I’m taking a couple of very infrequent biking friends away for a three day bike tour, staying in hotels or b&b’s in August in the UK but I don’t yet have a route. More than a minor technical difficulty.
A flat version of the South Downs Way would be ideal. Any ideas, dear forum members?
100 to 150 miles. Nice scenery. Pubs. Chippy’s. Parks?
This might be the wrong message board, I accept but I thank you for indulging me.

How infrequent?

I did the Way of the Roses coast to coast over 3 days last year with colleagues from work, one of whom only ever commutes 5 miles each way to work and had to be encouraged to do a couple of “big rides” (25 miles) in preparation.

Everybody completed it without any issues and with the exception of a couple of climbs around Settle and Pateley Bridge it is generally pretty flat. It’s also a bit more of an objective to ride from one side of the country to the other rather than round in circles.

The scenery is superb and the vast majority of the route is on very quiet roads with plenty of convenient stopping points. We passed all sorts of ages shapes and sizes along the route and everyone we met doing the same ride was really enjoying it.

Don’t think you’ll get much flatter than The Fakenham to Harwich Cycle Route. Also the taff trail is nice. Decent scenery, flat and off road. Only 55 miles but you can extend it onto the Lôn Las Cymru Trail but that does start to get hillier. Or you could do the two southern bits of the Lôn Las Cymru Trail. Basically cycle from Chepstow to Cardiff via Hay on Wye and Brecon. Would be fairly easy logistics too.

Err I don’t think the way of the roses would be ok if they want flat!

My wife and I did our first tour a couple of years ago and did the Kennet and Avon Canal route that Sustrans have made. Start in Bristol, easy to get to, there are longish flat parts but it does go off the canal a fair bit in the middle where there isn’t a towpath and along country lanes. Loads and loads of pubs and tea rooms, amazing scenery. Finish in Reading so easy to travel home.

We stayed the first night in a B and B near the Caen Hill locks and watched the sun go down while sitting near them. I can recommend the B and B but I can’t recommend the place we stayed on the 2nd night.

We did 40 ish mile days and absolutely loved it. Not so easy that you would find it done in a morning but if you take it easy and stop loads to have a beer or sit and admire the views it’s a perfect length.

Hop on the tunnel. Doesn’t get much better than my 3 days doing this:

Calais to Bruges

we’re looking at taking the ferry over to the isle of Wight, before pootling around for a couple of days.

Norfolk Coast Cycleway would be suitable I would think.

EDIT – a first glance, this looks quite useful….

http://www.deepdalefarm.co.uk/itineraries/norfolkcoastcycleway.pdf

Some great suggestions. Thank you. One of the party accompanied me on the Preston Guild Wheel route a few weeks ago as a trial run. She enjoyed it very much but was “A trifle hot under the collar” so nothing to strenuous would be ideal. She’s also prone to impromptu wine picnics so somewhere close to civilisation is of paramount importance.

I’ve done most of the Norfolk Coast route above. Fine if you’re holidaying in the area and want a pootle about, but I wouldn’t travel to the area for it. Most of it is a long way from and has no view of the coast, and a fair bit of it is on quite busy roads.

Way of the roses is superb, but quite hilly all the way from the west coast to Fountains Abbey, mostly flat east of that.

I was going to suggest Hadrian’s due to the high percentage off road, starting at Bowness, but maybe the hills would be a bit much.

…somewhere close to civilisation is of paramount importance…

That’s the isle of Wight off the list then…

Sustrans have just published their Round the Bay route around Morecambe Bay, which is 82 miles of almost complete flatness. We plan to do it soon and extend it to 100 miles, in a day. You could do it and take the train back.