London Euston to Perth which route would you take?
Planned Euro tour unlikely to happen for various reasons so looking for a 'short' tour in UK instead.
Avoiding major cities / overly busy roads and with opportunities for camping / occasional stealth camp on the way.
Not adverse to a bit of offroad as would be on a gravel bike with 47mm tyres.
Planning hotels ( if available) every 3rd night.
Cheers
I would take a northerly route ideally - head up toward the Midlands, Yorkshire etc and carry on going up toward Scotland.
Sorry - just in one of those moods and need to lighten my own mood even if it as the expense of a crap post...
You could make your way up to Wirksworth at the southern end of the Peak District and pick up the Great North Trail and peel off as you get to Edinburgh for Perth before it turns east towards Glasgow. I believe it can be done on a gravel bike.
Not sure about bit north of London, but from Lincolnshire I'd pick up NCR 1 and follow most of that, with a few tweaks along the way.
Good mix of quiet country roads and some traffic free sections on old railway lines
I'd attempt to make it interesting by getting the train to Yorkshire, pedalling the Spine race route, then maybe use a bit of the SUW across to inners, then take the Scottish National Trail to Perth.
See what you can do from the London-Edinburgh-London audax route, though may not be great on the camping front.
Sorry I meant west - the Great North Trail turns west at Edinburgh for Glasgow...
Chilterns, Charnwood Forest, Derbyshire Dales, High Peak, Todmorden 😉 , Lake District, Hawick, TJ's place, Perth.
Euston to Derby (train)
Derby to Wirksworth on back roads, Great North Trail all the way up to Edinburgh, then branch off to Perth. Can't advise on off-road/quiet Fife stuff.
London to Kent, some nice rolling hills there.
Ferry to Calais.
Skirt round Belgium and into germany, then over the Alps in Austria and into Eastern Europe.
Down through Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria and then over the Bosphorus into Asia.
You've then got some decisions to make, but I'd be going round the northern edge of Iran, through Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and then into India. It'll be a bit lumpy there, but the views will be pretty special.
You're then going across to Bangladesh, Burma and Thailand.
You then drop into Malaysia and a flight to Perth.
Big ride that is. Good luck.
Hang on, you did mean Perth, WA, correct?
Just read a blog on the Great North Trail yesterday on either the audax or Gravel Bikes FB page - a loaded gravel bike may be very hard work on sections of the trail unless you have good offroad skills and experience- the author admitted he didn't.
You could do a lot worse than reversing the original Rapha Manchester - London route.
That finishes at Olympic Velodrome but a route form central London to there isn't difficult and you can probably use various bits of towpath if you want to avoid the worst of North London.
It goes out not far from Luton Airport but on surprisingly quiet lanes.
Rather than go into Manchester though, you can pick up the Great North Trail route from the Peak District:
https://www.cyclinguk.org/route/great-north-trail-full-route-cape-wrath
That will get you to Edinburgh then the route to Perth is a popular LEJOG one so there's load of info about that on LEJOG forums. Some of the Edinburgh residents on here will know the routes out of town to get you onto the Forth Bridge most efficiently.
Follow the EuroVelo 12 north sea route?
https://en.eurovelo.com/ev12/united-kingdom.
It goes through London, though skirts south of Perth into Dundee
West to welsh boarders, maybe using some of the canal network (never been impressed with the area north of London until you get a good 100 miles up), either Kennet and avon ish or union ish. Then roughly follow the boarder before cutting east to peak district, and threading your way up to the dales and Pennines. Then once in Scotland its hard to go wrong.
Not sure about bit north of London, but from Lincolnshire I’d pick up NCR 1 and follow most of that,
How about using the Grand Union Canal out of London, cut off towards Leicester, then across to Lincolnshire for NCR1?
See what you can do from the London-Edinburgh-London audax route, though may not be great on the camping front.
^^ Aye, ask on the Facebook page and you will get lots of good suggestions .
Audax UK
@dannybgoode
Made me chuckle 🙂
@lunge
Half of that idea was the original plan anyway!
Some good ideas there, may look at getting off the train North of London as opposed to going all the way into centre.
Off-road on gravel bike is no problem, live in the middle of Cairngorms so used to a bit of roughness.
Cheers
may look at getting off the train North of London as opposed to going all the way into centre.
I wouldn't. The main roads in London are awful but there are few of them and there are loads of really lovely places to see and quiet roads on your way out of town. I've had some lovely rides in London. It'd provide a nice counterpoint to the rest of your trip and it would only be for a few hours.
Grand union canal towpath should in theory go from Euston ish to Brum shouldn't it? After that I'd probably avoid M roads (here endeth my wisdom) 😉
Might be worth checking the Sustrans website to see what longer distance routes they have to link together. The further north the better they get but there is some crackers. Can be tricky to link them up sometimes and they often aren’t complete but it’s nice to follow a signed route for a while to ease navigation.
To Dover head to the Alps, skirt northern India head for Vietnam. Probably have to island hop for a bit, then coastal road to Perth. Good few months riding though.
Didn't read lunge's post then @onehndredthidiot? 😉
Bugger
Wouldn't be it be easier to start at the top of the map on Perth and then go down to London? Then it'll be downhill all the way
Preference?
Quite roads.
NCN cycle paths.
Easier off-road whilst using a bit of both of the above.
Challenging off-road (for a gravel bike).
If I was going to do something like this then I'd use NCN cycle paths and quiet roads. It's a hefty way and I'd want to do it at a leisurely pace to really enjoy it.
Make your way up to Manchester, then follow The GB Divide until you get to Stirling. Then turn right
The only answer is...sleeper from Euston to Edinburgh then a leisurely pedal to Perth.
After sight-seeing, turn bike to face south and freewheel back to London as it's all downhill.
