Britain abounds in curious places to cycle.Rob Ainsley, author of 50 Quirky Bike Rides, selects his Top 10
●Weird rides
I’ve always been fascinated by the quirky, the unique, the extreme. Especially if I can cycle to it. Perhaps it’s a consequence of growing up in a house whose only books were the AA Road Atlas and the Guinness Book of Records.
I’ve been collecting weird places to ride ever since. Netherton Tunnel, in the West Midlands, for instance: a mile-and-a-half-long canal tunnel that’s a psychological challenge rather than physical – the ghostly acoustic and pitch dark is one of Britain’s scariest rides. Or the vertiginous aqueduct at Pontcysyllte outside Llangollen that’s like cycling a Niagara Falls tightrope: no wonder they ask you to dismount. Or Blackbushe Airfield in Surrey, whose disused runways make the widest ‘cycle paths’ you’ll see in Britain. Or Yate’s ‘Road to Nowhere’ near Bristol: a 1970s dual carriageway that somehow never got properly connected to the road network, and is now used as a film set, making a strange all-to-yourself cycle experience.
And many others. Yorkshire’s Spurn Head, a three-mile spit of sand sometimes barely wider than the tarmac track that goes way out into the North Sea. An underpass on NCN1 in the Lee Valley that could be Britain’s lowest headroom, just five feet: duck or grouse. Church Lane, a cobbled street in Whitby that rises at 50% – yes, 1 in 2. The lonely road to Loch Hourn on Scotland’s west coast, Britain’s longest cul-de-sac at 22 miles... my list goes on.
So, here are 10 of my favourites. They offer not only Instagram amusement, but also the basis of some super rides.
Holy IslandBeal, Northumbria
Sometimes the waves rule Britannia. Lindisfarne, aka Holy Island, is connected to the mainland by a mile-long causeway that gets inundated by the tide twice a day. Riding across it in the dry is a thrill; safe crossing times are posted up on site and online. But time it right on an incoming tide (check very carefully) and you can enjoy the nearest thing to cycling on water. Because immediately off the mainland, the road dips and is the first bit to be submerged by the tide. As the tide laps its way surprisingly quickly over the tarmac, you can ride around on top of it, aquaplaning on the water, and getting back to safe, adjacent dry land well before your bottom brack
