Twelve!, yes twelve riders attended the MTB ride along the Wandle Trail on Sunday.
Paul White (Leader) Ev, Bob Green, MJA, Mick Curtis, Trevor, Barry Gregory, Andrew Adams and Andy Huddart left from Cheam Station and headed over to Carshalton Ponds.
At the ponds, our secondary meeting spot we picked up Dave Elliott, Dennis Peacock and Freddi.
The weather was kind with very little breeze and reasonably sunny all day.
There were a couple of minor experimental detours to our normal route along new and untried river paths on the way to the elevenses stop at Putney. Just to mess with those using Garmins, but more to change the scenery a little.
A very inconsiderate Wandsworth Borough Council has blocked off the only designated safe cycle way across the Wandsworth Town Centre one way race track to the Thames Path.
Whilst building works on the old Youngs Brewery site spill out onto the road there’s no option but to fend for yourselves so beware as they’ve made no other alternative route for our cycling safety.
A big thumbs down to them!
Our route took us onto the Thames in Wandsworth then west to Putney where unusually the weather was nice enough to eat Al Fresco.
After elevenses we headed further west and then onto a untried route I’d been looking at that uses the Beverley Brook and cuts across Barnes Common coming out roughly near ‘The Bull’ pub in Barnes. It appears to cut off around three miles of the Thames Path as the river loops north between Putney and Barnes. Being a sunny day it was a welcome detour as the Thames Path was packed with cyclists, walkers, dogs etc.
Back onto the Thames Path at Barnes our ride progressed slowly due to the amount of people walking along it. At Richmond it became walking pace and at Ham House I decided to once again cut off the Thames and take us through the quiet residential streets of Ham and rejoin the Thames at Teddingto Lock. This detour cut out a known bottleneck part of the Thames Path.
From Teddingto Lock we used our normal route through to Kingston and then up the Hogsmill River back to Cheam with various people peeling off along the way to routes for home.
Ride distance for me was thirty three miles.
Paul White.
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