a roadside café but sadly we arrived 10 minutes after they had closed. Several red kites soaring right overhead slightly compensated as we climbed the next ridge and travelled onto Markyate in the hope of refreshments – but open tea shops there were not, just a local store for purchase of emergency rations and drinks. And so we arrived back at Harpenden where some caught the train home straight away and the rest opted for a pub visit before returning to London. 35 great miles in the Chilterns countryside, so for most people a 45-50 mile day out in total. It was an unusually low tea stop count for a Wheelers ride – but this is what happens sometimes when a ride originally planned around Saturday hours ends up being run on a Sunday! A good sized group of 18 riders, and nice to welcome some newcomers who we hope will ride with us again.