It starts tomorrow, part two that is. If you are oblivious to part one of the Great British Cycle Tour 2020 (it started as the more humble ‘Yorkshire to Edinburgh’) then you can catch up on the details of the trip so far by visiting this page of CyclingEurope.org. Should that be too much like hard work for a late Sunday afternoon, basically… part one was a cycle from West Yorkshire to Edinburgh via the Yorkshire Dales, the Lake District, Northumberland, the Scottish Borders and the coast of East Lothian, followed by a cycle to Belfast via the (at times disappointing) west coast of southern Scotland and (more invigorating) Dumfries & Galloway, a ferry from Cairnryan and a short loop along the Antrim coast before a return inland to Belfast and a second ferry to Liverpool when the trip took a break on August 4th. Pause for breath…
Yesterday I collected my equipment together once again…
…and tomorrow morning at 9.30am I have a train booked for a return to Liverpool. I shall set off cycling from the exact spot where I stopped at the start of the month and part two will start.
My route is somewhat more planned for this second half of the tour of British capitals, mainly as I will be following three cycle routes; National Cycle Network route 5 (along the north coast of wales), the Lon Las Cymru route from Holyhead to Cardiff and then over the bridge to Bristol and Bath to cycle along the Kennet and Avon Canal to Reading and then the Thames to London. Don’t take the blue line on the following map too literally but here is the route:
And here are more details of the day-to-day destinations etc… I have all the accommodation sorted between Liverpool and London, mainly because I found the first 10 days of part one far less ‘stressful’ (it wasn’t that stressful but…) than the second 10 days as I had planned all the accommodation. COVID-19 and trying to sort such things en route don’t seem to go together well.
| Date | Cycling Day | From | To | km | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monday 24th | – | 9:38 – Huddersfield | 11:01 – Liverpool | – | Train |
| “ | – | 12:00 – Pier Head | 12:10 – Seacombe | – | Ferry across the Mersey |
| “ | 19 | Liverpool | Prestatyn | 71 | Warmshowers host |
| Tuesday 25th | 20 | Prestatyn | Holyhead | 75 | Warmshowers host (camping) |
| Wednesday 26th | 21 | Holyhead | Caernarfon | 93 | Warmshowers host |
| Thursday 27th | 22 | Caernarfon | Dolgellau | 80 | Torrent Walk Campsite (LL40 2AB) |
| Friday 28th | 23 | Dolgellau | Llanidloes | 62 | Dol-Llys Farm Campsite (SY18 6JA) |
| Saturday 29th | 24 | Llanidloes | Glasbury | 67 | River Cabin Camping (LD2 3TQ) |
| “ | 10am-2pm | Bicycle Museum? | Llandrindod Wells? | ||
| Sunday 30th | 25 | Glasbury | Cardiff | 97 | Sleeperz Hotel (CF10 1RH) |
| Monday 31st | 26 | Cardiff | Bath | 94 | YHA Bath (BA2 6LA) |
| “ | 2pm | Meet Paul G | Bristol Sphere | ||
| Tuesday 1st | 27 | Bath | Reading | 127 | Freind’s house |
| “ | ? pm | Meet Max G | Newbury | ||
| Wednesday 2nd | 28 | Reading | London | 74 | YHA Central London (W1W 5NU) |
| “ | 6pm | Meet Stephen F | Albert Memorial | ||
| Thursday 3rd | – | 10:57 – London | 13:47 – Halifax | – | Train home |
| “ | – | Coffee | Top Door Espresso! |
As you can see, I have arranged to meet a few people en route which is something that was nice from part one of the tour so it will be good to do that again. Daily updates will be posted to CyclingEurope.org, hopefully along with a few sketches; I have been practicing…
The weather looks โinterestingโ…
