With all the hoo hah about the Kielder 100 and the South Downs Way, it occurred to me that there are obviously a bunch of people out there who are capable of doing long rides, and that it would be nice if there were some good long routes in other areas of the country, sort of like a 'benchmark' route for various areas where there is lots of riding. I think these could be a whole lot harder than the South Downs Way too, which whilst it is hillyish, is mainly pretty easy riding.
Thinking more, it'd be nice if there were 50 mile and 100 mile routes, a long challenging route for fit people and a shorter route that pretty much anyone could do given a whole day to ride it in.
The neat thing about long rides is that they kind of force you to not just include the honeypot obvious trails, and you can include some good trails that are a bit further out from the obvious stuff.
As an example, in the White Peak - a pretty decent 50 miler across the centre of the White Peak, taking in a bunch of stuff, starting from Matlock (or Darley Dale, Bakewell, Baslow, Monsal Head, Rowsley for those coming into the Peak from North or West):
http://www.bikehike.co.uk/mapview.php?lnk=http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~jqm/Long_Matlock.gpx
One day, probably once the kid is somewhat older and lower maintenance, I will manage to take a whole long day out and do this one - 100 miles into the White Peak from nearish to my house, taking in most of the really good legal* riding in the White Peak. I've ridden all of it, just not in one day (yet!)
http://www.bikehike.co.uk/mapview.php?lnk=http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~jqm/White_Peak_Long.gpx
I can imagine that locals in other areas would be able to make up some pretty great 100 and 50 mile routes - there must be a good one across the Dark Peak, tons of possible ones in the Cairngorms and the rest of Scotland, Dartmoor, Quantocks etc. I can think up some pretty nice ones in the Surrey Hills / North Downs, although I'm very out of touch with the trails down there, so I'm sure someone local could do better.
50 mile routes would be great for when you were going to a new area too - to be able to get a sensible day route that was designed to be a long route, rather than having to piece together the pretty short routes in the guidebooks to make a whole days riding.
Anyone else have any ideas for long routes in your area?
Joe
