L2P - Day 1 Blackheath - Dover - Calais

Alarm call at 5.30am, load up on carbohydrate at breakfast and then a briefing at 6.30 - 6.45 before Le Grand Depart from Blackheath at 7am. The route went straight down Shooters Hill towards Dartford, and then on towards Maidstone.
Climbed Hollingbourne Hill just prior to lunch, which almost wrote us all off it seems to go on and on forever - i felt good though and reached the top and the lunch stop (at 10.30!) first.
Lunch was an amazing selection of cake, salad, rice, pasta and other energy fuel, we then set off again in the afternoon and again i reached the afternoon water stop first. So the last leg to Dover, by this time the determination was to be the first "over the line". The welcome to Dover sign and the sight of the sea were real sights to behold, and of the group of three of us that were together i crossed into the ferry terminal first. - What a feeling!
After some mundane admin of checking in etc we boarded the boat, crossed to Calais and after briefly losing my pedal, finally arrived at the Kyriad Plage Hotel for the night.