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Hi all,
As title really - who lives in the London area, and manages to ride MTBs?
- Roughly where do you live?
- Where do you ride, and how often do you get out?
- What type of bike do you have, and what kind of riding do you do?
- How do you get to where you ride (personal car, hire car, train, lift from mate etc)?
- If you own a car, are you able to park it at your house?
I've been living in London (Stratford area at the moment) for about 9 months now and haven't MTB'ed other than hiring at Bedgebury once, and trying to decide whether it's worth getting a bike and trying to get back into MTBing while based in London. Seeing what others do in a similar situation would be great!
Thanks,
Duane.
Considering where you live, you're not going to have many MTB options
You could have a nice ride out to Epping, there's lots to ride there but it's quite muddy at the moment.
You could grab the train to Broxbourne woods and do some MTB round there. You could also grab the train down to the Surrey Hills
I live in North London but rarely get a chance to get out MTB. If I do it's local, tame and more like a pootle on cheeky trails. I do it on a rigid SS to make up for it. I cycle commute over 100 miles a week at the moment so haven't been out on the weekend or in the evening in quite a while
I can't help you with advice on the logistics of living in London and riding a mountain bike,I would imagine you'd 'nearly' always have to travel to ride so that must make getting out riding harder.
I can however point you to some nice riding options/loops within riding distance for you south of the river though via the foot tunnel at Woolwich- Bostall/Abbey Woods(not ridden here myself but been told there some nice riding here and you can get to it along the thames path),Oxleas Woods and Joydens Woods(a bit further but some nice trails and riding here) .
East London.
'Local': Epping ( summer ), Surrey Hills, Bedgebury, Swinley, North Downs, South Downs, Chilterns.
Not so local: Peaks, Lakes, Wales, Scotland.
Winter, most weekends. Summer weekends plus an odd weekday evening.
Cotic Soul, One One 45650B, Nukeproof Mega TR275. Trail, XC & AM.
Van, parked on the road ( residents permit ).
TBH you need a car / van 🙂
I'm north London, a mix of the above chaps. Epping is frozen in the mornings currently and quite good. It'll be starting to dry out between now and may. It's my go to as I'm only 4 miles away .
From where you are is a short road ride up through Walthamstow into Essex also, probably shorter than you think.
It's only an hour in any direction to Surry Hills, Swinley and Hadlegh.
Thanks for the replies all.
I have access to a car, which I could possibly park by my flat (at a cost) or park a little further away for free (with extra faff).
I'd really like to be able to ride the likes of Surrey Hills, Chicksands, PORC (or whatever it's called now) etc, stuff that actually requires a MTB. I'm open to driving up to about 1.5hrs each way if the destination is decent (plus further to Wales etc for weekends).
I guess I'm trying to understand if there are other people who I could share lifts with (either my car or theirs), or work out hiring a car for a day, or even people I could rent a bike off if that made financial sense.
Thanks,
Duane.
I used to live just inside s.c. at Woolwich and would just get the train to the north downs or Swinley forest. I road a ridgid SS but not set up hardcore xc racer more "trail" style. Good fun.
Being as you are way London if you have BMX you are close to Romford and another cool park in Dagenham.
When I lived in Clapham it was Swinley, Now I'm in Hackney it's Epping Forest
You'll see all kinds of bikes in Epping but the most fun I've had in there has been on a rigid Inbred lol