9.47 train from Victoria (10.06 Bromley South) to Farningham Road, arriving 10.21.
Buy a day return to Otford (or Shoreham, Kent, if you definitely plan to finish there: but see return train info below). Technically you also need a single for the one stop from Swanley to Farningham Road, but it would be a hard-hearted ticket inspector who insisted on this.
While our fellow walkers struggle up bog and rock-strewn hillsides in Scotland, we who are left behind will console ourselves as best we can by strolling down a beautiful river valley, garnished on all sides by swathes of spring flowers. (All right, don't overdo it - Ed)
In more prosaic terms, this is a walk up (in the sense of going towards the source) or down (southwards on the map) the River Darent, encountering varied terrain on the way. This is territory traversed by a number of SWC walks, but this particular route has had fewer outings than others, being last featured in October 2022, and last done in spring in June 2021.
For lunch you have a choice between Farningham village after 4.2 miles - where the Lion Hotel has a gorgeous riverside location, but is often rather busy (and a chain pub to boot), while the Pied Bull (500 metres up the road) is a more traditional pub food alternative - or Eynsford village a mile or so further on, which has several pubs (again, on a short diversion from the route).
Beyond this, refreshment options continue to come thick and fast - Lullingstone Roman Villa serves hot drinks, the Lullingstone Visitor Centre does nice tea and cakes, and Shoreham has two pubs, two tea rooms and a vineyard with a coffee van and restaurant.
You can finish at Shoreham (9.8 miles) or carry on to Otford over Fackenden Down (good butterfly territory if the sun is out and you are not too late in the afternoon), where there are more tea and pub options.
Getting back: one good reason to carry on to Otford is it has better return train options: 37 past the hour to London Bridge (30 minutes) or Charing Cross (40 minutes); 55 past the hour to Victoria (41 minutes); and 29 past the hour to Blackfriars (51 minutes). The latter is a Thameslink train, stopping at a whole string of places in south east London.
Oddly, there is only one Thameslink train an hour today (usually there are two) and so Shoreham only has one train an hour, at 32 past, taking 48 minutes to Blackfriars - but only 34 minutes to London Bridge and 44 minutes to Charing Cross if you change at Swanley (a six minute wait on the same platform) to connect to the 37 past departure from Otford mentioned above. (Quite a clever piece of timetabling...)
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A perfect outing at a gorgeous time of year in w=hot-sunshine: who would want to be anywhere else? (In fact one of us did: prevented from going to Scotland by an injury: she joined the original 11 of us mid afternoon, making n=12 in all.)
At the start I inveigled the group into taking the shorter start down the Darent (ie leaving out Farningham Wood), simply because I happen to like this stretch of the river. (I think the magic word “shortcut” was what persuaded the others, however.) A new hard surface path has been laid here, making it somewhat less romantic, but drier underfoot.
This meant we got to Farningham village too early for lunch, so we continued on to Eynsford (through fields lined with gorgeous cow parsley). There we avoided the pub by the river (with its hordes of paddling children) and instead went to the more traditional Malt Shovel on the main road. Eight of us ate in their serviceable (if a little bare) back garden and two had drinks. One sandwicher carried on and was not seen again, but otherwise group cohesion today was excellent.
In the afternoon we went for a look at Eynsford Castle - quite a lot left given that it was abandoned in 1315 - and then took the route up the hill to avoid the traffic on the road to Lullingstone. Once up there we were disinclined to come down, so we freestyled a route into the Lullingstone Country Park. Here we did something so shameful and against the ethos of the SWC that I shudder to admit it: we sat down on the grass to have a snooze. (We then had to move almost immediately to allow two horse riders to pass, except they came an unexpected way and so we had to move again…but then we managed to have a rest).
All this filled the time nicely, so that by the time we got to the Visitor Centre it was time for tea. We split between sol and sombra factions, the former still wanting to drink up the sun’s rays, the latter fleeing to the shade to avoid the summer-like heat.
After tea, to Shoreham where six (if I have my arithmetic right) profited from the proximity of the 16.36 train, and five carried on to Otford. The magical butterfly slopes yielded only one dingy skipper, one peacock and a handful of brimstones (it was a bit late in the day for butterflies, to be honest), and it was bizarre to see little more than short grass where in a month downland flowers will teem…but we got to Otford in good time to get the fast 17.37 to London Bridge, Waterloo East and Charing Cross, with all expectations for the day met and boxes fully ticked.
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