We only occasionally pop up to Bristol on the bus, and then just for a wander around, but I know that there are some proper Bristol locals here.
There's an interesting little article on Bristol 24/7 about mountain biking in the area and the cost of, and struggle to maintain, its trails - https://www.bristol247.com/sport/cycling/bristol-could-be-best-city-mountain-biking-uk/
50 acre is a natural trail with just spot repairs where puddles / mud form pretty much. So that one isn’t in desperate need of anything.
Ride Bristol are doing a great job on Ashton court - maintaining a number of the trails with periodic rebuilds of sections to make them more fun / able to cope with the high volumes of riders round there.
Leigh Woods is in a state but never gets any tlc. Ownership of those woods is different to Ashton Court I believe and ideally they wouldn’t let any mtb access at all. Shame as it would flow better with some tlc to fill in the muddy bits.
None of the above actually use any of the meaningful elevation Bristol has sadly.
Bourton Combe has some fun little bits in and there’s a decent jump set of trails at Belmont Woods.
What about Bath, anything decent around there?
I’ve never really found anything meaningful around Bath. There are some bit so Bridleway you can link up around lansdown hill that I explored during Covid lockdowns when we weren’t allowed to drive anywhere. Heard there are some bits in the woods near part of the uni but I’ve never gone to explore.
There was going to be a bike park on the old golf course but it died a death for various reasons sadly.
Bristol is a good spot to live in for its close access to other riding though. Within an hour you can get to the Mendips / Quantocks / Cwmcarn etc / Forest of Dean / Flyup 417 / Windhill Bike Park etc.
Lots of forestry work happening far end of Leigh Woods currently. Things that make you disproportionately sad.
Yeah I rode round Leigh Woods last week and went down a bit of the off piste. Wishes I hadn’t bothered as they’re driving huge forestry machinery up and down the fire roads at the far end and it was an utter quagmire. After stripping one hillside of trees due to their desire to replant it with a native species a few years ago I haven’t seen much sign of that happening yet. Now they’re chopping more stuff out it seems.
The destruction that Forestry cause is unreal. They fenced off Star Wars on the Quantocks because it was an ancient burial site . Fair enough then next time I took a look there was a massive scar right through where they'd ploughed through with their machinery 🙄🙄🙄
In their defence, a lot of the work in Leigh Woods is because of ash dieback. They can't risk having dying trees close to popular rights of way.
There's a little bit good riding around Bath - some behind the uni and another chunk over in Conkwell, but otherwise it's linking a lot of bridleways/byways/footpaths together, which some people may enjoy. Not worth travelling for IMO.
In their defence, a lot of the work in Leigh Woods is because of ash dieback.
Absolutely, and it's been on the cards for some time now. Many of those trees were my friends.
