2nd September 2017, a first run around the bridleways near Dry hill.
Looking at the progress I've made so far there was a corner of the county that had not been covered, I'd been around Westerham and Sevenoaks, and needed to get down to south of the Bough Beech Reservior.
We started off at Four Elms, there's limited parking opposite the church but it is free.
Heading north on the B269 to turn right into Mapelton Road, lovely country lane beneath the north downs, continue on this road for roughly 1.2 Km and the entrance to the first Byway is on the left.
The byway runs westerly (through a farm) over to Spout Lane, its a good running farm track.
This winds south west, on a farm track and out onto the road, which we rode westwards, Dairy Lane to Swaynesland Road, we turned left (south) onto Guildables Lane and followed this south to Monks Lane where we turned right, the next bridleway is just on the left here.
It runs as a concrete farm trail down through Bachelor's Farm, there is a junction at Troy Lane and another bridleway continues on the left, take this trail.
This bridleway runs east over to the main road, it has a few gates, and runs through a grass section, getting thinner nearer the road.
Once you appear out onto the B2026, turn left and almost immediately on your right is the entrance to the next bridleway.
This runs down a grassy track alongside horse paddocks and out onto farmland, I have to admit we lost our way a bit here, the signage is a bit bleak, so we took a guess which turned out ok.
The trail loops around to the right and onto Swan Lane, it's ok, and if you want to skip it feel free, the views over the downs are good here though.
We took Swan Lane on the right and back onto the B2026 for a slog through Edenbridge, the ride through the high street is better than the bypass, we've done both and prefer the high street.
Out of Edenbridge following Mill Hill down to the junction with B2028 at Den Cross, this is an awkward right hand turn on a left hand bend, so take it steady.
This is Marsh Green Road, and the starting point of a few bridleways, the first is on the left at Shernden Lane.
This is more of an adopted driveway to be honest, tarmac and a bit of a disappointment, however it does get better (more on a later ride), for our firt foray we turned right onto another bridleway that essentially takes you out onto the road again.
Here we followed the road down to the next bridleway entrance:
This again starts out as a driveway/track and runs down to houses, before leading onto the nature reserve at Dry Hill. (Site of an Iron Age Fort).
We rode a few of these, covering more on a later ride, check out the OS Map, OS Explorer 147 to get an idea of the area, but there are some great trails here, through the woods.
Heading East we rode through Crippenden Manor and out to the road at Spode Lane, then turning left onto Hartfield Road, heading North to Hever and Hever station.
After crossing the railway at Hever, we headed left, then right, down to the river and towards Hever Castle, and turned left onto Hever road, following this for about 800m, until the bridleway entrance on the right.
At the time of riding this was overgrown and full of nettles, giving us a gentle reminder of the joys of bare legs. It's a good trail, crossing the river on a foot bridge and runs for nearly 2km, of singletrack.
This last stretch was back onto the road at How Green Lane, and returning to Four Elms.
The area around Edenbridge and Dry Hill is great for a ride, we could reduce some of our road times by changing our starting point etc, but I'd recommend checking out the trails here.
