Length: 17½ km (10.9 miles) to Wateringbury, or 20¼ km (12.6 miles) if you carry on to Yalding. Toughness: 3/10
09:31 Ramsgate train from Victoria (Bromley South 09:52), changing at Paddock Wood (arr 10:30, dep 10:40) for the Strood train, arriving Maidstone West at 11:00. Buy a return to Maidstone West.
You could also travel out from St Pancras (you'd arrive at Maidstone West just two minutes earlier from the other direction), but there's a long wait at Strood for the connection; irritating when you've paid a premium for the High Speed train. The other possibility of travelling out to Maidstone East is not worth considering as there's a replacement bus beyond Borough Green.
Late Start Option: Take the train one hour later and get off at East Farleigh (the stop before Maidstone West) at 11:56. That cuts out the first 3¾ km (2.3 miles). I reckon the main group will have passed through along the riverbank about 10 minutes earlier and if you're lucky you might encounter some stragglers, but if not you won't be far behind.
Return trains are hourly at xx:08 from Wateringbury and xx:12 from Yalding, changing at Tonbridge for Victoria or Charing Cross.
This is one of several new options which have recently been added to the Wateringbury Circular walk. You might have to share the first part of the Medway Towpath with some Sunday cyclists, but hopefully these interlopers will thin out as you move away from Maidstone and the scenery becomes more rural.
There's a new lunch pub on this variation, the “Country Pub & Dining” Horseshoes Inn on Dean Street. Picnickers might find it more pleasant to stop a little later in the churchyard at East Farleigh, where the route merges with the original Circular Walk.
You'll need to bring the directions from the L=swc.336.c (if you click c in the Walk Options list it will show this route on the Walk Map as well as skipping the directions for other variations when you print).
2 comments:
Only n=1 on the late start train, on a w=partly-sunny day. If there were any walkers on the published train they managed to evade the walks inspector, although he did his best by poking his nose into a few pubs and scouring churchyards for picnickers. Any further walk report would be welcomed...
I'm told there were two on the earlier train, making n=3. They escaped detection by making a small detour to a pub just off the main route, the Good Intent.
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