Cruisin' in the Chilterns



I decided to go for a ride in the Chilterns, it's an area to the north west of London, towards the university town of Oxford.  It's characterised by quiet narrow laneways often with short sharp descents and climbs on the other side.



I started off near the town of Chesham and followed the Chilterns Cycleway which is a signposted cycle route of mainly quiet back lanes, some off-road paths and some B-roads.




Much of the ride was down narrow laneways which were dark and unlit, this combined with a potholed road surface made for challenging descents, which sometimes were very steep.  This was my first ride with my new handlebar bag, it was great riding with this as I could put my camera in there as well as all the other goodies I need to take along on a day ride.




The Chilterns was the home of Roahl Dahl and a lot of the lush countryside reminded me of some of his books which I read as a child.  I find sometimes riding in the countryside in England that it's difficult to get away completely from humanity, however the Chilterns was nice in that there is a lot of areas where you won't see anyone.



Many of the laneways are singletrack with tall hedgerows on either side, which made the descents combined with the poor road surface, a cautious affair.



One of the descents was a 20% gradient...



Finally I reached Henley-on-Thames, a town known for it's regattas.




A lot of the land is used for agriculture, there are lots of long quiet laneways which cruise along the perimeters of wheat fields.



A few stately homes...


I had to stop at Wycombe as my knee was giving me trouble and I couldn't make it back to Amersham, it's a shame as travelling back from Amersham would have been cheaper as it's in the Oyster zone.  Thanks for reading.

1 comments:

  1. Certainly a lovely spot to expl;lore. I had three days of cycling round here last year and was amazed at how quiet all the roads were. Some lovely little tracks to enjoy. Beautiful

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