People living in Bromley need their Community Counselling Service because the charity provides long-term (and low-cost) counselling that can be life-changing or even life-saving. Support for individuals through periods of extreme stress and mental illness may mean that families are kept together, employment maintained or re-started and harmful behaviours avoided.

I have been helping them raise funds for two years and I thought it was time I did - perhaps - one last long distance bike ride to draw attention to the charity's need to raise £54,000 each year. BCCS is a good news story because it not only provides much-valued counselling - filling a gap which NHS services do not cover - but also accesses around £250,000 worth of counsellor volunteer time as they provide profession supervision. This enables counsellors to gain more experience and counts towards their qualifications.

So I'm riding around 300 miles on National Cycle Network routes 21, 2 and 1 between Bromley, Eastbourne, Dover, Rochester and back to Bromley. The trusty old bike is coming out of retirement. Because of work and family commitments I'm doing this in two instalments - 5th and 6th plus 12th and 13th of September.

Please make a gift for 'BCCS' if you can. They are a really good cause....I wouldn't be putting myself through another ride if I didn't believe that!