I went out today to try and put some more tracks together into a bigger loop at Dalswinton. I ended up going down some dead ends, which was fine, but I now have a figure of 8 loop which I am still going to try and extend further once I work out how things connect in my local woods.

There are some wonderful descents, very grassy on over grown fireroads.

Lovely

28th February by simon ralli, on Flickr

IMG_3533 by simon ralli, on Flickr

IMG_3513 by simon ralli, on Flickr

IMG_3536 by simon ralli, on Flickr

We have a few chunks of forrestry like that around my local area and they are so isolated that footfall is tiny – I love it. Most of it in my locale is a bit more mainstream – but sometimes I get as much pleasure from exploring as I do from the riding.

Sure it can be frustrating discovering dead ends, and enevitably ducking though promising looking alternative routes – only to pop out fifty meters from the origin after a half hour slog – classic!

Is that on the edge of the Forest of AE? If it is, looking at it on the OS maps it looks like you have MILES of good hunting around there. You are a lucky chap.

I do wish that Google Maps allowed me to overlay the contours (“terrain”) over the satellite layer (as well as integrate with the the other map layers better), I also wish we could now share a OS map so we could discuss the geography in more depth. Alas.

I did not comment earlier – for fear of killing/hijacking the thread – I’m not sure I am compatible with expected standards of forum ettiquette here – but I would advise (everyone being a critic, myself, typically not a reasonable one) that you need to give people more of an “in” if you want to get people pitching in with comments – some rambly off-topic trolling a bit (as I have just) may get the ball rolling…

Anyhow, thank you for your contribution – I enjoyed it. 🙂

Hi MrGroll – cheers for your comments – I missed this thinking that no one was interested in these pics.

The forest is a small one called Dalswinton woods, and it is the other side of a moor to Ae Forest. If you keep on riding, you end up at some windmills, and then you can go down the other side into Ae Forest and you end up at Ae Village.

26th February by simon ralli, on Flickr