Best TOWNS to live in as a MTBer?

Who wants to live in a city anyway? Not me for one.

I’ll get the ball rolling with Kendal, where I would like to move, for its balance of price/connections/proximity to hills.

But if I have to stay down south for work reasons I will probably look at whether I can afford to move to Dorking.

Start another thread if you want to talk about VILLAGES please. 😉

Your suggestions…

Rothbury.

Keswick

Or Peebles

I live in Dorking, it’s excellent, certainly best place in the south east IMO. Miles of XC & singletrack to ride from the doorstep. Excellent connections: an hour from London, 25 mins to Gatwick, an hour from Brighton, 100 minutes to Dover. A nice sized town (big enough to have everything one needs, but still human scaled). Geography (stuck in a valley) dictates it can’t grow.

There’s a reason it’s expensive.

Who wants to live in a city anyway? Not me for one.

Not me. I spent 3 months in Nice, which is a ‘great’ city. But it’s a prison, damn hard to get out of.

Aviemore

Peebles

Forest Of Dean

Keswick

Would love to live in kewick, for mtb but not for the weather!

Somewhere in Wales would be good aswell

Is Whistler a town or a village..

Is Whistler a town or a village..

Haha, if we’re going international I would have put Aosta in the cities list!

good old Bolton.

I come from Rothbury and I would not say Rothbury. Though some of the cheeky stuff is ace. Some wifey walking her dogs did shout at me on Sunday saying “What are you doing you idiot you will break your neck?” So it must have been good.

Conwy – best natural mountainbiking in north Wales on your doorstep, plus easy access to Marin Trail and Penmachno. Direct access onto the beach for all you fat tyred enthusiasts! And it’s in the ‘rain shadow’ of the mountains which means that it’s drier than the rest of Snowdonia. Great post-ride pub overlooking the sea, and a fab chippy.

Plus, I live here, so what more could you want 🙂

Hope is up there, enough shops, a superb bike shop, and 20 mins to Sheffield/40 mins to Manchester. Same with Marple, just the other way around for connections.

Cotswolds is good towns are small and FOD is close by.Only 3.5 miles from doorstep to hills.Better places and alot worse.Hate to live in city myself.

Aberystwyth or porthmadog would be my choices in wales i think.

Spent a lot of holiday time in the latter and always gobsmacked by the views.

For cycling, Milton Keynes.

Traffic free cycleways everywhere in the town so you can get anywhere you want safely.

Tons of singletrack on your doorstep at Woburn.

Toppest bikeshop at Phil Corley’s.

Great racing and roadie scene too.

You did say best for cycling, not architectural beauty, didn’t you…

Rossendale, its ace

I’d say buxton would be pretty good, Macc ain’t shabby either

Otley.

8)

Mansfield/Ravenshead/Nottingham.

10 minutes from sherwood pines.
30 minutes from the peaks.
1hr from Cannock.
1hr 30 minutes from north Wales
1hr 30 minutes from Dalby/ yorkshire

So it’s not bad.

Another vote for Milton Keynes here.

I would say Brecon on first impessions but in reality it is the Royston Vaysey of Wales!

Plymouth – awesome street riding, loads of local trails and some of the best biking buddies have been made there.

North Berwick, for beachriding 😉

If you could afford it 😯

When I moved here 8/9 years ago I thought it’d be a temporary thing and we’d move again to somewhere ‘nicer’.

But… still here and love it. Surprisingly nice town with plenty going on but the riding especially makes it for me. Literally miles of relatively unknown trails from my door in all directions. 30 minutes ride along the canal to Hebden Bridge and all the riding that offers. 30/40 minutes drive to Gisburn, Stainburn, Lee Quarry or Langsett for Cut Cate. Sub 2 hours on fast roads to the heart of the Dales, the North Yorkshire Moors, North Wales and the Lakes.

Where is this mountain biking oasis?

Halifax.

Dingwall.

Penicuik.

Taff – Member

Plymouth – awesome street riding, loads of local trails and some of the best biking buddies have been made there.

Oi, we iz a city now, innit!

Despite living in Plymski, I would say Tavistock (which is a town!) is actually better riding-wise. Closer to better DH stuff, no further away from most xc stuff and of course features those AWESUM dirt jumps next to the roundabout. Rains a bit though!

Otley…

Again.

near me, 1/2 mile roll straight into the hills, 1 mile to train to Brum, 1.5 miles to M5/M42 and connections to FoD/Wales/Scotland

Sheffield.. or even Doncaster as there are LOADS of old industrial wasteland sites.. old pit sites.. quarry’s dotted about.

Ross-on-Wye or Monmouth – you have the awesomeness of the FoD on your doorstep. 🙂

Dorchester – mate lives there – loads of lovely rides and the sea is close.
Buxton – right on the edge of the peaks.
Hope? – Sambob – it’s a village, and a small one at that, I work there!!!

Can’t believe nobody has said Manchester. You can live on the outskirts and still be able to get the tram in for nights out, then you’ve got North Wales, the Lakes, the Peak, the Pennines and the Yorkshire Dales within easy reach.

Aviemore or Rothiemurchus

Hope? – Sambob – it’s a village, and a small one at that, I work there!!!

And with all due respect, Marple isn’t a town either, it’s a small suburb of Manchester trying hard to be a village… though it does well for suburban riding. Better than Hampstead anyway.

The whole ‘best’ thing is part of the modern media ‘nugget’ disease – ‘ten best chainring bolts’, ‘ten best slums’, ‘ten best side-bars’ etc ad nauseum.

Oh, and Manchester isn’t a ‘town’ either. It’s a city… Fwiw, for me, its somewhere with ace mtb trails and cracking hilly roads on the doorstep. Could be anywhere. Access to coffee and cake’s nice too.

Kendal +1

Can’t believe nobody has said Manchester.

probably because the subject quite clearly states TOWNS 😉