Fancy a multi-day offroad adventure but needs to be fairly local due to work and family committments.

I’m thinking of an alternative to or variation on the Sustrans C2C route but taking in a bit more singletrack. Or possibly a diagonal N to S route linking both Exmoor and Dartmoor.

Anyone managed to string together a similar trip and fancy sharing some pointers?

The Rough Ride Guide book of sw routes has a couple of different c2c routes in it iirc. One closer to the Sustrans route, one pretty much all off-road st. Worth having a look.

http://m.evanscycles.com/products/book/-rough-ride-guide-south-west-mountain-biking-ec008592

Great – thanks for that. Will check it out.

Done the Plym trail before from Plymouth to Minehead and then over the Quantocks to get the train home. Bit of road in the middle mind you.

That sounds like a bit of an epic? How long did it take?

Really don’t mind a bit of quiet road if it’s linking up some decent offroad sections

drakes trail is now open that links plym valley up through to tavistock.

How about do Plymouth to Exeter on day 1 meaning you get to ride some of Dartmoor’s best trails followed by a blast down St Andrews lane off Haldon hill to finish(roughly 100km dependent on route).

Then catch the train up to Barnstaple and ride from there Taunton across Exmoor and the Quantocks on day 2/3.

This would get you a lot of singletrack without the road joining sections in-between the moors. If you wanted to bivvy just ride up on to Exmoor a bit from Barnstaple or otherwise stay in a B&B.

@burchy, did you lot ever do that plymouth to exeter ride?
if you did (as i missed it) then any chance of a route?

Hi Carl,
yeah – we did it.
Up the cycle path from Afjannerstan to Burrator, Sheep’s Tor Village, past the Scout Hut to Nun’s Cross, Princetown, road across to Bellever ( Powder Mills then picked up BW at the CP in the dip there ), Bellever Tor and the rock garden off. into the village, Pizwell Farm, across in to the woods ( Challacombe? can’t remember properly ) to the top of the hill. Wibbly Wobbly Trail of Almost Certain Death to the Warren House, Birch Tor, Hameldown, Jay’s Grave, Bowerman’s, Hobbit Trail, Plague ( i think? ), Railway Track to Bovey, Back lane and nameless trail to Chudleigh Knighton, road to chudleigh, and then to harcombe, through the woods to the Traveller’s Camp, Teapot, St. Andrew’s. back to mine for Curry and medals. 😀
one of my best days on a bike to date.

yer tis

Hello,
Me Bro in law and I did our take on this at Easter. We wanted a bit more offroad than the sustrans route and we wanted to bivvy. So we followed the Two Moors way. Kind of. We started at Forland Point on the North and headed south following the Two moors way. Rather a lot of it was rideable!

We left Foreland point at midday on the Friday and bivvied in some woods on the southern edge of Exmoor that night. Saturday was a big day of riding and took is across the nondescript bit between Exmoor and Dartmoor up through Chagford for dinner at the Warren House inn. We Bivvied saturday night in some of the old mine gulleys behind the pub. Was a good spot for the night. I must admit a large part of the Two moors way in the hinterland between the two moors proper looked unrideable and time consuming.We felt like it would take forever, so we cheated slightly and took a road route from Witheridge to Drewsteignton/Castle Drogo.

Sunday’s aim was to ride some of the Dartmoor routes we know that were just about enroute and get to Prawle point for dinner at 6pm with the family. So our Sunday route was Warren house inn over to Grimspound. Up onto Hameldown and descend towards Ponsworthy. Climb up to the top of Dr Blackalls Drive and decend to Newbridge, then followed the Two moors way proper all the way through Holne (for Lunch), Scorriton, up to Pupers hill and all the way across country to the train track near Redlake. Sped down train track to behind Ivybridge then took the roads through Loddiswell, Kingsbridge and finally on to Prawle point.

We were proper knackered but look forward to doing it again! If I knew Exmoor better maybe we could have fitted in better riding there, but all in all the riding was pretty good despite carrying bivvying gear.

Some great tips there. Thanks a million guys. I live in Moreton so know the Dartmoor bits pretty well but wasn’t sure how best to string them together. That’s given me some food for thought. Cheers.

Carl – what he said, its a top day out indeed!

yes looks good, I dunno how i mssed that going on? i remember a thread with you guys musing it over but missed the date ! sounds like a good un…may well be tempted to do that on my next dry day off..

Check out the Westcountry Way at mtbruk.co.uk I did the Plymouth to Minehead bit in a day (20 hours) many years ago. The author used to do routes for MTB Pro if you’re old enough to remember it 🙂