[Closed] Tunnel Hill. I got told off.

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Uselesshippy, ignore Firestarter, he's obviously an idiot.
It's a shame that this area is becoming more restricted. I've only ridden it during races but the loamy goodness available there takes some beating.

I'm with firestarter...that was a cool story, brospehine.

One of my mates from the 80's had a similar cool story from the other side. He was on guard at a bit of Greenham Common armed with a pick axe handle , a protestor asked if she could go past he said up to you I don't care so she did , 2 mins later an officer saw her where she had passed him and told him to remove her so fe ran over felled her and dragged her off. A board squadies indifference grants no licence nor any security .

Over there myself today, managed to avoid most of the military types, certainly very busy, best avoid at the moment.

It's been busy all last week. Normally they're tolerant, despite the orders from up top, but if they're busy with some big stuff, best avoid else could push that tolerance over the edge.

Other places to ride that keeps out of their way.

'They' are trying to do stuff that can hurt, maim and kill. Please don't be a mountainbikeforthepeople hero and steer clear. You'll screw tolerated and someone will get arsey and access will suffer.

I always give them a wide birth, sometimes I'll ask where they're training and go somewhere else.
It was just that this was the first time one of the army actually said, your not supposed to be here.

At least they don't [url= http://singletrackmag.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/us-military-confiscate-forty-five-bikes/ ]confiscate your bikes[/url] for riding there.

Yet.

I've heard they may be considering it, after a couple of incidents involving access being needed so ambulances could get on to military land to rescue injured riders.

It is theoretically within the byelaws but would be a literal and draconian action - P9 of....

I was up there today. Lots of army about, no problems with them.

BUT we did come across 3 lads on trail motorcycles. They knew they were in the wrong because they had their numberplates covered. To any of you that know it we saw them crossing the canal on the way up to Porrigepot, over the very narrow footbridge near the lock/railway. There were some other cyclists coming the other way and it created a bottleneck so I whipped the plastic bag off the last ones numberplate and memorised it (I can do that in 2 seconds, used to work on a weighbridge) which obviously created a lot of abuse towards me but they had no chance of turning round and there were about 8 MTBers stood round too, so they were well outnumbered and they knew it.
I managed to snap a pic as they rode off, I'll be reporting them

Tricky one that. General advice is to report them to the area marshal, but hypocrisy is we're not supposed to be there either 😉

I guess tunnel hill is busy with training because of all the forestry work at caesar's camp

Don't know this particular training area but a general good idea would be to avoid riding in training areas at night. Almost 100% certain to piss of those involved.
During daylight you might be a minor irritation but clomping around destroying peoples night vision and getting in way when most stuff actually happens is probably best avoided.
Of course, you lot most likely know this already.

I've heard they may be considering it

Pants mentioned it on Facebook 🙁

Sadly it seems to be going only one way at the moment.

Problem is, the MOD land is some of the only land in the area with anything like that sort of access. Yes the Surrey Hills are 30min away, but that's 30min on top of 30min for me, and with the Off-Piste at Swinley officially off limits, if this area's lost then it's just putting pressure on smaller and smaller areas. Dunno how true it is in general but I'm sure I've ridden there more since Swinley became a 1-way loop, and it seems busier at weekends, before I never saw anyone outside of Trolls rides.

There are a lot of groups there out at night these days. Used to be just the Trolls.

Riding there a few years ago, and cycled into the middle of a group of squaddies resting, and asked which way to go to get out stay out of the way. They told us to carry on as we were as we'd probably be distracting to the 'enemy'.
Now prefer to ride up frith hill and windmill hill as they are now much quieter. Well, until all the houses get build on deepcut barracks 🙁

The only time I ever came across troops at night on Tunnel Hill they asked us to sweep the nearby area with our lights to help them spot any of the 'enemy'

Thankfully we didn't reveal any, didn't want to be in the middle of a battle.

Once set off land-mine/flash-grenade/trip-wire thingy.

Well actually someone else did, I was just the poor sod who was on their wheel and got it right in my face after the microsecond delay.

Bumped into plenty of soldiers, just lights off and turn around if it's a group, or stop and ask which direction the exercise is if it's just one or two.

90% are quite accommodating, even going as far as to mark trails with glow sticks/equipment at the entrance. If you keep an eye out I reckon 75% of the time's I've bumped into exercises there's been something that's piqued my interest and thought 'what's that on the trail' 30s before actually seeing them.

Out of interest, where do the potential conflicts occur. only ever ridden that way during the day and then mainly south of the canal except for the stuff down from the hill by the barracks back down to the canal. cant imagine exercises on either part?

So I'm an obvious idiot am I rollingbumnut thanks for clearing that up. Then again I'm an ex squaddie who never understood people riding on army land when red flags were up or cared if they did it when they were down. Still its a cool story non the less

Just find the whole 'cool story bro' a bit lazy and pointless Firesmartass. 😀

No red flags on the main riding areas of tunnel/porridge pot hills, there all over the other side.
Teamhurtmore, I was stopped when I crossed the "old Guildford road" which is the green lane/big fire road/shit pit which runs through the middle of tunnel hill, the stuff south of the canal.
Like I said, I don't think the guy gave a shit, he'd just been told to tell people.

So I'm an obvious idiot am I rollingbumnut thanks for clearing that up. Then again I'm an ex squaddie who never understood people riding on army land when red flags were up or cared if they did it when they were down. Still its a cool story non the less

There are no red flags on TH, and a history or passive acceptance of riding in the area, hence it is noteworthy when people are told off.

It's MOD Public Access Land, not red flag danger area. Bylaws apply though. Short version - stick to established trails, keep out of the way of army and don't pick up anything that may go bang 😀

They're perfectly happy to let the dog walkers all over the place, despite claims that the new "interpretation" of the bylaw applies to all the public. Bikes though, orders are, get off. Well, stick to metalised roads as the new definition of established trails is apparently, and preferably only to make your exit.

I never said there were red flags there merely made a point of when I'd been on military land and bumped into riders
Some were safe some were crazy