Touring in UK?
 

Is there a resource akin to Adventure Cycling Association that would be useful for planning a British tour?

Sustrans plans, maps and signposts routes across the country and are a good resource, do you want road or off road routes? There are many rail to trail often incorporated into Sustrans routes and a large canal network you can cycle along although they can be somewhat gnarly in places.

https://www.sustrans.org.uk/

Thanks. I haven't really given it a whole lot of thought. I need to go to Cambridge on short notice, and having lived there in the mid 1990s, I remember it being a bit challenging. I was thinking on-road, but maybe off road would be a better idea. Thanks very much for the link. I will take a look now.

’Ere ya go mate

https://www.cyclinguk.org/ride/touring-and-expedition

It depends what style of riding you want to do really. There is an extensive network of National Cycle Routes, but the terrain varies. It could be quiet roads, old railway paths (either paved or gravel), canal towpath, fields, some single track, etc all along the route. The Sustrans website will give you the lowdown as to the type of terrain you can expect to encounter. Cycling UK has some good information and are releasing new routes every year. I tend to use Komoot for my planning. The cycling UK forum and cyclechat forum are mostly UK based/biased and will be helpful. Where are you looking to start/finish your ride?

already 30 years on and I'm sure you will find the roads much busier. As you know, the population density is pretty high and there are definitely roads that you'd want to avoid.
I have family up in northern Scotland and made it pretty clear that in England, especially the busier more populated areas, there is more of an anti-bicyclist attitude, so using the sustrans route suggestions seems like a good idea, just to avoid unwittingly using a narrow, very busy road that will just be unpleasant at the very least.

getting some opinions from here would be useful also
https://forum.cyclinguk.org/

cheers

Gauvins did a UK tour last year, here is a thread he started on his planning.
https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/1...g-trip-uk.html

I just arrived in Portsmouth 5 days ago. I've never been to the UK before. I was on the continent for 2 months, cycle touring, camping and staying at youth hostels. Here are a few of my thoughts on cycling in England:

• Piloting on the left is a mind f**k after 50 plus years of doing it on the right. Complex intersections will test your faith :lol:. I am making progress, slowly but surely.
• I'm not a great planner, didn't really have to, but did ok on the continent. The EuroVelo cycle paths were signed pretty well for the most part with name and/or number. I got around without much drama with digital maps and apps. England just uses a generic cycle path sign that may or may not be the one you are trying to follow.
• People talk about the traffic in the south of England. I grew up in SoCal, traffic is no big deal. What is a big deal is the narrowness of the roads and the complete lack of shoulders. There will literally be no place to pull over, hedges right to the edge of the road, and you're doing 2 mph up a hill with a line of cars behind you. The drivers have been very good and afforded me plenty of room, but still, it is the craziest riding I have done in my life.
• I have limited experience but the Rhine River and Normandy (highly recommended, by the way) are littered with reasonably priced campgrounds for tent camping. England not so much. For the first time on my trip, in 2 months, I have resorted to wild camping. Fortunately southern England is rife with wonderful places (parks and large stands of trees) that you can duck into and set up camp for the evening.
• Food and libations in Germany and France were competitively priced with equivalent items in the U.S. But the beer, wine cheese and bread are to die for in Germany and France :thumb::thumb: (had to give it 2 thumbs up). England is quite a bit more expensive (and the food is not quite as good), especially alcohol related products.
• Rush hour is very hectic and I would recommend not riding during those hours. Those quaint little lanes fill up quickly with cars in mid-afternoon to early evening.

Like I said I've only been here five days and barely scratched the surface. We'll see how it goes from here.
I am heading up north to Hadrian's Wall and hoping things get better.
I am writing this from the youth hostel (YHA) in Streatley-on-Thames. Nice little place, lots of charm, the people (hosts and guests) are very nice, would recommend.
Look in the YHA in the UK, they are fun, unique places for reasonably priced accommodations. Really a great way to meet other folks that are travelling.
So good luck on your UK adventure.

I recently spent a week biking in SW England (Devon) & SE England (East Sussex & Kent), with a train connecting the 2 areas. I had toured in areas in-between many years ago. Most of the cycling in England on this trip sucked for the reasons you described, as well as the trails which were of inconsistent quality which ranged from good to appalling. I didn't feel that the Sustrans descriptions were always accurate. I spent considerably more time on this trip cycling in France (3 regions: west-central France, northern Brittany, & Picardie). The biking in all of these regions of France was far better than the biking in southern England. The last time I had biked in the UK I was in western Scotland and a bit of Yorkshire. Both were nice and much more enjoyable than any biking I experienced in southern England this year. While I've never had an issue adjusting to biking on the left, the road quality in southern England was much worse than in France, drivers weren't as polite to cyclists as in France, and traffic was heavier than in France. The narrow roads with no shoulder combined with the hedgerows made for some occasionally scary riding. I have to wonder how many head-on collisions happen on those curvy narrow roads with hedgerows. In one area I had to resort to riding on a road with fast-moving traffic because the trail was unridable due to mud. (I had fairly wide tires & fenders, which worked well on the GAP & C&O Canal.)

There were certain places I wanted to see in both SW England & SE England, and I did very much enjoy the towns of Bath and Canterbury, as well as several gardens I wanted to visit--English gardens are fantastic. As for food, yeah England was more expensive than France, though I love South Asian food so I took advantage of the multitude of Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi restaurants for dinner. I wasn't camping and hotels and B&Bs are generally a better value in France, too.

Axo and Help-- I'm glad you both put down some realistic comments for this guy, and others, to be aware of--especially the narrow busy road aspect.

Axo--I've read of similar sustran cowpath offerings that sound like a real pain in the keester.
Your experiences of more north very much mirror my northern Scotland experiences of things being better off, although to be fair there are always narrow roads and some pretty damn busy.

Re being on the other side of the road, I was surprised how well I adapted. Touch wood though at all times for some busy intersections.

Again, pertinent points you both brought up.

​​​​

I was over in England and Scotland in May touring but not on a bicycle. I was struck by how few roads we were on would be good for cycle touring. If i was going to tour in Britain i would do lots of research on paths and safe routes .Having said that we loved England, and Scotland was super ,especially the highlands. Do your homework before heading over with your bike .Lots of roads with no shoulder and rock walls or hedges on the edge of the road.

This may amaze the North Americans amongst us, but you don’t have to ride in the gutter with all the crap on the side of the road in the UK, which is why there’s no shoulder except on some dual carriage ways and motorways (the latter you can’t legally ride on anyway). Just stay a couple of feet off the edge of the road and take primary position in the centre of the lane when you need to, you’ll live. Drivers will just have to wait and overtake you safely when they can.

Also, for route finding, have a look at cycle.travel

I realize that this is a cycling, not a hiking forum, but the walking paths in the UK are absolutely first rate.

have to disagree with your take on it. I ride all the time in cities and I also drive a car regularly.
Taking the lane is something I only do in very specific circumstances, but generally feel that what you are suggesting increases the risk to the cyclist, and also isn't a good diplomatic thing to do or considerate for cars on the road who come upon a much slower moving vehicle like a push bike.

on paper or on the internet, taking the lane is a fine idea, but in my opinion, a cyclist also has to be situationally aware of the specifics of a road situation.
Sure, Ive been on narrow UK roads where I had no choice but to impede car traffic, but there are many times when using my mirror and common sense, I just pull over for 5 seconds and let cars or a truck safely go by when there is lots of oncoming traffic also.

for the vast vast majority of my riding and touring years, this has worked perfectly fine and suggesting that one rides a few feet from the edge of the road is not the best solution.

you too might be flexible in your approach to riding on the road with cars, or you may be inflexible in your views, I can't know.
safe riding

I saw a bunch of these road signs in southern England when I abandoned an unrideable trail:

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...b1b261fbd7.jpg

If you’re riding in the first foot of the road, you’re hitting every drain grating and broken bottle, so good luck with that. Add another foot or two and you’ve got some space to move in case of emergencies. You take the lane to stop dickheads overtaking you dangerously at pinch points. Yes, by all means shuffle over and let traffic by on narrow lanes if that floats your boat, but realistically they’ll be a passing place at some point soon enough for the driving community to use. Compared to North America, it’s a different style of road construction and use, but it’s considerably safer in the UK than there and the statistics back that up.

This advice is based on commuter, audax, utility and touring riding around the UK between 1986 and 2016. I can also advise that it’s considerably better now than earlier, with drivers in the main being more considerate than in the 1980s and 1990s.

TDLR; North Americans, don’t let the different road style put you off cycle touring in the UK.

Reddle, that's the thing with writing on the interwebs and not talking face to face--the thing is I agree with what you say, as I said, I evaluate specific situations and do the same as you--but not all the time, and I have no problem pulling over for a few seconds to be courteous to some backed up cars at times too.

So ya, I suspect we have the same view, typing ain't always super clear and specific situations make me decide what to do anyway.

To emphasize again, I only have riding experience in northern Scotland, and drivers were really quite patient all in all.
But then I didn't ride on the A9 for example, not worth it to me, and I've done long trips in Mexico and Central America, riding into and out of big cities etc so I do have experience like you in all kinds of road situations and don't scare easily.
Cheers

No worries, just don’t want people put off riding in the UK because the roads look different to their experiences in other nations where banishment to the hard shoulder is a thing ;)

I'd say as a North American, the big difference is the "no escape" room thing of some narrow, winding, poor line of sight UK roads--hedges, or hard grass berms, that are unnerving because you know you can't physically bail if a truck lorry comes up behind you quickly at the same time as an incoming truck lorry, and the drivers don't have the space really to do much. Or a car pulling a trailer, a retired gent in a rental rv , that sort of thing that happens once in a while.

Not having a bail out generally gets my spider senses tingling. I had motorbikes back in the day too, and it's always good to listen to your (, hopefully good) instincts of increased danger.

Over here we tend to have more room on roads, shoulders are often good, but it's really really rare to have UK style , absolutely no shoulder no escape room type roads, and when we do, it's for short distances.

Most of the country roads I was on in SE England were too narrow for even one bicycle and one moderately-sized motor vehicle to safely pass one another without one of us stopping and going into the hedgerow. The one stopping was sometimes me, and sometimes it was the driver. It wasn't unusual for both of us to be surprised by the other and we'd have to quickly brake due to the complete lack of sightlines thanks to the extremely narrow road and hedgerows. And lest someone say I should have been on other roads or trails, there were some specific places I wanted to visit, so I often had little choice. I was also warned by a B&B host about the potholes on many of the roads in East Sussex and Kent, and she was absolutely right to warn me. Often when there was a bike path I could ride on, the vegetation (mostly tall grasses & stinging nettle) wasn't trimmed at all, turning the otherwise decent and reasonably wide bike path into a narrow strip with vegetation hitting my legs & panniers. I'd sometimes have to stop to remove grasses from my chain, derailleur, or spokes. I also had to watch out for stinging nettle which is extremely common.. If there happened to be a cyclist coming in the other direction, we both had to stop to safely pass one another. The only consistently good paved bike path I rode on was in Devon from Bristol to Bath, which isn't very far. Parts of unpaved trails in Devon were unrideable when I was there earlier this month. There was sometimes water streaming across the unpaved trail & thick mud in places. It was frankly pretty unpleasant riding, and I was very disappointed after the good memories I had of cycling in Scotland at the same time of year. I was very happy when I disembarked the ferry upon my return to France.

You weren't in Devon riding from Bristol to Bath- the city of Bristol is in the county of Bristol, Bath is part of the county of Bath and Northeast Somerset (BANES), and if you were on the Bristol to Bath Railway Path, you also travelled through the county of South Gloucester. These counties are nowhere near Devon (you have Somerset and North Somerset, and potentially Dorset in the way depending on your route to Devon).
I grew up in the US, both riding and driving in the UK is but very different to the US. If you're on a narrow lane, it is advised you to take primary position to discourage unsafe overtakes, but also gives you somewhere to go in case someone is a bellend.
The surface on our NCN routes do vary- they can be great or it can be a bit of overgrown singletrack or bridleway. It is what it is. The best thing to do is ask on local UK based forums about your route and things to be mindful of. You can look at places to avoid or to get advice on routes in general. Or times to avoid certain areas. It rains a lot in the winter in the south. I would avoid anything that potentially goes off road, through the woods, etc in early spring as it is likely to be flooded or thick mud.

Thanks for the geography correction, rivers.

I began riding in Plymouth and intended to ride the entire Coast-to-Coast trail in Devon, about 99 miles long. I was there earlier this month, June, so I wouldn't call it early spring. The trail started out OK, but as I biked northward and gained altitude, it deteriorated. The trail became unrideable south of Okehampton. It was not raining, but I presume it had rained in previous days. Water was streaming across the trail in places and sometimes there was thick mud. The trail eventually disappeared in a meadow filled with sheep, Finally, some portions became a virtual swamp. I had to put my waterproof shoes in a bathtub that evening to get most of the mud out, and I put on soaking wet shoes the next morning.

https://www.sustrans.org.uk/find-a-r...coast-to-coast

The main problem on the narrow roads wasn't people overtaking me dangerously. Rather, the problem was the inability to see oncoming vehicles until the last moment. And since the roads were so narrow, I wasn't about to ride in the middle of the road. I felt I had a better chance of avoiding death if I could quickly go into the hedgerow, if necessary. Potholes presented a different issue.

When I got off the unrideable trail and was on a fairly major road for a stretch, fast-moving vehicles were overtaking me dangerously. And of course, there was no shoulder whatsoever. In France, there are now signs along the road showing drivers to leave at least 1.5 meters (nearly 5 ft) between the side of their vehicle and a cyclist they're overtaking. Nearly all drivers in France were leaving at least that much space when they passed me. And since the road network in France was much better than in southern England, combined with a lower population density, it was easy to avoid busy roads.

With 67 million people in 81,000 square miles and a 150 year history of cycletouring, I think surely anywhere one would want to ride in the UK has been done before and it's been documented in some fashion. Off the top of my head, there's the Sustrans National Cycle Routes

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...d2dc60954a.png

and the National Byway

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...5ea2910bee.png

There are innumerable coast-to-coast routes

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...df76f996d3.jpg

and water-to-water routes like the Devon Coast-to-Coast (which curiously actually does cross Devon) and the Lôn Las Cyrmu across Wales

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...d0c9265e3e.png

and the Scottish C2C, a north-south route from Annan to Edinburgh.

For a walk on the wild side, there's the Hebridean Way.

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...3b541fd4d3.png


There are numerous documented & mapped routes from Lands End to John o'Groats (LEJoG). The Cicerone is pretty good.

There are guidebooks, published travelogs and even YouTube videos of these rides. Cycle UK offers local cycling guides:

https://www.cyclinguk.org/routes/cou...cycling-guides

Didn't bring your own bike? You can get a bike out of a vending machine in the UK!

I've been in country for 8 days now. I am using Komoot to route. On the continent I just plugged in the destination and it always found a decent route. In England I did the same and it consistently sent me to the closest high speed "A" road, which I didn't know or notice. Now I plan (when I can) the next day's journey like Eisenhower planned D-Day. I go over every stretch and add waypoints galore to avoid the main roads. The last couple of days I have been following the Sustrans cycle route 5. I have managed to stay off the main roads and it has been much less stressful and way more enjoyable. Of course I'm wandering all over the countryside instead of a straight shot to wherever, but that's ok since, for me, it is the journey, and not so much the destination. Having said that there are places I won't be going to since there does not seem to be alternative (little roads) ways of getting there. But, it is what it is, and you just have to adapt to the local conditions as best you can.

PS Concerning taking over a lane, I get it: I observed that the local riders do that. But at least they are going 15-20 mph. On a hill with my panniers and Bike Friday I'm doing 2 mph. So my current strategy is to just try to stay off those roads as much as humanly possible. As I said before the drivers, for the most part, have been very courteous in their dealings with me.

Using Youth Hostels in the UK
 

I just want to mention that part of a healthy British cycle tour might include looking into the Youth Hostel Association (YHA) of UK/Wales. I booked 3 nights at the YH at Stratford-upon-Avon, with full breakfast, for 80 GBP. If you know anything about the UK cost of living, that is a pretty good deal. I was at the Streatley-on-Thames YH last week and paid 40 GBP for a night, still not a bad deal. All the hostels I've been to also had secure bike parking.

It is a unique experience if you have never been to one. It is a little egalitarian though if you are used to being pampered. I have not seen any other cycle tourists in the UK so far but I have met tons in Germany, Belgium and France at the youth hostels. There are no age restrictions and it can be a great way to meet and chat with other like minded folks.

And now something to whet the travel appetite:
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...5806d9a78a.jpg
Couldn't tell if this English manor was abandoned or not.
My Bike Friday Diamond Llama (fat boi edition) with Carradice Super C panniers, on the road for 9 weeks so far.