[Closed] Lord of Loops, Peaks. Keen?

The northern side of that loop and in particular Cut Gate is FAR better the other way round (clockwise)

The bit around Hayfield, Birch Vale, Chinley etc works fine that way round and Roych Clough is OK either way. The extension out to Old Dam is a fairly pointless load of extra mileage, almost all on road (although it does take in the Cavedale descent).

Broken Road climb up from Castleton is fine, the drop off Mam Tor down to Edale is good. The last bit is OK either way although to be honest all that stuff around Cutthroat Bridge works better the other way too.

Also it doesn't include Jacobs Ladder.

When I first saw that route it seemed to be a very contrived way of just doing a massively long ride but the problem with the Peaks is many of the trails are difficult to link up in a flowing order - you always end up climbing what would be a great descent or going down a trail that would make a fine climb but is a dull descent. Or you end up looping round loads in order to fit everything in the "correct" way round - like that bit around Old Dam specifically to do Cavedale.

There are better routes out there.

I don't know if Cut Gate is really better the other way round, I quite like either direction, but I'd cut across to Dunford Bridge on bridleway/rail trail from the Flouch at the bottom of Cut Gate rather than try to ride up any of the Woodhead / the Snow Road, which is unrideable deep ruts unless it's changed dramatically. The Woodhead is death on a stick. Really unpleasant. If you route to Dunford Bridge, you can then turn left and ride up the back road to the Woodhead then cross straight over onto the Longdendale Trail.

I could give you a better - footpath route - from Hadfield through to Glossop, but it's slightly complicated and hard to describe.

Out of Charlesworth, I'd use the bridleway climb rather than Monks Road on tarmac, then cut round illegally to avoid the rest of the road section. The stretch of the A624 up to the bottom of Middle Moor is nasty and the right turn onto the bridleway is just approaching a near enough blind bend with plenty of death potential, I'd avoid that by any number of detours, maybe loop round on the Pennine Bridleway then... Chinley Churn by a different approach, but all this is kind of micro-routing.

If you want to ride Middle Moor the wrong way round - it's quite a cool, rubbly climb - I'd maybe approach it via the end of Monk's Road then the obvious permissive to miss out the A624 section completely. But I wouldn't do the bit of the A624 the route on OutdoorGPS suggests anyway. If it's not that route, you can disregard all this. But I don't think it's been very well thought through tbh.

IMO the bit after cut gate in that route for the next ~10/15k is bobbins, if you want a big day out from Castelton I'd be more inclined to go up the broken road and over Mam Tor to Hollins Cross, down to Greenlands, through Edale and up Jagger's to Hope Cross, down the Beast, up and over to Gores/Lockerbrook, then do cut gate as an out and back.

From there you can then go up to Derwent edge / Whinstone Lee Tor and down to Ladybower Inn, loop back up to Hope Cross, back down Jaggers, up to Hollins again and across to Rushup Edge, down Coldwell, up and over Jacob's, back up to Mam Tor and then head across to go down Cavedale and back to Castelton.

It'll be a big ole day out though!

Thanks everyone, really helpful... I was hoping to be lazy and just follow the GPX and get the map out if it failed, but it looks like that's not going to work if I want to get a nice ride in.

@crazy-legs.  Do you have any links for a GPX of a better route?  I'm not massively bothered if it's on or off road gravel or trail, I've got an entire day of 'no one else to worry about' so my threshold for happiness is essentially getting very tired without needing to think about anything other than riding.

Did it last year in a day with full bikepacking gear,  the Old Dam bit was OK a least you didn't have to ride Rushup edge.   I actually slept in the woods nearby and set off from there.   The worse bit was definitely between langsett and the picking up the trans-pennine bridleway.  I tried some cheeky stuff on the left of the Woodhead to avoid the snow roads but it was tuff going so the Dunford bridge option sounds good,

I think bennett has described a beauty there. If you want more there are extensions from hayfield over shooting cabins then over to rowath and back over lantern pike, but that route he's listed covers all my peak favourites.

ebennett has a pretty banging loop there. If it were me, I'd go up the Broken Road then down Cold Side to Greenlands first, back up to Hollins Cross and down to Backtor Farm, and instead of going down Jaggers I'd go down the Brink to Hope then along the road to come back to Hollins from either side, but whatever suits really!

Great, thanks all. I'll get on the OS and make a GPX of @ebennet's route. 👍

i did most of it in december 14 - rode road from chapel-en-le-frith so missed the last section out - the first 50km is the best, the rest just feels like miles for miles sake