B Group - 23rd October

Although Colin and the leader hadn’t noticed, the long-trouser season is back with us, after what has seemed like quite a brief summer. But despite a slight prospect of rain and warnings of muddy tracks and slippery tree routes, not to mention the prospect of dining at a ‘gastro pub’, 23 riders embarked on our B Group ride.

We set out across Bushy Park and crossed the Hampton Court Bridge and Portsmouth Road into Littleworth Common for our first encounter with a fairly squiffy but rideable path through the trees. And soon we were roller-coastering through the forest in Arbrook and Esher Commons, then skirting around Fairmile Common, dodging the cemetery at Upper Cobham Tilt, and bounding over the River Mole (via the conveniently located bridge).
 
Fast forward through to Horsley where I had intended to ride along the path through Lollesworth Wood, alongside the railway line. However, as we had all gone to the trouble of pre-ordering our lunches and I could see that we were on track to arrive late (around 1:30), I decided that we should head straight on down Forest Road to The Duke of Wellington and get on with eating our lunches.
 
That was a good idea; the food there is very good, very much as they claim on their website, “good quality, fresh, honest food”. Sian and the team looked after us very well and I’d happily go there again, with or without entourage. I have no recollection of going to this pub since John Gould took us there in November 2011 and again in November 2012 so this visit was quite overdue.

 








 





We headed north after lunch and turned into Lynx Hill for the scenic path . At this point the intention was to follow, in reverse, the route of Dave Ward's June ride through to Orestan Lane and thence to Great Bookham but the leader made a navigational blunder, taking the muddy track known as Dirtham Lane rather than continuing along the muddy track known as the Old London Road. Once back on the right path we cycled through Fetcham and took River Lane across the two small bridges to Randall’s Park and, once beyond the M25, we rode up the Leatherhead Road and onto the lovely path along the top of Ashtead Common. Thence to The Old Moat garden centre for tea, coffee and cake; We arrived there at 15:50, just in time to catch them before they stopped taking orders.
 
A lovely autumnal ride; everybody managed the technical bits (slippery paths) very well, and we more or less escaped getting wet.
 
Thanks to Peter Tiller for back-marking and to numerous people who marked corners and generally kept an eye on proceedings. Thanks to Steph and Pam for several photos.Thank you all for coming on this mini-adventure, our last ride before the great going back of the clocks.
 
~ Tim

Pam's photo