Cycling The Ridgeway - Then and Now?

[GrahamJohnWallace]

The Ridgeway has now been a National-Trail for 50yrs, though the Wiltshire/Berkshire section was being cycled long before this. The increasing use off off-road recreational vehicles in the 1970's turned what had been a relatively straightforward ride, enjoyed by rough-stuff riders on their road-bikes in the 1960's, into what could be an entertaining trail to ride on a mountain bike. Being a very different experience to ride in summer and winter, it soon became my favourite long-distance trail.

Back in the 1980's & 90's, I frequently cycled the Ridgeway and remember the mess that the four-wheel-drive vehicles used to make of the trail surface. This was worst in the winter when they carved up the soft ground, leaving the trail badly rutted and potholed throughout the following summer. However, since 2006 motor vehicle use has been restricted, drainage improved and the muddiest narrow sections gravelled.

It would be interesting to hear about people's experiences of riding it BITD as well as more recently?

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Here is a brief timeline of cycling on the Ridgeway from the formation of the world’s first off-road cycling organisation in 1955 to the arrival of American mountain bikes in the mid 1980’s.

Few riders of the Ridgeway write down their experiences, and even fewer have their ride accounts published. Therefore, the following list only includes a fraction of the pioneering cyclists who left their imprints on the Ridgeway.

Early Ridgeway Cycling Timeline:

Summer 1956. Rough Stuff Fellowship member Alan Mepham rides from Avebury to Streatley on an unmodified road bike.

1973. Geoff Apps rides the Ridgeway from Wantage to Wendover on a single-speed, balloon tyred, ‘equal wheel’ Pashley delivery bike. This was a period when Apps was trying out different styles of bicycle to find out how well they performed off-road.

July 1974. 18 years on, RSF member Alan Mepham, rides again from Avebury to Streatley.

1980. Geoff Apps and his girlfriend ride two of his Range-Rider mountain bikes along the Ridgeway.

December 1982. Geoff Apps starts running monthly mountain bike rides from Wendover in Buckinghamshire. These first British mountain bike rides frequently involved riding sections of the nearby Ridgeway.

Summer 1984. Nicholas Crane and Marsh Norris cycle from Streatley to Avebury on US mountain bikes

1985 July. Geoff Apps lead a group ride from Tring Station to Streatley and return the next day. (Riding this north-eastern half of the Ridgeway was far less common than the Wiltshire/Berkshire end because of the diversions required to circumnavigate the numerous footpath sections).

1985 November. Nicholas Crane with cousins Richard and Adrian cycle on mountain bikes from Streatley to Avebury at night.

December 1985. I took ten hours to ride from Avebury to Streatley on a Cleland Aventura bicycle designed for riding in mud. In summer this could be four-hour ride but in winter the surface could become so waterlogged, muddy and carved up by motor vehicles that, on some sections, it was easier to ride, off-piste, through the long grass at the edge of the trail.

December 31st 1985. Former Ridgeway riders Nicholas Crane and Richard Crane, take British-made mountain bikes up Kilimanjaro in Africa.

 

[enigma]

Hoping people join in with pics, I don't live too far away, and its on my list for next year. When I were a lad I walked some of it for my d of e.
I am a sensible mostly summer Land Rover laner ( standard and cossetted, not winch , tyres etc..! ) one of the reasons I am careful is ive ridden plenty of local lanes over the last thrity ish years and many used to be horrendous, owing to inconsiderate use of vehicles, horses, farmers, et all.. now much improved largely locally by various things, like being opened up and surfaced for stupid great big tractors, for instance.. but the ridgeway has eluded me with an atb.
Lord knows why as I live in Devizes, Wiltshire! I guess I am just spoilt round my hometown, and used to enjoy any really big rides mostly up on Salisbury plain in all fairness, hazy summer memories of riding for miles no handed on well maintained quiet tracks.. now the world and its mother tear around and the tracks are kept rough to slow them down and deter them.
I built an as yet not proparly tested retro bike packer bike last winter, and the ridgeway looks like a good bet for some mile crunching.
I can ride the K & A canal to pretty close to the ridgeway, around Froxfield if I remember rightly.
So I will be following this discussion hoping there's some good intel out there.. I cannot remember his name, there was a guy riding some of it on you tube , I saw ages ago...

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Hi enigma, I remember when the Land Rovers used to crawl along the Ridgeway in twos and threes so that they could pull each other out when they got stuck, and because local tractor drivers would charge to pull them out.

More recent, 'post restriction', forays onto the trail give the impression that conditions now have greatly improved. I must admit to being torn regarding these improvements. This is because I quite enjoyed the challenge of negotiating the deep ruts and riding through water filled pot holes at speed. Meanwhile, my wife hates riding through ruts because they have caused her to fall off in the past.

In the long-term, I hope that they don't improve it so much that it ceases to be a natural, unsurfaced trail.

I am planning to ride it sometime this winter from my home near to the Ivinghoe Beacon end to Avebury and back over four days. Only then, will I be able to make a good comparison with how it used to be.

Though I have ridden the Ridgeway at night, and in daylight snow, it's my ambition to ride it on a moonlit light when it's covered in snow. With a full-moon, you wouldn't need to use lights.

 

[swannymere]

Used to ride the Ridgeway in around 1999, 2000 and 2001 on an enduro motorbike with a friend on his. We got on from a car park just past north of Chieveley Services. We rode lightly and definitely noticed an increase in modded 4x4's who took great pleasure in getting stuck and then employing winches etc to get out. It got to the point that the enjoyment of a slow and steady ride was ruined by having to struggle through thick mud puddles that were upto 100m long. Got a road bike in the end.

 

[player]

Will ride parts of it this Saturday hopefully starting my ride at Totternhoe - Dunstable Downs-Ashridge then over to Wendover and Coombe Hill and back.

I now live in Somerset but grew up riding those trails in the 90's and would usually end up visiting the Mountain high shop in Risborough.

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Used to ride the Ridgeway in around 1999, 2000 and 2001 on an enduro motorbike with a friend on his. We got on from a car park just past north of Chieveley Services. We rode lightly and definitely noticed an increase in modded 4x4's who took great pleasure in getting stuck and then employing winches etc to get out. It got to the point that the enjoyment of a slow and steady ride was ruined by having to struggle through thick mud puddles that were upto 100m long. Got a road bike in the end.

Yes, I remember there were long sections with three parallel ruts. So either the outside ones made by 4x4s and the middle one by motorbikes or someone was driving Reliant Robins on the trail. Once we rode up to a Ford Escort which had grounded after falling into the ruts. Together we lifted it out but to our surprise the driver carried on, saying it was a hire car. I wonder what happened but there is no way he could have got through.

 

[swannymere]

Used to see convoys of Willy's Jeeps about 3 times a year and also the crusty travellers in their old coaches, trucks and various other trucks.

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Will ride parts of it this Saturday hopefully starting my ride at Totternhoe - Dunstable Downs-Ashridge then over to Wendover and Coombe Hill and back.

I now live in Somerset but grew up riding those trails in the 90's and would usually end up visiting the Mountain high shop in Risborough.

This is the area where UK mountain biking began when Geoff Apps started running monthly rides from Wendover library car park in late 1982.
I too used to visit the Mountain High bike shop in Risborough, usually at the beginning or end of riding the Risborough to Streatley section of the Ridgeway.

I hope you enjoy your ride.

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Bike packing 1985 style:



Camping near the River Thames at Goring in July 1985, after cycling from Tring Station.

In order to navigate around the numerous footpaths on the NE end of the Ridgeway, you either needed a lot of map-reading stops or a guide with good local trail knowledge. Remember, no sat-navs, mobile phones or internet for planning routes back then, just maps and a compass.

So this, my first long-distance ride on the Ridgeway, involved tagging onto the end of a group ride led by Geoff Apps. And I mean tagging on in the literal sense because, whilst I had been told that other riders would also be camping, it turned out that everyone else was travelling light having booked into B&Bs. And there are a few challenging hills at the Chiltern end of the Ridgeway that are not best suited to riding up on an overloaded bike.

Soon after, I invested in a lightweight tent.