Probably better to be asked on a fb group but the admin get a bit twitchy of late when you mention cheeky riding, so a bit more freedom here. 🙂

Up above the Ladybower inn there’s a summit called BACK TOR which handily has a road up from the inn and then a bw going to it, the path seems to come in just below the actual summit of Back Tor.
Looks like a nice long descent could be had by traversing from where the BW ends to Dovestone Tor and then onto Whinstone Lee Tor and then down to Cutthroat and back down to the Inn. Can anyone confirm whether this will be any good?
From the aerial pics it looks ace, rocks and stuff and by my reckoning just over 4 miles of descent? I’ve mapped it out Here

Additonally, it looks like you could also traverse north from Back Tor along Cartledge Stones Ridge to another summit (Flint Hill) and then meets a bridleway called Dukes Road and then meets the road at Smallfield/Agden Bridge.
This loop looks like it would also be a complete descent (or very nearly) from Back Tor to the road at Smallfield.
Can anyone confirm wether this is the case and if it’s worth riding?
Looks like you could have a nice figure of 8 starting and ending at the Inn by riding up to Strines twice on the road.

I would be riding mid week and I am very polite and friendly to any walkers I meet. I think the byeway laws are ridiculous in this country and a lot more could be done to open up the land for MTBers. I’d love to suggest a mass cycle tresspass in the same way some other people did on Kinder years ago on foot, not that it matters anyway as people cycle where they like regardless. Anyway, answers to two above questions on routes would be welcomed.

I’ve done this loop both ways….I wouldn’t recommend doing it on a weekend as the footpath sections are a popular route with ramblers and Park rangers….. Its a good route to do with the lights on 😉.. but Mortimer road is a slog on a MTB.

JFDI

Do it and report back!

FWIW Whitestone Lee Tor > Cutthroat > Ladybower Inn is a lot of fun. Not steep but you can really build up speed and start jumping the bumps and lumps – a good way to end a ride.

JFDI? just flipping do it? least that’s what I think you meant. 😉

Ladybower is an hour and halfs driving for me so I’d rather not get up to the top to find a heather laden off on walk ride off on fest when I could just do the Ladybower loop, which I’ve many times before and have a great time.

FWIW Whitestone Lee Tor > Cutthroat > Ladybower Inn is a lot of fun

YES, it’s mint int it. Love the descent, so many lines to choose from and little rocks and bumps to launch off.

Theres a better descent from whinstone Tor to the pub if you have a look around 🤔.

Foulstone road from behind the Strines Inn up to Bradfield Gate Head had a make over a year or 2 back and is now hardpack/rocks all the way up.

The path from there running along the edge all the way to WLT is a mix of stone slabs and hardpack/big drainage ditches (think like the remodelled lower bit of the WLT -> Cuthroat Bridge B-way).

What you choose to do with that info is up to you… (although my recommendation is that the sunrises and sunsets up there can be beautiful)

Dukes Rd Derwent Edge is what I would do if I was riding Cut Gate, makes it into an excellent loop, although better in the summer.
Dukes Rd is a stony sort of track for most of the bw, but does hit a boggy stretch that I imagine could be a bit swampy at the moment – it’s then a stone causeway up to Back Tor. Also open moorland with not a single tree for miles, so would be miserable in bad weather. We’re not talking big distances, though.

Riding Foulstone – Back Tor – Smallfield would be pretty average riding, I don’t recommend that. All the fun is to be had the other way along the edge and down to Cutthroat bridge.

A ride I used to love when I lived on the west side of Sheffield was going from Strines up the Foulstone Road to Back Tor, then turning right along the edge. Then turn left, descending a rutted single-track to Green Stitches. That’s not much of anything but the descent that goes between the E and R of Derwent on the 1:50,000 map to the reservoir is amazing, a real challenge. Then back down the side of the reservoir, take the flagstone path up towards Whinstone Lee Tor but go straight up the footpath climb instead of following the bridleway so you descent south west along Derwent Edge to Whinstone Lee Tor. Then down the cheeky trail I know as Telegraph Trail (also known as Les Arcs or New Pants Please) then back to Strines on the road.

An amazing ride with not one bridleway descent. It’s a very early on a weekend morning type ride.

Thanks lads.

Please don’t ride this at the moment.

Not because it’s a footpath but the fact it will be a swamp.

Perfect riding 6-7months of the year but avoid in the winter or after prolonged rainfall

Bloody admins asking MTB community to help out with making stuff better for everyone eh? Selfish bastards.

Oh, and the same admins of that group built the ace trail down to Cutthroat Bridge btw. The other one is now fecked.

Pooky I love the work that the group do, I genuinely think it’s fantastic and I wish I could be involved more if it were not for my young children. My issue is that as soon as anyone mentions cheeky riding it’s shut down by the admin. We can’t have a proper debate in a room full of silence.
What do you think is going to happen if we discuss cheeky riding? it’s only a facebook group.

Landowners read it an accuse us of being irresponsible quite frankly, then don’t engage in dialogue with us, or when they do, they use it as evidence against improved access. We’ve had strava used against us on that very descent at the LAF.

FWIW, I think it’s bloody ridiculous that some of the stuff up there’s FP only. But Les Arcs is shagged.

FWIW, I think it’s bloody ridiculous that some of the stuff up there’s FP only. But Les Arcs is shagged.

Well, this is the daftness of access laws which bear no relation to the suitability for use of a particular track. So you can have a stone-slabbed or bedrock, non-erodable track that’s technically a footpath and not legal for bike use or a bridleway that runs over delicate, boggy peat that’s it’s totally okay to ride in a legal sense despite it being a boggy rut-fest for half the year.

On the plus side, they do limit traffic on some trails that would otherwise last five minutes. I’ve been riding long enough in the Peak to remember when the Shooting Cabin was a narrow ribbon of sparkling quartzite sand rather than the sprawling, water-washed rubble fest it is now.

yep. But we’re working on it.

Anyway, as I’ve said elsewhere…

Alpine has been a source of friction for ages. A really bloody visible example of erosion (from users AND water), over recent years it’s got noticeably wider, straighter and flatter. Now as bikers, whether you’re floating over the path at a level 10cm leaving all of a Tinkerbell’s fart of evidence you’ve been there or steam rollering through with 10 inches of travel front and back cursing Greta Tunberg all the way down, the impression to everyone else is “bikes have done this”.

This was certainly the accusation thrown at us in the local access forum a few years back, helpfully backed up with Strava evidence. PDMTB are the mountain bike voice on the Peak District local access forum. We lobby for and defend you all.

One silver lining from it – standing up in the LAF gave the landowner someone to talk to which they didn’t have before.

Yep, boring council meetings. That we give up our time to go to. the kind that get access and money and support. And put us, the MTB community, in front of people like landowners.

We were talking to the landowner, they asked us politely to avoid riding Alpine.

So then we’re into the world of policing trails OR as was the case here, working with the landowner. The PDMTB line on Whinstone Lee Tor to Cutthroat Bridge is evidence of what we can do working with the landowner.

Back to Alpine.

With a working relationship, the challenge then is to prove we can do what we say we can do. Check out the advocacy files for evidence of this. A change in landowner has created another challenge but we’ll stay on course.

There was a request to get bike track to fix alpine.

Now, getting professional contractors on to fix a path which isn’t even an official right of way, much less a bike one – especially when it’s contentious – is never going to happen unless we can prove to that landowner that mountain bikers are good tenants. Thankfully, in the main we are. Again, check out advocacy files.

So what then? Well help the advocacy groups like Peak District MTB. We’re not asking people to lay off stuff cos we’re dicks, we’re asking with a bigger target in mind and we **** need your help. We’ve proved we can make stuff better. And yeah, if we get permissives in place where they weren’t before we could make THEM better too. But first things first. Make friends. Influence people. Be good tenants. Enjoy the ride.

We wouldn’t even need money for that.

The Advocacy Files – a celebration of effort

Pook, subtle wooden fencing to force people on to the original line on Alpine and not cut corners would improve the situation and give the scar a chance to heal before it is really too late. If you know the owner any chance of doing this. I Would be happy to help.

Landowners read it an accuse us of being irresponsible

Particularly if it is ratted out by the couple of horsey infiltrators that PDMTB has on its books.

PDMTB is fantastic and it is doing a great job, but it is trying to tread a very fine line as it is an advocacy group. The problem will come if access never quite materializes whilst the group is basically co-opted as an anti-MTB police force. I have seen this happen locally to me. The landowner was not acting in good faith, merely dangling the carrot with the hope of a bit of divide and conquer in mind. PDMTB will have to judge it for themselves. They can’t say ‘**** off’ to the horsey shit stirrers as they have to seem ‘inclusive’.

The horsey shit stirrers just want everything flattened so we go cheeky or footpath and become someone else’s problem. They are playing a blinder and, because ‘we’ seem to doing the begging, they are taking advantage. Is anything going back the other way, I wonder…..

Absolutely acute observation Danny. Stay tuned though.

Oh, and we don’t have to be inclusive if we don’t want.

Stay tuned though.

??

Not being inclusive doesn’t play very well if you are asking for something, though, does it?

In any case, I appreciate the line you are trying to tread. Please just don’t get taken for a ride (pun intended)!

Danny H says it like it is.

What happens when we talk about cheeky stuff on facebook?
1) 5000+ people read about it
2) Loads more people start riding the cheeky stuff and it is no longer quite, narrow single track it turns into a rutted busy mess ruining the fun it was. Alpine/Telegraph/Les Arcs is a great example.
3) When PDMTB get 5 minutes to chat with an authority that has the power to increase access we spend the first 4 minutes 30 seconds having to listen to them complaining about examples of cheeky riding. Then we get no time to talk about the good stuff. I can think of a number of examples of this happening.
4) When we do something amazing like raise £74 000 to mend one of the best bridleways in the UK people ignore that and still think we are d*ckheads because some d*ckheads who claim to ride bikes like to talk sh*t on social media rather than riding their bikes.
5) People think we are d*ckheads so don’t want to work with us to improve mountain biking.

1 million people live within one hours drive from the Peak District.

Most of the riders consider themselves to be “locals”. It seems locals think that they somehow don’t have any impact. In fact, they have the most impact.

Finally: Why don’t people get that cheeky trails should be kept to yourself like wild camping? If you tell everyone where the best wild camping spots are they get ruined. That’s why traditionally you don’t find loads of details on the internet or in books.

Do some research yourself and go out and explore. You’ll find places no one else goes and they are the best. Then keep them secret and they’ll stay amazing.

Do some research yourself and go out and explore. You’ll find places no one else goes and they are the best. Then keep them secret and they’ll stay amazing.

Totally this.

Have a look on an OS map. If there are plenty of close contour lines and the shading is light green with a few cartoon trees, chances are it is worth a look and chances are you won’t be the first. If you blab, though, you might be the last.

If you must share, word of mouth (in person) is the only acceptable means.

The Advocacy Files – a celebration of effort

Just re-read ‘The Advocacy Files’ in your link and I’m left with the impression that apart from perhaps Whinstone Lee Tor and involvement in Cut Gate, the Advocacy Files actually reads like a celebration of what has been achieved predominantly in the Sheffield area by Ride Sheffield …

I’m not doubting PDMTB’s efforts and attempts at trying to change the current situation in the Peak District area and attitudes towards MTBs or the challenges faced by having to deal with the various landowners/land managers/tennants etc but fair play and massive thanks again to Ride Sheffield !!

Finally: Why don’t people get that cheeky trails should be kept to yourself like wild camping? If you tell everyone where the best wild camping spots are they get ruined. That’s why traditionally you don’t find loads of details on the internet or in books.

Do some research yourself and go out and explore. You’ll find places no one else goes and they are the best. Then keep them secret and they’ll stay amazing.

Wise words indeed!!!

The problem will come if access never quite materializes whilst the group is basically co-opted as an anti-MTB police force.

+1 Fully appreciate it must be a difficult position trying to hold the middle ground but I guess a fair question is who does PDMTB actually represent? The Landowner/Landmanager or the Mountain Bikers?

FWIW, I think it’s bloody ridiculous that some of the stuff up there’s FP only

Just to point out for what it’s worth (not much I suppose) but Back Tor to Winstone Lee isn’t even public footpath. It’s access land.

Can I put in a plug for PDMTB’s 22% campaign?

Digby, the new version has more of the pdmtb stuff in. The one online is a few years old now. For more up to date stuff check out
http://www.peakdistrictmtb.org

And it’s our AGM coming up. If you want to find out more, join up and come and have a chat.

And we absolutely represent the mountain bikers. We’re the MTB representation on the local access forum and are banging on the doors of landowners and being invited to their table too.

Happy to talk about it all at the AGM.

The thing I don’t understand is why these landowners even care. There is an old oath on their land, people have used it for a long time and will keep using it. What difference does this strip of bare earth make to them? None. And what difference does it make to them whether feet or tyres are on the path? None.

The law is foolish. The Foulstone Road is a great example- it’s a bridleway that reaches a remote point then just ends at a permissive footpath. Then you’re stuck. It makes no sense.

I’m happy to advertise trails. I’m also glad that after a lifetime of being a Peak District resident I’ve moved back to Scotland where common sense prevails.

The thing I don’t understand is why these landowners even care. There is an old oath on their land, people have used it for a long time and will keep using it. What difference does this strip of bare earth make to them? None. And what difference does it make to them whether feet or tyres are on the path? None.

Well, if you want to get political about it, our whole unbalanced society is founded on the ownership of the bulk of the land by a small minority of people. The reason housing is expensive isn’t the physical cost of building houses, it’s because the land houses are built on is expensive and that system is to the benefit of land-owners.

It’s a relatively short stretch to argue that a sort of knee-jerk defence of those rights of ownership is almost built into the system. It’s not really about the damage caused by trails or bikes or walkers, it’s about ownership as a concept.

There’s also the stuff about third party liability – the idea that the landowner could be liable for injury, but my take would be that it’s a smokescreen.

The thing I don’t understand is why these landowners even care.

The landowner/manager has a legal responsibility to maintain & clear a PRoW

So gates, stiles & vegetation etc all have to be repaired and replaced and PRoWs made safe so as not to endanger users, which means unwanted expense for the landowner.

One of the previous landmanagers in the Ladybower area was well known for his dislike of pretty much everyone using the PRoWs across his land including walklers, cyclists & fell-runners. His attitude was ‘why should I have to pay for the upkeep on paths and gates etc for these people who contribute nothing’ …

Some Peak District residents and businesses seemingly take the view that extensive ‘tourism’ contributes little and costs alot. For sure lots of local businesses rely on vistors but those that don’t often view ‘grockles’ with disdain.

Happy to talk about it all at the AGM.

Thanks for the invite @Pook

There’s clearly a ton of experience on this thread that would be invaluable to us at pdmtb. Please, do get involved