Hundreds of bikers are set to descend on North Kent in preparation for a protest ride tomorrow - with many due to meet at Gravesend.

Nell's Cafe off the A2 at Marling Cross is a popular meeting place with bikers and is set to welcome hundreds before they embark on the Rolling Thunder rally in support of Soldier F, a former British soldier charged with murder over Bloody Sunday.

As many as 7,000 bikers are expected to make their way into London tomorrow to lend support to the unidentified soldier, who is being prosecuted for the murders of James Wray and William McKinney - both killed in Londonderry in 1972.

The riders are expected to gather in the morning at number of meeting points, including service stations around the M25, before setting off for Westminster.

The bikers are also riding in support of Dennis Hutchings, a 77-year-old ex-soldier who will be tried for attempted murder for a fatal shooting in Northern Ireland in 1974.

Last month the Public Prosecution Service said there was sufficient evidence to prosecute Soldier F over the murders, which came to be known as Bloody Sunday, when paratroopers opened fire at civil rights demonstrators, killing 13 people and wounding 15.

But veterans say many former soldiers are elderly and in poor health, and have described the prosecution as a travesty.