This is the 4th post on a series about the Via Beata pilgrimage by bike concluded on the 3rd of August 2021.
his post is natively available in English only. For other languages, please use the Google Translation drop-down option on the right menu (desktop version).
The map below shows a “cleaned-up” version of our route between Lowestoft and East Harling on this day. By “cleaned-up” I mean, where I considered necessary, I edited the “real-life” track to exclude some of the mistakes or issues we encountered along the way, such as navigation errors, closed gates or other impassable obstacles (with a bike), etc. The objective being to prevent you from making these same mistakes or benefiting from the experience we acquired while riding on this route. Keep in mind everything changes… life is dynamic, roads and paths are closed for maintenance or become impassable for a number of reasons, access to certain locations may become restricted, etc. Use it at your own risk.
In addition to the raw GPX route shown in the map above, which you may download through the link below the map, I have also created a Google Maps version of the entire route in the EyeCycled Google Account.
To visualise the Google Map of the Via Beata route and main Waypoints please click on the link below (opens in a new tab).
These are the pictures we took on this day of the journey. Where possible we provided some context in every picture taken. These pictures are not to be sold or used without prior consent.
Click on the thumbnail to expand picture and read about that moment. The navigation numbers below each gallery refer to the number of viewable pages in the gallery.
5. Links to useful online resources for this day of the journey.
We are giving you our experiences here for free, but it is up to you if you want to replicate them or not. Each journey is different and you may want to plan a custom one for you. Hopefully some of your journey may match ours, but for any portions that don’t these are useful online resources for this day.
Little Gidding is a Way-Station but also the fourth and final poem of T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets, a series of poems that discuss time, perspective, humanity, and salvation which is one of Katy's favourite poems.
Stanwick Lakes Country Park comprises of 750 acres (304 hectares) of former gravel pits.
Prior to the construction of a bypass road, a Roman villa was excavated between 1984–1992 and several mosaics were found. In 2013, one of the mosaics was returned after being studied and is now on display in the Park's Visitor Centre. There are still extensive archaeological remains in this area, including a mid-late Anglo-Saxon and medieval settlements abandoned before 1450.
The easiest way is to use the form below and send us a message, but you can also leave comments both here as well as in YouTube or our social media accounts. Kepp in mind we do this as a hobby, not as a job, so our responses might be delayed. We aim to provide a response within a week, but it can happen that we are travelling or otherwise unavailable for longer than that. If you didn’t receive a response within 2 weeks, but send us a folloy-up message.
Do you like these posts? Why, then, don’t you pay me a coffee to help with the blog hosting cost and as a caffeine incentive to keep me going through the long hours of the night?(Suggested amount: £2.00 or USD $3.00 or 2.50€ or whatever you want to give).
You may donate through my Patreon Page or through PayPal directly.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
This post is natively available in English only. For other languages, please use the Google Translation drop-down option on the right menu (desktop version).
The map below shows a “cleaned-up” version of our route between Lowestoft and East Harling on this day. By “cleaned-up” I mean, where I considered necessary, I edited the “real-life” track to exclude some of the mistakes or issues we encountered along the way, such as navigation errors, closed gates or other impassable obstacles (with a bike), etc. The objective being to prevent you from making these same mistakes or benefiting from the experience we acquired while riding on this route. Keep in mind everything changes… life is dynamic, roads and paths are closed for maintenance or become impassable for a number of reasons, access to certain locations may become restricted, etc. Use it at your own risk.
In addition to the raw GPX route shown in the map above, which you may download through the link below the map, I have also created a Google Maps version of the entire route in the EyeCycled Google Account.
To visualise the Google Map of the Via Beata route and main Waypoints please click on the link below (opens in a new tab).
These are the pictures we took on this day of the journey. Where possible we provided some context in every picture taken. These pictures are not to be sold or used without prior consent.
Click on the thumbnail to expand picture and read about that moment. The navigation numbers below each gallery refer to the number of viewable pages in the gallery.
5. Links to useful online resources for this day of the journey.
We are giving you our experiences here for free, but it is up to you if you want to replicate them or not. Each journey is different and you may want to plan a custom one for you. Hopefully some of your journey may match ours, but for any portions that don’t these are useful online resources for this day.
Unfortunatelly we were unable to visit this way-station. It is located inside the Harvest Centre in Brandon, which gate was locked. The centre appeared to be closed. Possibly due to covid restrictions.
The easiest way is to use the form below and send us a message, but you can also leave comments both here as well as in YouTube or our social media accounts. Kepp in mind we do this as a hobby, not as a job, so our responses might be delayed. We aim to provide a response within a week, but it can happen that we are travelling or otherwise unavailable for longer than that. If you didn’t receive a response within 2 weeks, but send us a folloy-up message.
Do you like these posts? Why, then, don’t you pay me a coffee to help with the blog hosting cost and as a caffeine incentive to keep me going through the long hours of the night?(Suggested amount: £2.00 or USD $3.00 or 2.50€ or whatever you want to give).
You may donate through my Patreon Page or through PayPal directly.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
This post is natively available in English only. For other languages, please use the Google Translation drop-down option on the right menu (desktop version).
The map below shows a “cleaned-up” version of our route between Lowestoft and East Harling on this day. By “cleaned-up” I mean, where I considered necessary, I edited the “real-life” track to exclude some of the mistakes or issues we encountered along the way, such as navigation errors, closed gates or other impassable obstacles (with a bike), etc. The objective being to prevent you from making these same mistakes or benefiting from the experience we acquired while riding on this route. Keep in mind everything changes… life is dynamic, roads and paths are closed for maintenance or become impassable for a number of reasons, access to certain locations may become restricted, etc. Use it at your own risk.
In addition to the raw GPX route shown in the map above, which you may download through the link below the map, I have also created a Google Maps version of the entire route in the EyeCycled Google Account.
To visualise the Google Map of the Via Beata route and main Waypoints please click on the link below (opens in a new tab).
These are the pictures we took on this day of the journey. Where possible we provided some context in every picture taken. These pictures are not to be sold or used without prior consent.
Click on the thumbnail to expand picture and read about that moment. The navigation numbers below each gallery refer to the number of viewable pages in the gallery.
5. Links to useful online resources for this day of the journey.
We are giving you our experiences here for free, but it is up to you if you want to replicate them or not. Each journey is different and you may want to plan a custom one for you. Hopefully some of your journey may match ours, but for any portions that don’t these are useful online resources for this day.
This way-station is entitled "The Glory of God gives it light". It's based on the scripture of Revelations Chapter 21 v. 23, about a vision of the "Heavenly city" that John had while he was a prisoner on the island of Patmos. It is currently located on the grounds of the Church of St Peter & St john in Kirklet.
We actually missed this way-station. We tried to find it, but were unsuccessful. It could well be we cycled way past it and didn't see it. See video for more details.
Located near the gate to the Emmaus Centre in Ditchingham – a charity that gives homeless people a place to live provides training for job opportunities.
The easiest way is to use the form below and send us a message, but you can also leave comments both here as well as in YouTube or our social media accounts. Kepp in mind we do this as a hobby, not as a job, so our responses might be delayed. We aim to provide a response within a week, but it can happen that we are travelling or otherwise unavailable for longer than that. If you didn’t receive a response within 2 weeks, but send us a folloy-up message.
Do you like these posts? Why, then, don’t you pay me a coffee to help with the blog hosting cost and as a caffeine incentive to keep me going through the long hours of the night?(Suggested amount: £2.00 or USD $3.00 or 2.50€ or whatever you want to give).
You may donate through my Patreon Page or through PayPal directly.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
This post is natively available in English only. For other languages, please use the Google Translation drop-down option on the right menu (desktop version).
The map below shows a “cleaned-up” route from Lowestoft to St Davids. By “cleaned-up” I mean, I edited the “real-life” track to exclude some of the mistakes or issues we encountered along the way, such as navigation errors, closed gates or other impassable obstacles (with a bike), etc. The objective being to prevent you from making these same mistakes or benefiting from the experience we acquired while riding from Lowestoft to St. David’s in 2021. Keep in mind everything changes… life is dynamic, roads and paths are closed for maintanance or become impassable for a number of reasons, access to certain locations may become restricted, etc. Use it at your own risk.
In addition to the raw GPX route shown in the map above, which you may download through the link below the map, I have also created a Google Maps version of this route in the EyeCycled Google Account.
I know it looks identical to the map above, but this map can be shared with anyone you know who you think might benefit from it without the need to download it.
As the items it the map don’t appear to be clear, I’ve add a little picture below that might help.
The name ‘Via Beata’ in Italian means “blessed way” or in as preferred by its British founders ‘a way of blessing’.
The Via Beata was the idea of Steve Eggleton, who lives in Banham, located right on the route. In conversation with Steve, before we started our journey, he mentioned that he literally dreamt of it one night and the idea never left his mind. The dream was of a line connecting the west coast to the east coast at its widest point, from Lowestoft (the UK’s most easterly point) to St. David’s Cathedral in Wales. As Steve is master artisan of wood carvings, his dream included a network of Christian art-works along this route that had the intention to communicate God’s love for people. These art-works are referred to by him as “Way-Stations”, positioned in key points along the way. The number of way-stations is increasing gradually with new way-stations being added to the route every year, which gives this pilgrimage a dynamic nature.
The first way-station was set up in Banham in the Summer of 2009 and then the organizers have worked outwards to the East and to the West with the initial aim of establishing a way-station every ten miles or so and linking them with existing footpaths and rights-of-way. The Via Beata was therefore established as a walkers path.
The Via Beata really isn’t yet an established bike route: like Lands-End-to-John-O’Groats, so there is no one way to do it. But it has piqued Sustrans’ interest and we were lucky enough to have been sent a pdf and GPX files of a possible route that Sustrans had put together from various National Cycle Routes and other bike-friendly paths and roads. Katy, who has discovered this route and worked tirelessly on planning before our start in 2021 dedicated a disconcerting number of hours to tweaking the route, avoiding some of the more obvious possible pratfalls resulting in a planned journey to go in 10 stages: long days towards the start (where it is flat) with the shorter days saved for the Welsh mountains.
I confess, if it wasn’t for Katy’s reaserch and planning I’d have probably never heard of the Via Beata, so all credits must go to her. She wrote a blog explaining her motivations and how close this was to her heart. I encourage you to read her blog here.
As it is often the case, things never go completely as planned, especially when you are in a group of pioneers executing th plan for the 1st time. We had our fair share of issues and problems along the way… from inexisting paths, locked gates, weather related detours, blocked roads and other impassable obstacles with a loaded bike. Yet, we’ve managed to keep our route reasonably close to the planned one and achieved our goal in the planned 10 days of the journey.
The series of videos and blog post that follow are an account of our experiences in these 10 days. For the vast majority it was an extremelly positive experience. Both Katy and I loved this trip and when you really like something it is only natural that you want to share it with other like minded people.
So, the product we are giving you for free here, are our experiences and advice on how to avoid the major pitfalls we had along the way. We’ve spent counteless hours editing the videos so they look consistent and present a view of every meter of the route so that, if you want to follow in our footsteps (or bike tracks rather) you’ll know exactly what to expect. For the few people left in the world who are avid readers, Katy has written detailed accounts of every day of the trip in her blog and I’ll be linking my blog posts to hers as she does a much better job in textually describing our experiences than I ever could hope to. The more technical details, such as the GPX route, the stats (altimetry, distances, speed, heart rate and other telemetry stats) and the videos are more on me than on her, but we did work cooperatively in order to provide you with a reasonable guide.
If you read to this point, I’d like to invite you to donate us a coffee for this work. We don’t sell the information, nor get any money through monetizing or advertisment at the moment, so donations are this blog’s only source of income. If enough money is obtained through your generous donations that will enable us to pay for the renewal of EyeCycled.com, the hosting of the information and as a added motivation for us to keep doing this. We are very thankful for anything you can spare.
4. How will the Via Beata materials be presented and made available to you?
The Via Beata materials will be available in written format here, in the blog, and as a playlist of videos in the EyeCycled’s YouTube Channel.
The blog posts will follow a similar structure as presented here with 1 major difference: For the written account of each day’s journey, I’ll just provide a link to Katy’s Via Beata Blog posts. She worked hard in publishing these posts on the same days the journeys happened. I was always very impressed by her commitment and dedication. Even after having cycled long distances all day and being very tired, she always found the motivation to stay up in the evenings writing the posts. There is no need to reinvent the wheel. Her blogs are fantastic written accounts of the journey and if it wasn’t for them a lot would have been lost in memory from 2021, when we actually did the journey, to 2025 when these posts and videos are being published in EyeCycled.com.
For those familiar with EyeCycled’s YouTube channel you will know that videos are mostly the “time-lapse” recordings of the journey, with commentary and a musical background. The difference between these videos and previous ones are, in my humble opinion, the unprecedented level of clarity and stabilization of the footage provided by mechanical and electronic means and the clear 4K resolution footage recorded. Katy and I also worked hard in providing relevant commentary to the footage where we considered it to be useful.
From the time this introduction blog post and video are published, there will be 1 new blog post and video every week until the entire journey is covered. As the journey took 10 days and the playlist is planned to contain 12 videos, incl. today’s one, we expect the entire program will complete in 11 weeks after this publication.
The series of Blog posts and videos were the result of hundreds of hours of hard work. We didn’t do this with the objective of making any money out of it, but if they are useful to you and you’d like to recognise the value of this work, please consider sponsoring EyeCycled.com or providing a one-off donation to keep the blog going.
You’ll find below several picture galleries, one for each day of the journey plus an extra one for the days we spent in St Davids after the pilgrimage was complete. These will be repeated on the posts for each specific day. There are 463 pictures between “Day Zero” and “Day 10” of the journey and then another 261 pictures for the remaining 3 days we spent in St Davids. I considered not posting them all at once, but perhaps they might serve as an incentive for you to follow the series of videos and blog posts as they are published. Where possible I provided some context in every picture taken. These pictures are not to be sold or used without prior consent.
Click on the thumbnail to expand picture and read about that moment. The navigation numbers below each gallery refer to the number of viewable pages in the gallery.
Use the links below to jump directly to the desired gallery.
6. Useful online resources for planning your own journey.
We are giving you our experiences here for free, but it is up to you if you want to replicate them or not. Each journey is different and you may want to plan a custom one for you. Hopefully some of your journey may match ours, but for any portions that don’t these are useful online places you can go to aid in your planning.
If you are walking (or cycling) the Via Beata, this is the main place to go. Keep in mind, however, the Via Beata route is mainly designed for walking and there are a few stiles and kissing gates on the route that are challenging for cyclists.
Currently composed of 12 videos, incl. 1 introduction video, 10 videos of the journey (1 for each day) and a final conclusion video in St Davids after out arrival there.
This group is mantained by us (EyeCycled). It is unofficial, but it may be useful as a forum for the exchange of information between those who have already done the pilgrimage and those who are planning to do it. We've created a similar group for the Pilgrims' Way pilgrimage and that has proven to be a valuable resource for pilgims.
The easiest way is to use the form below and send us a message, but you can also leave comments both here as well as in YouTube or our social media accounts. Keep in mind we do this as a hobby, not as a job, so our responses might be delayed. We aim to provide a response within a week, but it can happen that we are travelling or otherwise unavailable for longer than that. If you didn’t receive a response within 2 weeks, but send us a follow-up message.
Do you like these posts? Why, then, don’t you pay me a coffee to help with the blog hosting cost and as a caffeine incentive to keep me going through the long hours of the night?(Suggested amount: £2.00 or USD $3.00 or 2.50€ or whatever you want to give).
You may donate through my Patreon Page or through PayPal directly.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
OK, if this is the first Pilgrim’s Way post of mine that you are reading, I’d recommend you go back a little and read my Introduction to the Pilgrims’ Way blog. There are a few things I explain there that I don’t here and this post might look confusing if you don’t know these things beforehand (e.g. why 15 stages?).
This post is all about the forth day of the pilgrimage – but do take into consideration I was cycling, so if you are walking it is likely you’ll cover much less ground than me! In this one day I covered stages 13, 14 and 15. I describe them separately here. The section below provides the statistics for the full day, but in each video, there are some statistics for each one of the stages such as distance and time.
YouTube Playback speed settings.
I reckon that the videos show the route and the difficulties quite well, despite being so speeded-up. You can pause them for more detail or reduce the playback speed in the YouTube interface, if you don’t mind watching it for a longer time (if you do this, don’t forget to mute the video to avoid hearing a slowed-down version of the music!).
Also, bear in mind that this pilgrimage was undertaken during the pandemic and that, although some restrictions had been lifted in the UK in August/September, many places, such as small community churches, were still closed.
The tracking was done by 2 Garmin devices: A Garmin Edge 810 bicycle computer and a Garmin Forerunner 235 watch. There appears to be significant differences between these devices.
Stage 13: From From the Harrow Inn Hotel near Lenham to the All Saints’ Church in Boughton Aluph
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 6’42″).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 13th stage between the Harrow Inn Hotel near Lenham and the All Saints’ Church in Boughton Aluph. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took
Before I left the hotel in the morning I had the task of replacing the inner tube of the rear tyre. Thankfully the spare inner tube I was carrying with me worked well, but pumping a fully deflated tyre, with the little bike pump I had, took considerable time and effort.
Leaving the Harrow Inn Hotel, I turned right into the Waterditch Rd and then immediatelly right again into Rayners Hill which I had to ride for a few hundred metres to join the dirt track of the Pilgrims’ Way again on the left (which I almost missed). You’ll walk / ride a good few kilometres on these dirt tracks passing farmyard buildings with fields and often a tree line on both sides. The paths are wide, firm and easy to ride despite a bit of gravel on the ground.
It was in one of these paths I met 2 cyclists (a couple) whose intention was to tour from the southeast of the country all the way to Wales in the west, a good few hundred miles away. We’ve spent only a few minutes talking, I gave them a card, but they never got in touch and I don’t recall their names anymore.
You will eventually get to the A252, but will only have to ride / walk on it for 10-15 m in order to cross over to the Pilgrims Way (the road) on the right. The Pilgrims Way is a paved single track with farm fields on both sides at this point. Eventually the asphalt ends and it becomes a dirt track again with a denser tree line between the farm fields. Quite enjoyable to walk / ride on. The asphalted single track returns about 1 or 2 km later (still on cycle route 17).
At the T-Junction between Dunn St and Westwell Ln you’ll need to take a path that has a, sort of, “U” shaped gate (I had to lift my bike vertically to get through it) leading to a path on a farm field that appears to be part of cycle route 17 hence the curiously looking bike sign (as in bikes allowed) post. One would think cycle routes would be unobstructed paths that facilitate the life of cyclists, but that concept does not appear to be valid in the UK. You’ll ride / walk on unpaved single tracks until you get to the edge of a field where the path becomes less pronounced and when I was there the field had just been prepared for planting, so the crossing of the field wasn’t an easy / pleasureable ride. Surprisingly it all still appears to be part of cycle route 17. There is another of such obstacles on the other side of the field, but this one I was able to (barely) transpose without having to lift the bike. Curiously, this entire stretch is in Google Street View and whenever Google took these pictures it looked very different than when I was there.
As you re-join the asphalt straight ahead you’ll eventually get to a kissing gate that the original walker’s route instructed to take, but I decided to stick to the road and turn right few metres later. This road doesn’t appear to have a name, but will lead to the A251 and the village of Boughton Lees. The All Saints Church is perhaps 1 or 2 km away from Boughton Lees in a place called Boughton Aluph, which strangely does not appear to be a village at all as the only thing around it is the church and some farm buildings. To get to the church you can stay on the road or, like me, take the narrow shortcut path with barbwire fences on both sides (be careful). After riding a few hundred metres on some farm fields you’ll get to a metal Kissing Gate that leads to the church yard and where the German TV crew was already waiting for me as they wanted to shoot some scenes of me arriving at the church. The All Saints Church has a long pilgrim tradition as medieval pilgrims coming from both Winchester and Southwark would gather there to cross the (then) dangerous King’s Wood forest (which was known to be infested with robbers) together to Chilham. The origins of the church can be traced back to Anglo-Saxon times (1066), but the church itself, more or less as it stands today is from 1329. At the time I was there the church was closed due to Covid restrictions but in normal times it hosts once a year the Stour Music Festival. Its well worth a visit.
The picture gallery below shows the pictures taken by me along this stage. Click on any picture to enlarge.
Stage 14: From the All Saints’ Church in Boughton Aluph to the Village Hall in Chilham
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 4’19”).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 14th stage between the All Saints’ Church in Boughton Aluph and the Chilham Community Hall in Chilham. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took
As mentioned in the previous stage, the German TV crew filming the Pilgrims’ Way documentary wanted to add a little acting in the King’s Wood due to the relevance it had in medieval times. As this isn’t really part of the route and the pilgrimage, I have not included it in the video.
As I left the All Saints Church in Boughton Aluph, I crossed a farm field that led me to White Hill Road. The walkers’ route I had obtained on the internet was instructing me to cross the road and follow straight on the farm’s dirt track, but as I had to meet the German TV crew I turned left and climbed White Hill Road to meet them at the King’s Wood Car Park 2 km away. After all the filming I rode back less than a kilometer to enter the King’s Wood at the point I highlight in the video. Hard for me to make a recommendation about a path not taken, but if you are doing it on a bike I would avoid the farm’s dirt track and enter the King’s Wood where I did.
The ride through the wood is very nice and easy with only a few slopes along the way, being the one at the end the more challenging (but easily done). Eventually the path I took joins the path of the walkers’ route. You’ll exit King’s Wood at the A252, not far from Chilham. You’ll ride / walk along the A252 all the way to the Village of Chilham. The walkers’ path will lead you to the St Mary’s Church in Chilham, but by mistake I continued on the A252 and missed the church, hence the reason I end the video of this stage in the Village Hall. After the Village Hall, the next street to the right will take you to the church.
The picture gallery below shows the pictures taken by me along this stage. Click on any picture to enlarge.
Stage 15: From Village Hall in Chilham to the Canterbury Cathedral.
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 13’09”).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 15th and last stage between the Chilham Community Hall in Chilham and the cathedral in Canterbury. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took
If you get to start this stage from the St Mary’s Church in Chilham you will likely be on Church Hill Road. You’ll cross the A252 to take Long Hill and continue all the way to Old Wives Lees, where you’ll turn right on Lower Less Road (the road that was undergoing roadworks in the video). You’ll walk to the “triangle” intersection of Lower Ensden Rd and you should see in front (a little to the right) the path that will take you through some farm fields all the way to the Apple Orchards of Nickle Farm in Chartham. I usually eat an Apple a day (to keep the doctor away) and to me seeing all the Apple trees and their pleasant smeel was a real delight.
Nickle Farm belongs to FW Mansfield & Son and it is a big business, with many workers, mostly coming from Eastern Europe for the harvest. As I rode through the farm I got a little lost and asked for directions, but communication was a bit difficult. I eventually found the path, but when I saw the pebbles on the track up hill I got demotivated. That forced me to look for an alternative and after talking to another person in the farm he recommeded the path to Canterbury over Chartham village, alongside the Great Stour river, which isn’t really part of the original Pilgrims’ Way route (see where the yellow line and the red line disconnect on the map above).
The original route, on the walkers’ path and the guide will take you to the villeage of Chartham Hatch (yellow line), but I decided to override that. This was MY pilgrimage afterall and, personally, I take a river path over a single track lane any time. Again, it is probably not right for me do make recommendations over a path not taken, but I am glad I did ride to Canterbury alongside the river. The path is beautiful, very flat and very enjoyable, but you’ll have to divide it with a number of other cyclists and walkers (incl. dogs, children, etc). You’ll see magnificent river houses, trees and fields all the way to Canterbury. I think the video is much better at showing you this than I could ever put in words, but if you take the same path as I did you’ll be giving up the historical path of the pilgrimage.
The video includes some drone footage I filmed the NEXT day with Katy and some details about Canterbury with Katy’s voice. I hope you enjoy the bird’s eye view of Canterbury at the distance (at that point the Cathedral is about 3.5 km away).
Upon arriving in Canterbury, as it became the norm over these 4 days, the German TV crew was already waiting for me at the Westgate Towers for a quite intense session of filming. Honestly, I felt a bit like a movie star walking into Canterbury city centre being followed by TV cameras and a filming crew. A sensation that I wasn’t necessarily comfortable with due to all the attention it drew onto me… all for a good cause anyway.
I should consider myself lucky they were there though. I did this pilgrimage during the times of the pandemic and if it wasn’t for the TV crew I am sure a few doors wouldn’t have been open to me. Upon arriving at the cathedral I was warmly greeted by canon Emma Pennington who received us and led us first into the cript of Saint Thomas Becket and then into the high altar where I received my final pilgrim’s blessing and where Katy sang at the end of the video.
In all fairness, I must warn you, the pictures you see in the video are from the next day though as the arrival at the cathedral and all the filming for the TV crew was quite intense. I didn’t really had a lot of time to film for myself, but the experience is the same. If you ever get to watch the documentary, the final footage of me (if included at all) might likely be an aerial / drone footage at the campus of the University of Kent riding into the sunset (quite moving really) onto another challenge.
This stage concludes the pilgrimage. I hope you enjoyed this short series of videos and posts about my Pilgrims’ Way pilgrimage by bike. To me these are memories I’ll take to the grave 🙂
The picture gallery below shows the pictures taken by me along this stage. Click on any picture to enlarge.
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to comment or send me a message through the contact form.
Please subscribe to my Blog and/or to my YouTube channel if you don’t want to miss the next one and help me spread the word by liking and sharing my Facebook Page, Instagram and Tweeter feed also.
Thank you for your time!
Do you like these posts? Why, then, don’t you pay me a coffee to help with the blog hosting cost and as a caffeine incentive to keep me going through the long hours of the night?(Suggested amount: £2.00 or USD $3.00 or 2.50€ or whatever you want to give).
You may donate through my Patreon Page or through PayPal directly.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
OK, if this is the first Pilgrim’s Way post of mine that you are reading, I’d recommend you go back a little and read my Introduction to the Pilgrims’ Way blog. There are a few things I explain there that I don’t here and this post might look confusing if you don’t know these things beforehand (e.g. why 15 stages?).
This post is all about the third day of the pilgrimage – but do take into consideration I was cycling, so if you are walking it is likely you’ll cover much less ground than me! In this one day I covered stages 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 and I describe them separately here. The section below provides the statistics for the full day, but in each video, there are some statistics for each one of the stages such as distance and time.
YouTube Playback speed settings.
I reckon that the videos show the route and the difficulties quite well, despite being so speeded-up. You can pause them for more detail or reduce the playback speed in the YouTube interface, if you don’t mind watching it for a longer time (if you do this, don’t forget to mute the video to avoid hearing a slowed-down version of the music!).
Also, bear in mind that this pilgrimage was undertaken during the pandemic and that, although some restrictions had been lifted in the UK in August/September, many places, such as small community churches, were still closed.
The tracking was done by 2 Garmin devices: A Garmin Edge 810 bicycle computer and a Garmin Forerunner 235 watch. There appears to be significant differences between these devices. For example while the Garmin watch shows an elapsed time of 9h 56m, the Garmin Edge 810 shows 13h 3 min. Distances are also slightly different, but the Garmin Edge 810 shows a distance that matches the one tracked by the Komoot App on my phone.
Stage 08: From From the Days Inn Hotel near Westerham to Otford
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 6’46″).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 8th stage between the Days Inn Hotel near Westerham (M25 Clacket Ln Service St) and the village of Otford. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took.
As I left the Days Inn Hotel I knew I was going to have to find a bike repair shop. One of the screws that holds the rack in place had become lose and fallen out (lower right screw), possibly due to all the Kissing Gates I had to raise my bike up and down vertically. I added a picture to the gallery which shows how out-of-alignment the rack was in relation to the frame of the bike.
I messaged Katy that morning and she kindly offered to search online for a bike repair shop as close as possible to the route of the Pilgrims’ Way, which isn’t easy. In case you have not noticed yet, the Pilgrims’s Way doesn’t exactly track along large populated areas, where is where you’re most likely to find bike shops. More on this later.
So, leaving the hotel I got a bit disoriented with my maps and started to ride in the direction to the motorway. Thankfully I realised this soon enough and corrected my mistake, but I was asked by a police officer on a motorcycle if I had entered the motorway, which in the UK is forbidden for cyclists and pedestrians.
Back on track, I rode on Clacket Ln until it met the Pilgrims Ln, which later becomes the Pilgrims Way. As mentioned before, many roads have the “Pilgrims Way” name along the Pilgrims Way route.
You’ll see some beautiful vineyard sights on the right as you pass by the Squerryes Wine Estate. You’ll be walking or riding on the Pilgrims Way (the road) pretty much until you get close to Chevening Park. At this point, the walking guide describes a walking path through Chevening Park by turning left at Sundridge Hill towards the village of Knockholt with the entrance at a place called Keepers Cottage. I contacted the author of the guide and even he struggled to describe the best way through Chevening Park. As this is all private property and likely footpaths I decided not to risk it and I turned right at Sundridge Hill, which becomes Ovenden Rd, and then turning left towards the B2211, which can be a bit busy in terms of vehicle traffic but still acceptable for experienced riders. At the junction with Chevening Rd I turned left towards Chevening Park as I wanted to visit the village and see the 13th century St Botolph’s Church there (where I flew the drone, with images described by Katy in the video). I am sure walking on Chevening Park would be a very pleasureable experience.
Leaving St Botolph’s Church I had to cross some farm fields to get to the B2211. I rode the short distance to the roundabout with Starhill Rd, turning left into Starhill Rd and then right into Lime Pit Ln which sort of ends in an industrial estate, but there is a kind of hidden footpath towards the A224, right by the bridge that crosses over the M25 to find yourself on, guess what? The Pilgrims Way again, not far from the village of Otford.
As I arrived in Otford, I tried to look for a place where I could get a stamp for my pilgrim’s credential and the only place I saw open was the Otford Tea Rooms and gift shop, which doubles as a charity shop. I thought it was as good a place as any to get a stamp, but unfortunatelly they didn’t have one, though they kindly signed the credential to prove I was there.
The picture gallery below shows the pictures taken by me along this stage. Click on any picture to enlarge.
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 4’39”).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 9th stage between the village of Otford and the Wrotham Recycling Centre. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took.
Having left the Tea Rooms in Otford, I rode through the village centre on the A225 passing the entrance to the train station on the right, bridge over the track and turning right on “Pilgrims Way E” (where I can only presume the E stands for East). Eventually the “E” disappears and the road becomes Pilgrims Way again. You’ll pretty much follow this for many km / miles until the Pilgrims Way (as the pilgrims’ route) becomes a dirt track. As I mentioned at the start of stage 8, however, I was looking for a bike shop to fix the issue with the rack, so as I got to the village of Kemsing, I left the Pilgrims Way momentarily to look for a bicycle repair place that (according to Katy) should exist. I could not find it, but by the place it was supposed to be there was a car garage and the friendly mechanic solved the problem by securing the rack to the frame with a self-taping screw (which may have damaged the tread of the screw hole in the frame, but at least solved the issue).
After that detour, I continued and after crossing Exedown Rd and continuing on the dirt track, I met two pilgrims on foot and had a quick chat to them. This track will pretty much lead directly to Wrotham and at the edge of the village when you meet the tarmac again, that will be the Pilgrims Way street in the village of Wrotham itself.
The end of this stage is in the rather disappointing Wrotham recycling centre (as per the walking guide) which is just a collection of recycling bins (bottles, paper, plastic, etc) on the left and the Wrotham recreation ground on the left. There are a few benches to sit on at the Wrotham recreation ground, but the recycling “centre” has really nothing to offer (unless you have rubbish to throw away), so I don’t think any pilgrims will be spending much time there.
I was in a bit of a hurry on this day. The German TV crew filming the documentary for the Pilgrims’ Way was expecting me at the Carmelite Priory in Aylesford later on, so I didn’t stop as much as usual to take pictures and unfortunately I have no photos of this stage to show, but I hope you enjoy the video.
Stage 10: From Wrotham to the Peter’s Village roundabout in Wouldham.
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 7’25”).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 10th stage between the Recycling centre in Wrotham and Peter’s Village in Wouldham, Kent. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took.
For this stage of the pilgrimage I was confronted with the decision of whether I should ride to Halling or not. It would have required a ride a few kilometres north only to come down south again. I had also ascertained through Google Maps and Google Earth that the walkers’ route I downloaded from the internet appear to be inaccurate, as it led to a point at the edge of the River Medway in Snodland, south of Holborough, where there is no bridge or any discernible form of river crossing (maybe there used to be a ferry crossing at this point a long time ago). The walking guide actually instructs the pilgrims to walk north to Halling and then cross the river at the same bridge I did (quite new bridge leading to Peter’s Village). As I mentioned before, I was pressed for time at that point so I decided to skip Halling altogether in my pilgrimage, making the goal of this stage the Peter’s Village sign on the Peter’s Village roundabout (an arch metal structure welcoming visitors to Peter’s Village).
After the Wrotham Recycling “centre” you turn right to the bridge over the M20 and almost immediatelly after this you’ll find yourself on nice and quiet single track lanes with farm fields on both sides. In the T-Junction between the Pilgrims’ Way (in which the name plate actually had an apostrophe) and Nepicar Lane I decided to stop and record a short video to show the fields and document the fix on my bike.
Eventually the paved Pilgrims’ Way single track turns right and becomes the Wrotham Water Rd with the pilgrims route continuing on a dirt track to the left. This is a nice track with trees and farm fields and leads to a road called Vigo Hill where a few metres down the road you see the sign “Pilgrim House” at some residence which I stopped to take a picture of (I don’t believe it is a lodging, just a family house, but they do sell homemade preserves). Vigo Hill leads to a single track lane called (again!) Pilgrims Way that ends in a sort of cul-de-sac, with a small step at the end, and continues on a beautiful dirt track with trees on both sides. After crossing Birling Hill you’ll eventually get to a single track again called (guess what?) Pilgrims Way, a short ride for me because as I decided not to go to Halling, I turned right at Ladds Ln stopping just to take a few panoramic pictures of the impressive white ridges. I rode on Ladds Ln until the roundabout of Manley Blvd, taking the A228 to the roundabout leading to the Peter’s Bridge over the River Medway and to the roundabout of the Peter’s Village sign. I stopped on the bridge to take a few pictures of the river and then at the Peter’s Village roundabout to take a few pictures of the sign, but other than that I just continued on the way to the next stage.
The picture gallery below shows the pictures taken by me along this stage. Click on any picture to enlarge.
Stage 11: From the Peter’s Village roundabout in Wouldham to Aylesford
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 9’59”).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 11th stage between the Peter’s Village roundabout in Wouldham, and the Carmelite Priory in Aylesford, Kent. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took.
I think I should mention again that, as I decided NOT to follow the instructions given by the walking guide, the end of “my” 10th stage (and start of the 11th) the Peter’s Village Sign. The distance between this point to the end of “my” stage 11 (the Carmelite Priory in Aylesford) is a short one: Just over 5.5 km. The walking guide instructs pilgrims to walk up to Halling, so “its” 11th stage is considerably longer.
This is the point where pilgrims have also the option to walk or ride north to Rochester, the point at which the Pilgrims’ Way route coming from London mets the route from Winchester. I decided not to do that because (as previously mentioned) the German TV crew was waiting for me in the Priory.
I rode through Peter’s village, but on hindsight I could have taken the path to the left of the roundabout, going under the bridge and then ride on what appears to be a nice river walk leading to the same cyclepath I took out of the village. After the cyclepath parallel to Village Rd you keep right on the fork to Old Church Rd, which leads to a closed gate, but with an open bike / pedestrian passage. I was concerned that this area was private property, but upon meeting some women walking the other way my concerns were dismissed. Whatever it is, it is a public right of passage and appears to be a nature reserve of some kind. You’ll ride / walk on farm track for a few metres until you reach Bull Ln, turning right in the direction of the Carmelite Priory, known locally as “The Friars“.
A visit or even a stay in this place is highly recommended and if you watched the video above you’ll probably get this by the number of times I said “amazing place!”. They offer Pilgrim accommodation there, but due to the Covid situation they were closed for guests. The friar told me the price for an overnight stay was £45, but better get in touch with them to confirm before you leave.
I can’t say enough how much I recommend a visit there.
Stage 12: From Aylesford to the Harrow Inn hotel near Lenham.
If you haven’t done so already, please watch the video first and then read this blog for more detail! I didn’t want to include all this information in the video voiceover because it would have added too much to the length of the video (which is 9’24”).
The picture below was used in the video and I hope will help you make more sense of the text below.
Map of the 12th stage between the Carmelite Priory in Aylesford and the Harrow Inn Hotel near Lenham, Kent. In yellow the downloaded walker’s path. In red the path I took.
What the video of the previous stage doesn’t show is the amount of time I spent with the German TV crew recording for their documentary. The Friar and I were acting for the camera to give the viewer of the documentary the impression that I was staying overnight, which I would have loved to do, if it wasn’t for the fact they were closed for guests due to the pandemic.
As we finished filming it started to rain. It was already late afternoon / early evening (around 6pm, I think) and I still had another 25 km to ride to my final destination of the day, the Harrow Inn Hotel near Lenham .
To make matters worse, there appeared to be a small puncture on my rear tyre, which caused the air pressure on the tire to go steadily down over a period of 45 to 60 min. Instead of stopping and fixing the problem, replacing the inner tube with the brand new one I had brought with me, I decided to continue stopping from time to time to pump more air in the tyre. At the time I thought this would save me more time than a permanent fix and I knew I could always fix it at the hotel later on.
As I left the Priory, I rode through Aylesford on the High St, taking the Rochester Rd until it met the Pilgrims Way (the road). After a small mistake I took the dirt track crossing under the A229 continuing on the nice dirt track among trees and fields on both sides. After that dirt track, the road you’ll get to is (again) called the Pilgrims Way (for a short while) and as it turns left it becomes a road simply called “The St”, but you’ll continue on the Pilgrims Way to the left. That is the point I had to turn my lights on as it was starting to get dark and I was still some 18 km from my final destination. I knew then I would arrive in the dark.
I crossed the A249 in the village of Detling and continued on the Pilgrims Way passing the village of Thurnham, stopping on one occasion to pump air into the rear tyre and trying to ride as fast as I could (which at that stage was already becoming a challenge as I was tired) with rainfall of varied strength.
I passed the village of Hollingbourne still with daylight, but dusk was already falling. It was a few kilometres after Hollingbourne that I had the only incident / accident of the journey and, for me, it was an unique one. As far as I can ascertain from watching the timelapse video, I must have had a sudden loss of control, perhaps due to the slippery conditions, or low pressure in the rear tyre or simply an oversight by me, and suffered a fall, apparently hitting my head on the ground or on the edge to the left in such a way that I completely lost memory of the event.
From watching the video above I concluded that I don’t appear to have lost consciousness, only memory, which is a very weird sensation. To see oneself, yet not to remember anything, is somewhat disturbing, in my opinion. Other than a few bruises and small cuts (which I only really saw after arriving at the hotel and going for a shower), not much appeared to have happened to me.
I only realised I had an accident some 10-15 min later when I stopped at the crossing with Stede Hill near Harrietsham to pump air into the rear tyre again. By this time daylight was gone and I had to continue in the dark, hence the reason I changed this portion of the video to show only a Google Earth fly-along animation.
I arrived at the Harrow Inn Hotel, checked-in, had a shower and went to the hotel’s restaurant for dinner. The German TV crew was there also and we had a few beers and laughs after having watched on my phone the timelapse video of the fall together.
As you can imagine due to the time pressures and the fact that it was getting dark I didn’t stop to take many pictures along this stage, so the gallery below is rather small.
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Leider ist diese „post“ auf Deutsch nicht verfügbar. Meine Zeit ist sehr begrenzt und die Übersetzung, Erstellung und Veröffentlichung eines Beitrags dieser Art erfordert mehrere Stunden Arbeit.
Wenn Sie Englisch verstehen und bereit sind, mir zu helfen, um den Posten nach Deutsch zu übersetzen, wäre ich sehr dankbar. Ich verspreche es so schnell wie möglich, zu überprüfen und die Übersetzung zu veröffentlichen und seinen Namen als Übersetzer Kreditieren.
Sie können den Text auf Englisch kopieren und in Programmen wie Microsoft Word einzufügen, übersetzen und es zurück an die Adresse senden Paulo@EyeCycled.com
Danke.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
Leider ist diese „post“ auf Deutsch nicht verfügbar. Meine Zeit ist sehr begrenzt und die Übersetzung, Erstellung und Veröffentlichung eines Beitrags dieser Art erfordert mehrere Stunden Arbeit.
Wenn Sie Englisch verstehen und bereit sind, mir zu helfen, um den Posten nach Deutsch zu übersetzen, wäre ich sehr dankbar. Ich verspreche es so schnell wie möglich, zu überprüfen und die Übersetzung zu veröffentlichen und seinen Namen als Übersetzer Kreditieren.
Sie können den Text auf Englisch kopieren und in Programmen wie Microsoft Word einzufügen, übersetzen und es zurück an die Adresse senden Paulo@EyeCycled.com
Danke.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
Leider ist diese „post“ auf Deutsch nicht verfügbar. Meine Zeit ist sehr begrenzt und die Übersetzung, Erstellung und Veröffentlichung eines Beitrags dieser Art erfordert mehrere Stunden Arbeit.
Wenn Sie Englisch verstehen und bereit sind, mir zu helfen, um den Posten nach Deutsch zu übersetzen, wäre ich sehr dankbar. Ich verspreche es so schnell wie möglich, zu überprüfen und die Übersetzung zu veröffentlichen und seinen Namen als Übersetzer Kreditieren.
Sie können den Text auf Englisch kopieren und in Programmen wie Microsoft Word einzufügen, übersetzen und es zurück an die Adresse senden Paulo@EyeCycled.com
Danke.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
Leider ist diese „post“ auf Deutsch nicht verfügbar. Meine Zeit ist sehr begrenzt und die Übersetzung, Erstellung und Veröffentlichung eines Beitrags dieser Art erfordert mehrere Stunden Arbeit.
Wenn Sie Englisch verstehen und bereit sind, mir zu helfen, um den Posten nach Deutsch zu übersetzen, wäre ich sehr dankbar. Ich verspreche es so schnell wie möglich, zu überprüfen und die Übersetzung zu veröffentlichen und seinen Namen als Übersetzer Kreditieren.
Sie können den Text auf Englisch kopieren und in Programmen wie Microsoft Word einzufügen, übersetzen und es zurück an die Adresse senden Paulo@EyeCycled.com
Danke.
Please rate this post by clicking on the desired star (1 = Awful, 5
= Excellent)
