daven1986

hi all,

i keep seeing these nice long rides people do in the US, and was wondering do we have anything similar in or around london?

thanks

daven

markhr

There are many, e.g., surrey hills, circuits around richmond park, epping forest, etc. It might help if you joined either a weekly organised ride or a London/home counties cycling club. Condor Cycles and, possibly, Brixton Cycles will be able to help.

https://www.condorcycles.com/store.html
https://www.brixtoncycles.co.uk/find_us.html

If you're a racing snake and want to race then the BCF has a "find a club" search function.

https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/web...chome/home.asp

Apart from the racing snakes on the club runs there're also CTC and LCC organised social rides most weekends.

https://www.ctc.org.uk/
https://www.lcc.org.uk/

daven1986

cool thanks. not looking for races really, just nice areas to cruise around in!

bottlemasher

Hi daven
Why not jump on a train with your steed and come up to
Norwich for the weekend and ride with us

tleaf100

how about trying the canal towpaths,they can get a bit crowded in good weather (!!!) and fishermen can be a pain,but the paths are usualy pretty good and you always know which way your going,also you can cheat and ride UP the canal path on way out knowing its all DOWN hill on way back in !!! very handy if not wanting to work too hard,a lot of towpath routes also link with or are close to old ex railway tracks that have been cycle pathed,towpaths also take you through some of the greenest countryside we have left and there are 2000 + miles to explore,even in inner london there are some very nice towpath rides,though not quite as pretty as out here at watford,but metropolitian line tube takes bikes outside rush hour as do most trains.
give the towpaths a try,i'd be surprised if you did'nt enjoy !!

coasting 

how does north of london and south of london compare?

Matt Gaunt

Richmond Park closes at 8pm (pedestrian gates at Roehampton Gate at least) every night and from what I remember does so all through the winter. Watch out after that though as the deer cull is on at the moment!

All good suggestions above but RP for me is just what I need. It's easy to do an extra loop or two or drop one depending on how you're feeling, plus you're always a fixed-ish distance from home. Nobody likes changing a tube in the cold/dark/wet/all of the above.

jefmcg

Has it changed? It used to be that the pedestrian gates were open all night, except in November and February when they are doing the cull, when they closed at 7.30 or 8.

I once got locked in, it's not a big problem, you just go to one of the main gates and use the phone to call to be let out. It was a stupid wait in the cold though.