In this episode of The Cycling Europe Podcast, journalist Steve Silk talks about the journey behind his new book, Go West, a cycling odyssey along the A40 from London to the west coast of Wales. We also hear from Australian cyclist Gayle Moore who recounts the story of her two coast-to-coast rides across Ireland and then northern England.
Andrew Sykes heads into the Yorkshire Dales for a few days and this episode of The Cycling Europe Podcast sees him travel from Bradford to Skipton, Appletreewick, Grassington and Buckden, via a canal and a couple of steep hills. Much of this episode, however, is given over to other cyclists who have recently contributed to the podcast in the form of a monologue. We hear from Justin Shiels about Welcome To My Garden, Neal Porter about his cycle around the coast of Britain in aid of MND and from Richard and Cath Jeffries about their winter LEJOG…
Sophie Gordon of Cycling UK discusses the development of the organisation’s off-road routes including the newest of the eight routes, The Marcher Castles Way.
“A cycling book with great insight, humor and self-irony! In conclusion, it must be pointed out that the book naturally requires a certain amount of English skills to get the full benefit, not least on the humorous level… Le Grand Tour on a Bike Called Wanda is a classy exponent of a cycling story that can get other than just hardcore adventure cyclists on the steel horse!”
I see that Cycling UK have just launched another of their routes. This one straddles the English-Welsh border and has been named the Marcher Castles Way. The route – there are now eight of them in total – appear to be aimed more at the bikepacker than the traditional cycle tourist. I wonder how feasible it is to ride them with a pannier set-up on a touring bike rather than a mountain bike and ‘packs’. Looking carefully at the videos and the photos, the surfaces seem to be OK. They remind me of cycling along the Yorkshire coast a few years back from Scarborough to Whitby. Any thoughts?
Mark Wedgwood had always been a lover of maps. In 2022, newly liberated from the constraints of a full-time job, he decided to cycle across every Ordnance Survey Landranger map of Britain. He spoke to The Cycling Europe Podcast about the challenge that took him from the northernmost point of Shetland (map 1) to Fowey in Cornwall (map 204)… the long way.
Mark Wedgwood had always been a lover of maps. In 2022, newly liberated from the constraints of a full-time job, he decided to cycle across every Ordnance Survey Landranger map of Britain. He spoke to The Cycling Europe Podcast about the challenge that took him from the northernmost point of Shetland (map 1) to Fowey in Cornwall (map 204)… the long way
“Hours, days, weeks and months in the saddle does something funny to your brain. We came back from the trip convinced that cycling was the answer to all of life’s problems and that if we could convince every last one of you to choose a bike not a car, we’d be well on our way to saving the planet. Easy, right?!” Those are the words of Beth Ward who, alongside her partner Robin, cycled from Wales to Istanbul in 2019. As they pedalled an idea grew in their minds to set up a community bike workshop. When they returned home, that’s exactly what they did in Llangollen. Beth has now been included in Cycling UK’s list of 100 women in cycling in 2022. The Cycling Europe Podcast headed down the Dee Valley to investigate…
“Hours, days, weeks and months in the saddle does something funny to your brain. We came back from the trip convinced that cycling was the answer to all of life’s problems and that if we could convince every last one of you to choose a bike not a car, we’d be well on our way to saving the planet. Easy, right?!” Those are the words of Beth Ward who, alongside her partner Robin, cycled from Wales to Istanbul in 2019. As they pedalled an idea grew in their minds to set up a community bike workshop. When they returned home, that’s exactly what they did in Llangollen. Beth has now been included in Cycling UK’s list of 100 women in cycling in 2022. The Cycling Europe Podcast headed down the Dee Valley to investigate…
And so is the Highway Code. It’s been interesting to see how the gammons, ‘kippers and Nigels (apologies if you are a Nigel who doesn’t adhere to the thoughts of the ridiculous Nigel Farage) of Britain have been reacting this week to the news that the updated Highway Code will (shock horror!) introduce a pyramid of hierarchy that sees those who are more likely (and able) to inflict death and destruction on the roads being assumed to have more responsibility that those who pose little danger to others.
Despite the headlines on today’s newspapers that are screaming that we will be able to travel out of the UK this summer, I suspect that for the majority of us, it’s more likely to be another year of staycationing. So the arrival of a new map of Britain on my doorstep yesterday was welcome. But it’s not just any old map… MarvellousMaps.com make a series of these detailed themed maps of the country…
This weekend sees the start of the 2021 Cycle Touring Festival. It’s virtual once again so you can listen to the speakers and watch the films from the comfort of your own living room. You do need to register however for each of the sessions (delivered via Zoom) and you can full details on how to do that by visiting the Cycle Touring Festival website. My contribution this year will be mainly in the form of a short talk in the first session at 8pm on Friday 12th February. The theme is ‘touring in a time of COVID’ and I’ll be discussing the motivation behind setting off last summer to cycle to the four capital cities of the UK as well as the journey itself. Below are a few screenshots to whet your appetite. Look forward to seeing some of you there.
In these somewhat strange times, heading out to the cinema to watch a film, let alone attending a film première, might be off the agenda for most people. Yet today I can offer you the chance to do just that from the comfort of your own home. You are formally invited to the film premiere of The Great British Cycle Tour: The Film. The film premières on YouTube on Sunday 27th December at 6pm UK time (that’s GMT)…
Having just upgraded my computer, I’m now in a position to start editing the film of last summer’s Great British Cycle Tour. Here’s a few minutes from the start of the movie… Hopefully the complete film with be readyy by the end of the month.
My project for December is to edit the film of this summer’s Great British Cycle Tour. I’ve just started piecing things together and have started to consider options when it comes to the ‘look’ of the film. I’m tempted to go down the black and white route. What do you think? Here’s the ‘teaser’ that I’ve just uploaded to the Cycling Europe YouTube Channel.
A photographic retrospective looking back over 11 years of cycling Europe…
An upcoming episode of The Cycling Europe Podcast will tell the full story of my cycling trip around the four capitals of the United Kingdom during the Coronavirus summer of 2020. Here’s a short teaser to whet your appetite. It focuses upon the background to the journey and cycling day one from my home in West Yorkshire to Bolton Abbey at the southern edge of the Yorkshire Dales.
If you are a lover of silent films, this will be a treat for you; the final instalment of The GReat British Cycle Tour 2020 videos. (It has no sound…) It’s longer than the previous ones covering ten days from Liverpool along the coast of north Wales to Anglesey and then across the principality via the Lon Las Cymru before a final sprint for the 4th and final capital, London…
A long, flat day… it started here in Cardiff: It finished at 9pm at the Youth Hostel in Bath. There was a transporter bridge: And a catch up with Paul Gentle in Bristol who joined me for the cycle along the old railway path to Bath where we […]
In these stones horizons sing. There’s something upon which to ponder. I have arrived in Cardiff and that is the inscription written above the doors of the Millennium Centre, close to the finishing point of my cycling journey along the Lon Las Cymru. (Is there a bit of […]
Today was a pretty ride that never reached yesterday’s level of ‘spectacular’ although the Wye Valley is a very appealing place through which to cycle. And for most of the day, that is where I was. The route profile in the Cicerone guide was spot on; there’s no […]
The sun is shining so here’s an early, visual, update…
Having just looked at the two route profiles for the next two days of cycling to Cardiff in the Cicerone guide, I think today will go down as the most challenging stage of the Lon Las Cymru, certainly in a vertical sense. Around 1,000 metres of climbing; one […]
Having just spent the night at the foot of Cadair Idris, perhaps it’s an appropriate time to repost this video from a couple of years ago when I climbed the mountain at dusk with a friend. We got lost and camped near the summit but only found the […]
A soggy day but ultimately a rewarding one with some good quality and varied cycling. Hopefully Colin, Chris and Sarah are reading this. They are fellow cyclists and I chatted with them along the way. Colin was on his was home from tending to his boat but told […]
…via the eastern part of Anglesey. After yesterday’s storm and my slightly truncated journey that stopped at the Victoria Hotel close to the Menai Suspension Bridge, I decided against a long ride to Holyhead and back for the sake of starting the cycle along the Lon alas Cymru […]
“Didn’t we have a lovely time the day we went to Bangor A beautiful day, We had lunch on the way and all for under a pound you know… “ Fiddler’s Dram / See footnote* Well the first half of the day – up to Llandudno – was great, but […]
Before the pedants point out that there was no ‘cycling day 18’, there was. It was just a shortish one when it came to cycling and I never wrote about it. It involved a cycle from the hotel in Belfast to the ferry, a cycle from Birkenhead ferry […]
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 […]
I’ve done it! In our COVID world of 2020, having no accommodation booked in advance is not the best option for a touring cyclist so I have spent a few days sorting out my overnight stays. As you can see it will be a mixture of Warmshowes, campsites, youth hostels and one night with a friend in my old stomping ground of Reading. Some cheap – very cheap! – train tickets have been purchased and all I need to do now is start pedalling…
“Lois Pryce argues that bicycles need to be reclaimed as simply a mundane means of transport – and cycling needs to be uncool again. As a passionate advocate of two-wheeled transport, whether it’s powered by an engine or her own legs, Lois is tired of disapproving looks. And she thinks that in the case of bicycles, it’s partly because cycling has turned into an identity. She wants to revert to the time it was just a way of getting around.”
Two capitals remain; Cardiff and London and I am beginning to piece together a plan for an 10-stage cycle which would see me return to Liverpool (the point at which I paused in early August) on the train, cycle across the north of Wales to Holyhead on Anglesey where I would pick up the Lon Las Cymru cycle route to Cardiff and then head west along the Kennet and Avon Canal and the Thames (national cycle route 4) to my final destination, London.
“From 4th July, provided that no more than two households stay together, people will be free to stay overnight in self-contained accommodation, including hotels and bed & breakfasts, as well as campsites as long as shared facilities are kept clean.”
I do wonder what this will mean for us cyclists.
Have you noticed that there will be a British general election in December? Hopefully you plan on voting. (If not, why not for goodness sake?!) As I did in 2017, I have looked at the different party manifestos for mentions of the word ‘cycling’. All the main UK-wide […]
Some names are easily forgettable. David Evans, Margaret Butcher, Terry Wilson… (I just made those up. Apologies if you are offended because you have one of those names.) My own name isn’t that exciting; Andrew Sykes. That’s why I stuck the ‘P’ in there for the purpose of […]
The HandleBards are a unique cycling theatre company, who carry all of their set props and costumes on the back of their bicycles, performing charmingly chaotic Shakespeare’s plays at outdoor venues all across the UK.
By Ron Ferguson When they go on holiday, most people feel the need to relax and have fun. Others want to spend their getaway in the most glamorous areas. There are also those who want to spend time in the middle of nature. What about combining all this? […]
So, here is the complete film of my August quest to climb the highest peaks of England, Wales and Scotland. 26 minutes of hiking adventure…
The art of camping is in keeping as many things as possible of off the ground, which, if you are in a tent (for that is proper ‘camping’ – don’t get me going on that one…) is usually grass or mud. I’m not sure I’ve ever made that […]
One morning last August I made an impromptu decision to head off to the Dales and hike up the three major peaks of Yorkshire: Pen-y-Ghent, Ingleborough and Whernside. I did so over the two days of August 20th and 21st. I’m hoping to do something similar this August […]
Here’s an interesting and important statement from Sustrans regarding the future of the National Cycle Network here in the UK. It’s worth a read: “The National Cycle Network (NCN) will undergo a major review of its walking and cycling routes to ensure they meet the highest design standards […]
A heavy-duty bit of research has gone into this post. I hope someone finds it useful… Not so much about the ferries this time (if you want detailed information about taking your bicycle on a ferry there’s some useful advice here), it’s just the trains. If you read […]
To save you looking, here are the results of a little piece of research that I’ve just completed. I searched for the word ‘cycling’ in each of the main manifestos: Conservative Party Manifesto 0 mentions… Labour Party Manifesto 1 mention… Liberal Democrat Manifesto 1 mention… UKIP 0 mentions… […]
…and here’s part two. (You will need to read the previous post if that makes no sense.) On Friday, at the invitation of a former teaching colleague and friend, I drove across to the west of Wales to climb a mountain. The plan was to climb during darkness, camp […]
By Philip Gamble of the YHA Bike Week 2015 is now upon us and cycling events are taking place across the UK in order to encourage more people explore the outdoors on two wheels. From ‘Bike Breakfasts’ to pedal powered juke boxes, there are a wide range of […]
I have a friend who owns a Brompton bicycle. When I meet him for a coffee, he invariably arrives at the cafe on his Brompton. He speaks lovingly about his travelling companion in the same way that I speak about my own bicycle, Reggie. People think that I […]
By guest blogger Tom Nelson With the National Road Race cycling route now confirmed and the weather picking up into longer, brighter spring days it’s time to get on your bike and explore the beauty of Britain. The plethora of exciting cycle routes in this relatively small country […]
Steve White has posted a comment on the Eurovelo 2 section of CyclingEurope.org and I think what he has written is worthy of elevation to the main blog. Over to you Steve: “Back in April I cycled part of the Eurovelo 2 route. From Bangor, North Wales to and across […]
Here’s Matt Krog from Cape Town. He has been my first Warmshowers guest of the weekend and today he heads off to Devizes before cycling to Wales & then Ireland. It’s his shakedown for his main trip of the summer along the Eurovelo 6 from Nantes to Budapest. […]
Today is the last day of the half-term holiday… Back to work tomorrow. But skipping over five days back at the interactive whiteboard, next weekend looks interesting. If you remember a few weeks back, I had Kate Clabby staying here in Reading after she contacted me via Warmshowers.org. […]
This website doesn’t always live up to its name, CyclingEurope.org. I’ll ignore the fact that I’m just a budding author & traveller (& teacher) and not by any stretch of the imagination an organisation. I’m talking about the ‘Cycling Europe’ bit. This post, however, certainly ticks the boxes […]
I received an email on Friday from someone called Kate, a travelling cyclist who was planning on making Reading a stopover en route from London to Oxford. She’d found my contact details on WarmShowers, the social network for cyclists looking for and offering accommodation. I used the site […]
Time to catch up with a few of the cyclists who I have been following or I will be following over the coming weeks and months. There are quite a few… First of all my brother, Matthew, who is cycling with quite a few other supporters of Huddersfield […]
Matthias Pleyer, organiser of the London Cycling Book Club which will be discussing Good Vibrations: Crossing Europe on a Bike Called Reggie in under two weeks’ time (more info on club’s website), has just asked me to answer some questions for the website. His final question was as […]
The above expression was coined of course by The Inbetweeners to great comic effect but what follows is at the other end of the spectrum of mirth. A Bristol bus driver has been sentenced to 17 months in prison afer using his bus as a weapon to knock a […]
Dear Mr Sykes – I’m too full of respect to refer to you as Andrew – I’ve just completed reading your “Good Vibrations: Crossing Europe on a Bike Called Reggie” and thoroughly enjoyed it, well done, not just for completing the journey, but also the book. You are […]
Here’s a man with a film waiting to be made about him; John Adrian Short. He has just posted a comment on The Book section of the site about his cycling journeys (presumably prompted by the discussion between my cousin Richard ‘Bill Bryson’ Birkby & me about Portugal). John […]
Remember Rachel McCormack & partner Giovanni who are cycling from Ireland to Puglia for the Irish Cancer Society? They are following a sightly more easterly route than me but it is interesting to see that they used the Saint Gotthard pass to cross the Alps – see the […]
The Internet is sometimes a confusing thing. It’s not helped by the fact we all make it complicated by people like me signing up to a myriad of different ways of communicating. So when I send a message via a website (in this case http://www.sanoodi.com by filling in a form […]
