Great North Trail, the Route you Want to Take

2019-09-03
great north trail
2744
Views

Cycling UK is an organization whose goal is to promote the use of bicycles. Formerly known as The Bicycle Touring Club, the foundation was founded in 1878 by Stanley Cotterell. Today, in addition to promoting the use of bicycles, they also provide legal support to their members in the event of an accident, they fight for a bicycle infrastructure and they provide driving courses alongside many other activities.

One of these is making cycle routes, or bringing together existing routes. On the website there is even a generator of cycle routes where you can select a starting point, a destination and the pace you want to go at and it marks the route you prefer through bike paths, residential areas and quiet roads.

Great North Trail

Of the pre-set routes, the Great North Trail stands out. A route of 1,186 kilometers with 16,600 meters of bumps that runs from the south of the Pennines, in Derbyshire, England, to the north coast of Scotland. The expansion north of the “Pennine Bridleway”, which should cover the Great North Trail, is officially planned for 20 years, but in the light of government passivity, Cycling UK has decided to link several existing routes and thus create an alternative route.

The route passes 98% through areas without traffic, such as green roads, bike paths or residential areas, although most of them are all roads and paths through the countryside. In Cycling UK they have indicated the difficulty with different colors on a technical or uneven level of each section. There are even parts that can be done with children.

Great North Trail

You can find the full or split track, in case you want to start at a specific point or just want to make part of the route. To make the whole tour, it is best to do it in about 15 days, to be able to go at your leisure and to enjoy the experience without hurry. The areas it runs through are Yorkshire, Dales, Kielder Forest, Corrieairack Pass, Loch Ness and Cape Wrath. All very, very, green. The trail itself passes very close to Edinburgh and Glasgow, although it does not enter the urban centers. If the idea is to do some more “conventional tourism” here, you can find hostels where you can spend a day and park the bike. What we do see, and in fact part of it, is the Loch Ness. Seeing the monster is not guaranteed.

If you need the trail, as well as more detailed information such as where to stay every day, tips and basic information, we recommend that you visit a part of each part of the Great North Trail on the Cycling UK website.

What? Have you already decided where your next cycling holiday will be? Then take everything you need with you. Bicycle bags? Rest assured, we have these at Santafixie.

Great North Trail

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *