Lake District Weekend!!!

[Boggs]

Oh............and as for the lakes as others have said Hardknott & Wrynose are must do's,i find them doing them east to west the most fun,esp Hardknott,Newlands Pass is also another good one not to be missed,from Portinscale to Buttermere.

[smudger272]

Just ride and see where it takes you was there last year with wife rode through from Hadrian s wall trip
Wished I was going . Oh I am going I'm the 3rd rider just follow me Dibbs and keep up coz Karl is no slow coach
As you will find out

If we follow you smudger we will probably miss the Lake District altogether!!!!!

Argh but what a trip it would be

[smudger272]

I wouldn't go out of your way to do the Kielder track,it's really nothing special in my opinion,done it a few times but if your up visiting Kielder anyway,which is nice by the way then fair enough go for it.If your passing DH8 area or the A68 i could show you a nice run through Slayley Forest if im not busy with other family duties etc.

That maybe an option how long is that ride through the forest

[Hugh]

Greetings,

I have made a possible route up for you using ViewRanger but I can not add it to this reply. The route starts and finishes at Aira Falls.

If you provide me your email address I will send it on to you.

TTFN

Hugh.

[dibbs]

Thanks Hugh pm sent

[Hugh]

Reply sent to you.

TTFN

Hugh.

[Boggs]

I wouldn't go out of your way to do the Kielder track,it's really nothing special in my opinion,done it a few times but if your up visiting Kielder anyway,which is nice by the way then fair enough go for it.If your passing DH8 area or the A68 i could show you a nice run through Slayley Forest if im not busy with other family duties etc.

That maybe an option how long is that ride through the forest

Not long about 10-15mins

[dibbs]

Well just back from our 800 mile return trip, and wow what a trip it was! My own personal view of the TET route in that area is its quite a lot of road work so smaller bikes might not work so well, but bigger bikes might struggle on the off road sections in the rain as we did! unless you are very good at riding off road. the journey up on Friday was fine and bright, but we awoke to grey skies and drizzle on Saturday morning, and this stayed like it pretty much all day, so most of the high peaks were hidden!


We had planned to follow the TET route from Greystoke round to Ambleside, then ride Wyrnose, Hardknott and Stanton passes in both directions, then jump on a ferry across Windemere and follow the 'A' road back to Pooley Bridge which is where we were based. But in the end we didnt get further than Ambleside before we headed for home as it was dark (8pm) by this time. so we really only covered half of the intended route, as we took far longer than expected on the trails, and found a few were shut to traffic and we bottled out 'the old coach road' as it looked very slippy and muddy (as were a few of the other off road parts)





The Lake district is however a fantastic place and the highlight of the trip was riding the three passes mentioned which all had 'WOW' moments. The scariest by far was riding all three of them in reverse in the pitch darkness,!!!! which was a challenge in itself. (we had to do this to stand any chance of getting home before Monday!!!)

This was a view from Hardknott Pass (in the daylight!)



Some more of the easier trails (even our mate on a Fazer 600 managed to paddle his way along them but took ages and he is a good rider!!)



And a view of one of the many lakes we passed



Amazing place but we bit off more than we could chew again!!!!! as had overestimated the mileage covered and time we had, but would definitely go back for more (perhaps in the dry next time)

We also decided to go via the Yorkshire dales on the way back home and crossed 'Butter Tubbs' which is also a beautiful pass and a fantastic area to explore for another time.

Thanks for all the help you guys have provided on places to visit, ride and stop at. Some we did and others we didnt, but all in all a brilliant trip.

[bowber]

Wow, looks like it was far worse over that way than East Cumbria, we had sunny spells and it was quite warm!

The Old Coach road is mainly stone/gravel so you'd have been fine, the worst part is at the Keswick end and that's only because of the ruts from rain run off, very little in the way of mud.

Steve

[dibbs]

Thanks Steve

Im gutted now that we didn't go for it!!!!