A Day in the Garden of England

Event HQ

Sevenoaks Station
London Road
Sevenoaks
Kent
TN13 1DP
UK

Route

• The orchards and woodlands, crisscrossed by ancient paths and tracks, are dotted with medieval magnificence and decent pubs – definitely a great day out on a gravel bike.
• Meet outside Sevenoaks Station (4 trains an hour from London), where the first task is to climb up to Sevenoaks’ medieval town centre.
• Despite the modern(ish) street-level shopfronts, the half-timbered houses still prevail. A turn left brings us to the different world of the Knowle deer park and the magnificent Jacobean Knowle House, the ancestral home of the Sackville-West family. Riding through the deer park, along some ancient sunken roads, leads to another architectural gem, less grand than Knowle.
• Ightham Mote is a romantic moated manor house nestled in a wooded valley, quite beautiful and worth a quick coffee stop.
• Moving on, past a Japanese Garden, through the sleepy village of Plaxtol, which is sure to charm you, and nearby Old Soar Manor, the route climbs into the Mereworth Woods.
• Lunch at West Malling in one of the many pubs that cluster around this pretty village centre before heading to Snodland on the Medway River.
• Pilgrim’s Way, another ancient trackway, follows the base of the Downs, through Wrotham, another very old village once busy with pilgrims en route to Canterbury but now basking in peace.
• It’s only a few more miles along Pilgrim’s Way until we turn sharp left into the woods of the Greensand Ridge and back to Sevenoaks.

Map

Included

• The GPX route
• Guide/pace rider
• Planned feed stops
• Bail points/times
• Basic trail side repairs

Not Included

• All food and drink
• Return train fare