Adventures on my bike
Date climbed 29th October 2013 Elevation gain 244 feet Length 0.39 mile Duration 4.5 minutes This hill is so steep that, even in a car, it is scary going down. In fact most drivers seem to take it quite slowly. I have only included figures here for Vigo Hill itself. Before you reach the beginning …
| Date climbed | 26th August 2013 |
| Elevation gain | 193 feet |
| Length | 0.3 mile |
| Duration | 3.4 minutes |
I first heard about this hill whilst on a club run. It was described as one of the few ‘double-chevron’ hills in the area. 
The double chevron symbol on an ordnance survey map indicates a gradient steeper than 20%. In this case it’s 25%!
It’s one of those hills that has trees and woods on each side. As you struggle to climb it there are no visual clues as to the severity of the gradient. The absence of any man-made verticals, like gate posts or brick walls, combined with the lack of long-range view makes it almost impossible to get any sense of how steep the incline might be. Your legs will let you know though! Standing on the pedals in your lowest gear, putting loads of effort in and going virtually nowhere fast are all the signs you need to tell you that it’s ‘kin steep. Like all good hills, this one gets steeper and steeper. And, as if you don’t already have enough to concentrate on as you grind your way up, the surface isn’t very good either, so you have to spend effort dodging the potholes and staying off the gravel.
And now for the good news: it only lasts three and a half minutes or less!
I climbed this hill during this ride. Although Lockyers is steeper at 25%, it didn’t feel as tough as Cob Lane, a mere 20%, which still holds top spot for the toughest hill I have yet encountered.
This route was planned with the sole purpose of riding up White Hill. Someone on a club run had mentioned it and I had made a note to do it one day. And that day was today. As usual, of late, the weather was warm and sunny. I planned a 54-mile route that took in quite a lot of unknown territory.
The first 18 miles or so were covered at 16mph. There were some nice lanes around Charing, just keeping to the South of the Downs. After 23 miles I came to a lovely lake, Eastwell Lake.
Less than a mile past the lake my progress came to an abrupt halt when I was confronted with this:
Damn! Again I had failed to check if all of the route was on public roads. But again I figured that the route-planning software wouldn’t direct me across private land, so I once more assumed that there was some sort of right-of-way.
I looked for a way around this road blockage and noticed, a little further back from the gate, a footpath sign. This led me past some sort of old tower or something.
Through one of those anti-bike type gates and across a rough field I came to another bike-unfriendly gate. This one was too small to manoeuvre through, so I just lifted my bike over the gate next to it.
and found myself on a smooth tarmac road
After about a mile of this I came to learn where I actually was, by virtue of this sign
Another interesting ‘off-road’ excursion comes to an end.
About a mile and a half later I arrived at the goal of this journey, namely White Hill. As it turned out, it wasn’t too bad a hill. It’s quite long at 1.6 miles, over which it rises about 450 feet, but I managed nearly all of it in 3rd gear, so it was hardly challenging. But the view from the top was worth it.
The next seven miles consisted of some beautiful roads across the top of the Downs before dropping down again through Lenham Heath and Grafty Green, after which I climbed Ulcombe Hill to the Greensand Ridge for the next four miles before dropping down again into the Vale of Kent. I included a bit of a twist in the tail of this journey in the shape of Westerhill Road, whose 17% gradient I just had enough energy left to climb.
Well, as promised, this route is a modification of the Greensand Hills Route I did last week, except this time the previous descents become the new ascents and vice versa.
I wasn’t really in the mood for this ride. Maybe it was the couple of beers I’d had the previous evening; I just felt a bit lack-lustre, performance-wise. It was a fairly hot day (25°C) with sunny spells.
The first climb of the day was Yalding Hill, and it felt a bit of a slog, which was worrying, this early in the ride. Then, it was down Barn and up Hunton Hill. This was the first time I had climbed Hunton Hill and it was steeper than I had expected. Nearly two miles later came Vanity Lane. Having climbed this for the first time a couple of weeks before, at least I knew what to expect; it didn’t make it any easier though! As I panted my way up the steep incline, a woman jogging (or at least to the extent that one can ‘jog’ down such a steep slope) past me in the opposite direction quipped “and I thought I was mad running down it!”. A grunt of acknowledgement was all I could muster in response, as I gasped for more air. I was glad to get Vanity Lane out of the way – the remaining hills are all less severe. Only eight more to go!
Five hills later I was wishing it could be over. When I came to the top of Windmill Hill I mistakenly thought I had completed the last one, so when I found myself descending again I thought “Drat, there must be another one to go” (or thoughts to that effect!). And there was – Headcorn Road has an ascent of 220 feet in half a mile. With that out of the way I just had 11 fairly flat miles to ride home.
Even though it was a slog I was still glad I had done it once it was over.
Reading something on the web about a year ago, someone suggested a route of this nature – ie. going up and down each consecutive hill along the Greensand Ridge starting at Yalding Hill and moving East. At the the time I thought it would be a killer, as I considered Yalding, Barn and Hunton Hills, Westerhill Road, Vanity Lane, etc, but really these are the worst ones – with one or two exceptions the hills get easier as you go East. I thought I’d give it a go. I designed the following route (43 miles, 3,340 feet ascent) : It was a hot day (26°C) with light winds. The first climb was Barn Hill. I’m very familiar with this short, sharp shock. The next ascent was Westerhill Road and that was really tough, certainly the steepest on this route – it’s up there with the toughest of all the Ridge hills and required out-of-the-saddle heavy breathing action to get up it! With that one done, the rest were easier.
During this ride I discovered some really nice country lanes around here that I had never ridden before, such as Loddington Lane. I think this route will become a favourite. I have designed another one that goes up the hills that this one goes down and vice versa. I tried something new on this ride, namely having an IsoGel every 7 or 8 miles. It seemed to work OK and I noticed no unpleasant side-effects, other than feeling more hungry than usual once I got home.
A hill I remember from childhood
70-mile route with almost 6,000 ft of climbing
| Date climbed | 28th April 2013 |
| Elevation gain | 336 feet |
| Length | 0.6 mile |
| Duration | 6 minutes |
I remember the first time I saw One Tree Hill. It was on a ride back from Ide Hill and as I passed near Underriver my route turned right but as I looked to the left I saw a large house on the top of a hill and I couldn’t believe how high it looked. You had to almost crane your neck up to see it. I made a note to check it out when I got home.
Well I did check it out and found that it was Carter’s Hill, although everyone seems to know it as One Tree Hill. It has enough of a reputation that I was able to find several cycling-based references to it on the web. I became intrigued. I had to try it.
There is a false start to this climb. In fact it even descends briefly before the good bit kicks in. And kick in it does, ramping up steadily getting ever steeper as it twists and turns its way up to Fawke Common. The section just before the end hits 17.5% gradient for about 600 ft, before it eases back to 10% to the finish.
It’s a good one. There is a sportive called the Circuit of Kent that features this hill at the end of a 80+ mile ride. That’s just cruel!
| Date climbed | 18th July 2013 |
| Elevation gain | 284 feet |
| Length | 0.7 mile |
| Duration | 6 minutes |
I was chatting to someone about the steep hills on the Greensand Ridge and I said that I thought East Hall Hill might be the steepest. “But surely Vanity Lane is steeper” they said. Needless to say, my next ride included Vanity Lane. I had never climbed this hill but had been down it a couple of times about ten years before. I was always amused by a sign about halfway down warning drivers to be careful of “Free Range Children”.
By the time I came to climb it yesterday I had already ridden 55 miles in 28°C heat, so probably not at my best. The first few hundred metres seemed easy. I looked down at my gears and saw that I was in fourth. “This is going to be easy” I thought to myself. Vanity Lane is one of those hills, like so many around here, that gently twists as it rises, so you can never see that far ahead.
Around one bend it ramps up, and in the distance you can see that it’s getting steeper. In all it has three distinctly separate and progressively steeper segments. The third, and steepest, section starts just before you ride under a strange footbridge spanning the steep-sided (or ‘sunken’ as I have heard it called) lane.
By the time I got to that part I had run out of gears, but I still managed to maintain a steady pace because now I could see the gradient easing up ahead.
Accurately calculating gradients is difficult, it seems. While most internet sites agree when it comes to distances, they vary wildly when it comes to gradients. Strava reports that the steepest gradient in Vanity Lane is over 20%, whereas Cob Lane only reaches 18%. Instinctively I feel that Cob Lane is much steeper than Vanity Lane. My own calculations for Vanity lane show the steep section as being about 15%. Suffice to say that it’s bloody steep. But it’s not as steep as East Hall Hill which is not only steeper, but sustains a steeper gradient for longer.
| Date climbed | 6th April 2013 |
| Elevation gain | 371 feet |
| Length | 0.8 mile |
| Duration | 8 minutes |
Hollingbourne Hill is a long (by Kent standards), ever-steepening slog. It starts just as you pass Hollingbourne Manor on your left. It’s already quite steep as you ride through the village and past The Dirty Habit pub on your right. As you exit the village it gets steeper.
The high banks on either side of the road offer no views to inform you how high you are and there is never any sign of where the top of the hill is. It just keeps climbing remorselessly towards the next bend up ahead. And it keeps getting steeper! After about six and a half minutes you finally see the gradient easing up ahead; the road takes on a convex profile, indicating that it’s becoming less steep. You’re nearly there. The worst bit is over. You can change up a couple of cogs now and ease off the gas as you approach the summit.
Addendum
Two and a half years later, I entered the Hollingbourne Hill Climb event
Cycling in the Jura, this ride starts in Lélex, heads south to cross the Semine valley to Belleydoux and back via Les Moussières.
Cycling in The Vosges, I took on The Super Planche des Belles Filles, a tough climb often featured in the Tour de France
A bike ride in the Jura from Lélex to Les Bouchoux via Mijoux, Lajoux, returning via Belleydoux, Champfromier and Chézery-Forens
Notre Dame de la Paix: I rode the steep climb to revisit the splendid statue of Our Lady of Peace, who looks down over the town of Cornimont
