Great times, great people.

Carol Vorderman lives in Bristol, she bought one of the houses overlooking the bridge about 8 months ago.

Bemmie is OK, but its no Clifton is it 😉

But none of them actually ever ride mtbs do they

Aye, but one of them is tremendously shit on a road bike.

You should just ride your road bike round the woods KT, I’ve been riding round the woods on 90psi slicks for weeks!

Carol Vorderman lives in Bristol, she bought one of the houses overlooking the bridge about 8 months ago.

She likes to complain about how difficult it is to park her 4×4 on the school run. I should think Clifton suits her perfectly…

You should just ride your road bike round the woods KT, I’ve been riding round the woods on 90psi slicks for weeks!

Hell no, those trails have claimed enough of my skin in the last few months thankyouverymuch.

Clubber/ ADH: the LVIS audax was awesome! Clearly, another good reason to move to Bristol…

Brizzle: wouldnt want to live anywhere else, except Vancouver, Grenoble, etc. Good music scenes, great riding from your house or further afield in a car, friendly vibes, more chilled out than SE England commuter belt where i lived previously. If you want to get specific: I lived in Clifton for a while but much prefer Totterdown. both were a nice walk into town, close to AC/LW etc and work. Difference is now i’m closer to Temple Meads, and I knew most of my neighbours by name after a few months in T-down whereas and the people in Clifton seemed less friendly. Less students being rowdy on school nights too. i’ve got a pump track minutes away from me now too thanks to a lot of hard work from some people on here.

Clubber/ ADH: the LVIS audax was awesome!
Clearly, another good reason to move to
Bristol…

well I didn’t want to boast but now you mentioned it 🙂 http://audax.lvis.org.uk

I knew most of my neighbours by name after a few months in T-down whereas and the people in Clifton seemed less friendly.

I would agree with that, right upto the point I got a dog. After which I knew most of my neighbours.

mmm roast beef baguette and a pint please 😉 (the missus makes better cauliflower cheese though)

^ That was a good weekend. A skinful of lethal cider the night before, early trip out to the Mendips, a lillypool special for brunch:

Then more secret trails with the locals, a few pints, then Mrs Poddy’s awesome corgette muffins for afters, and ride home to Bristol via the walled garden cafe. Good times 🙂

Thats the best bit about Bristol, if you get a bit fed up with the local stuff, its dead easy to go somewhere else for an ace ride!

anotherdeadhero – where were photos 7-9 taken out of interest?

have you ever watched a series of ‘Skins’..?

If not, do so… cos it’s exactly like that

anotherdeadhero – where were photos 7-9 taken out of interest?

*counts*

Erm…
7. an audax that went via the Valley of the Rocks, norf devon.
8. Black Down trig point on the Mendips
9. Some road race. Cotswold league. I forget which round.

Interestingly yunki, me and some mates rode into a Skins set, when they were doing something in LW. I’ve also ridden through the back of shot of Casulty, apparently, when they were shooting something down in Cumberland Basin.

Whats your budget ?

This is taken 15 mins ride from my house (OK 20 mins but I’m slow on hills these days 😳 ) which is pretty central.

As a Londoner I’m very much a city person but I love that I can be in the country so quickly and easily.

Thanks guys, I think that this has actually sold it for me. 😆

Just had a quick look a streeview, some nice cladding on the terraces south of the river.
Any street names you could slip in so I can waste the evening on Google maps. Regarding the budget Redthunder, I don’t really have one yet, about 600 notes doesn’t seem excessive to me for one person and would get a reasonably sized flat, what I’ve seen so far are older properties. Any modern, higher rise + view developments to look at?
I lived in Chester for 10 years so I know quite well small city living and all about snobs, scallies and students. 😉
I’m surprised that no-one has mentioned any qualityness of the bicycle shops. Does no such thing exist in Bristol.

Webbs of Warmley for road-related stuff and banter. The Bristol Bike Project for a warm feeling and doing good. Bike UK for bargains. The rest are either too cool or too niche for me!

600 notes will get you something nice south of the river.

I really enjoyed living on British road (BS33BZ), there were a couple of restaurants on west st that were really cheap and friendly,decent thai and an indian that could seat about 40 people between them, easy walk to north st pubs and bars for nicer eateries and only a 30 min drunken stumble back from town.

Everything from there to the river is pretty nice, things get more expensive once you get between North St and the river.

If you’re looking to get out to Swindon on occasion then you can go south out of Bristol and round the ring road (against most of the traffic) and then the A420 is a pretty clear run up to Chippenham (and good for a blast)used to take me about 40 mins in the mornings.

BS3 is terrible Ashton Gate is there and inbreeding is rife.Watch them going to football is an eye opener.

Is that the best you can do?

1/10.

and inbreeding is rife

Don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it.

Actually Don if you’re after high rise living, you want to be looking at south Bristol. I wouldn’t recommend the ones in Easton/Eastville for various reasons. £600 would get you a nice 1 bed apartment in Totterdown. I still wouldn’t live in Bedminster though.
If you really don’t mind the area which you live in; look at lakeshore development in hengrove.

Aust, NOrthwick , Pilning Severn Beach.

Easy riding for the Bristol and Wye Valley etc.

Near the m-ways for everywhere 🙂

How about Airpoint in Bedminster for high(ish) rise living in a very modern newbuild development. I’ve heard good things about it.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?um=1&hl=en&safe=active&q=airpoint%20bedminster%20bristol&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.,cf.osb&biw=1280&bih=862&wrapid=tlif133346949199821&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=iw&ei=USF7T5ywIMal8QPfmoiyCA

http://www.firmstonedevelopments.com/airpoint.php

I’m totally open and in your hands here regarding what and where. I don’t know anything at all about Bristol.
I do have a feeling that I’ve been sold on the Bristol idea and can start plotting seriously, I might have to look at making the trip an over nighter.
I’ve just had a look at a couple of flats around Lakeshore, how difficult is it to get to city centre from there, timewise?

Is this that place, clubber?
Looks cool.

Ooh, Hotwells is nice and there’s some places within your budget there.
Quick walk into the centre too. Maybe cotham? bottom of gloucester road?
Not really high rises though. St Pauls is becoming more of a trustafarians paradise. Could be OK, particularly if you like “edgy” and “drugs” 😀

Airpoint? Do they take your belt & shoelaces off you when you get the keys?

Airpoint

Prison

We lived in Hotwells, loved it.

Seriously though, if I had to get to Swindon on a regular basis, I would NOT live in the city centre. Traffic is genuinely awful and First will arse rape you over rail fares.

Nowt like living in the centre for the convenience and buzz mind, though there are plenty of places outside Bristol to the west, north and east that’d be more convenient for Swindonia. Depends what you’re after.

Just don’t live in Bradley Stoke. *shudders*

Just don’t live in Bradley Stoke. *shudders*

AMEN.
You will not like bradley stoke.

Seriously though, if I had to get to Swindon on a regular basis,

It wouldn’t necessarily be on a regular basis and not necessarily at peak times either.
*getting excited*

anotherdeadhero – Member
Seriously though, if I had to get to Swindon on a regular basis, I would NOT live in the city centre. Traffic is genuinely awful and First will arse rape you over rail fares.

Train fare to swindon isn’t that bad, and it’s vastly prefferable to driving imo…

clubber – Member
How about Airpoint in Bedminster for high(ish) rise living in a very modern newbuild development. I’ve heard good things about it.

I was disappointed when i found out the pool room on the roof contained a pool table and not a swimming pool…

^ That was a good weekend

It certainly was ADH. Here’s some more Mendip magic:

South Bristol is ok but driving to Swindon will take twice as long from south of the river than it would from somewhere like Downend, Mangotsfield or Emersons Green.

The first two of those have a proper mix of housing from proper old (c1900) to more recent. Most of Emersons is less than 20 years old. From either of these – or yate / chipping sodbury – you can be up to junction 18 on the M4 in around 10 minutes and Swindon in another 30.

I was born and brought up in Ashton which is fine but North Street and Southville isn’t all that IMHO, just currently a couple of “the” places to be if you believe the hype. For interesting local shops read estate agents, co-op, banks and a couple of ok bars.

For me if I didn’t have to travel and didn’t have kids I’d live centrally. If you want to be in the “right” place it’s South Bristol atm or if you need easy motorway access I’d live North side.

am sure noteeth will be along to post a mini-essay

Not sure that will be necessary – it mostly been said already…

Suffice to say, I’m not really a ‘city’ type – but I’m very happy here. At this stage in my life & in terms of the southern UK, I’m not sure I’d want to be anywhere else. Like Tangent, I grew up on Mendip (marvellous pics, Buzz!) & the weekend’s big adventure would usually consist of taking a Badgerline bus to either Bath or Bristol – mainly to visit bike shops (and later clubs…).

But I ended up living here entirely by accident, moving to Bristol after my undergraduate degree – and it was pretty much the best thing that could have happened to me. I spent much of my twenties broke, living in a house where the rent was £150 a month & riding in the woods almost everyday – it was like a biking version of Spaced. The city has its problems, for sure (the traffic, organised bike crime, ugly overpriced dockside flats, a drugs turf war that occasionally resembled The Wire) & it’s notable that many Bristolians can be deeply ambivalent about their native city, but I loves it here. After five years in Bedminster, and a few years away, I now live on Ashton Road – a short hop from the riding in Leigh Woods and a short walk from the mighty Mark’s Bread & the equally mighty Nova pub. As has been alluded to, the ever-shifting micro-geographies of Brizzle are a constant source of amusement (Bedminster is the new Southville, etc), and some areas have changed dramatically (my mum lived in Clifton as a young staff nurse & it was a good deal more bohemian than it is now…). But there’s good stuff in most places.

It’s a well-worn cliché to say that there’s a huge buzz here, but it’s true – it’s chock full of interesting people doing interesting stuff (my personal fave being the fleapit delights of The Cube), and there’s no end of good clubs, bars & pubs. You can get to some great trails within ten minutes of the city centre, and a whole panoply of riding (Mendips, Quantocks, FOD, Wales) is within easy driving reach.

So, San Fran Bristol: big old bridge, lots of mountain bikers, good music scene – it’s like San Francisco, with added mud. 😀

I’ve just had a look at a couple of flats around Lakeshore, how difficult is it to get to city centre from there, timewise?

I wouldn’t, personally. I’m sure the flats are lovely, but they’re stuck on a generic retail park a fair way from anything really. Forget walking to a nice pub or restaurant…

Loving the Bristol Lovin
I commuted from BS3 to Malmesbury (so not quite Swindon) for 6 years. The good thing is that you are going against the general flow of traffic that commutes into Bristol. The bad thing is that there is only 3 realistic options for crossing the river which may deliver you into traffic hell whichever one you take. On the way back generally traffic starts to get bad at the bottom of the M32 and is bad all the way to the Bedminster bridge (Redcliffe or Templemeads are the choke points). There are back route but on the worst days (generally when it’s wet or during the summer holiday the average 50 minutes could quite easily be 90mins- 2hrs.
Colleagues who lived near the M32 (Horfield generally) had much easier commutes, generally 20 minutes less.
Personally if I wanted to live in a flat I’d probably look at Hotwells.
Having said that BS3 is the best Bristol area 🙂

Having said that BS3 is the best Bristol area

Amen to that. 8)