Usual easy-paced ride, this one mostly quiet roads with a few path sections through parks.  Some gentle hills, nothing extreme.

Inspiration comes from the last Waterlink way ride that made me curious about another tributary of the Ravensbourne, the one with the easy-to-remember-name, the Quaggy River.  The Quaggy meets the Ravensbourne down by Lewisham station where all the new development is taking place.  Here we get a first view of Quaggy river where some quality landscaping (not yet finished) is going in at the confluence with the Ravensbourne.

The ride will follow the Quaggy, mostly hidden behind buildings in a sad concrete culvert.  At Manor Park the river emerges, but is still hidden away to start with, although at the south end of the park you can get close on natural banks. Then on to Manor House Gardens where the Quaggy is kept in a channel, behind railings.  What a contrast to the Ravensbourne in Brookmill Park which we will have seen earlier in the ride.  Lots of information about the Quaggy on the web site of QWAG (Quaggy Waterways Action Group, https://qwag.org.uk/river-quaggy/) an active organization whose “goal is to demonstrate, using the Quaggy, that rivers can be major assets to an urban environment – bringing natural beauty, educational facilities and wildlife value into urban landscapes and urban lives.”

Route is at https://goo.gl/svHy65 or download GPX file from Healthy Riders site.  Outward leg goes via Brookmill Park, return leg goes past the Lewisham Leisure Centre, Brockley Station and Nunhead.  16.5km, just over 10 miles.