Microadventuring, mini tours etc

Any recommendations for a destination for a quick wild camp this Friday? Planning a post work ride our from London and back, was thinking of heading down to Rye / Dungeness then back but wondered about alternative destinations as out that way into Kent is my usual riding territory (so loses some of the "uncharted wilderness" appeal!).

Main thing is finding spots that are nice for a wild camp...

How far do you want to go? Do you want to ride from your doorstep or consider trains part of the way?

South Downs.

Yeah, there's some lovely wild camping spots around Alfriston/Jevington etc on the SDW. If you want coastal cuckmere haven beach works for sleeping out on the beach and night/morning swims. Not so good for fires, but Friston Forest just back from the coast is also a great spot...

100k each way maybe? My Dungeness route is about 130k each way and that seems enough...

I'm doing after work so probably prefer not to take a train (might be difficult to be allowed on with a loaded bike).

South downs could work although I don't know a nice direct route out of London in that direction...

These are all really useful tips, right in range for this purpose!

Take the ride of the falling leaves route as far south as you want and then add some nice lanes to where you want to get to? https://ridewithgps.com/routes/7739511

Whitstable's a lovely destination, and this is probably my favourite ride from London, but I've yet to spot a good wild camping option in the vicinity... if anyone has any suggestions I'd love to hear them!

https://ridewithgps.com/routes/2706283

That looks nice! I do a similar route for day rides where I follow the pilgrim's way then go north to Rochester before looping back, but straight on to Whitstable looks nice too. Also an option, although I dunno how close to Whitstable I'd be able to find a camping spot where I'd feel safe enough sleeping with my bike next to me! I guess the beach if I can find a reasonably remote spot?

Thats's always been my thinking, but I've just been playing around with google street view there and a few miles in land from whitstable there are a load of the little blue circle (360 picture things) like this and this that appear to be showing the crab and winkle bike path, which I've heard of but never ridden. From those pictures it looks like there would be loads of opportunity to find a subtle bivvy spot. The only problem with this for me is that one of the main attractions is going to the old neppy on friday night, which is one of the great pubs, but probably too far to make it back from there to the crab and winkle way for decent bivvying....

Hmmm this is potentially an excellent suggestion! Will let you know if I go that way and how I get on if so, thanks very much

Please do mate, I'd love to know if it was a live option!

Annoyingly just wrote a long response to this which was lost as I tried to upload a picture!

I did use the route, thanks - it was a lovely one, I agree! Rolled into seasalter around 11pm and slept on the beach, awoke to a high tide, a sunrise over Whitstable / Herne bay and a seal swimming in the sea ahead of me... Pretty successful all round I'd say

Dreamy! Sounds perfect. Presumably the beach was deserted at that time and no disturbance from anyone/anything?

All pretty quiet - in hindsight I was slightly too close to the beach huts at seasalter next to the sportsman, as I could hear voices which made it slightly less restful. Still no disturbances though, and the early morning was pretty perfect.

Looking at mini tours from London that are train and or ferry. 3-4 days riding, not mega distances, credit card touring - so light loaded. Did the Isle of Wight recently and that went well, so maybe try further afield.

So far, have come up with..

1. Cherbourg to St Malo - about 250km, mostly greenways
   https://en.tourdemanche.com has some interesting routes, could use the ferry into Portsmouth from the start and finish in France - but the schedule is very seasonal.

2. Amsterdam > Utrecht and then where ever time allows.
   Direct train to Amsterdam then heading into the countryside, see some friends in Utrecht. The new train service is ££££. Need to wait for a sale!

Open to other ideas!

I did a mini tour to attend a wedding in Normandy last August, thoroughly recommend. It went like that:

• train to Portsmouth on Thursday morning very early and ferry to Cherbourg, arriving at 1pm
  
• mess around Cotentin, Normandie and Seine-Maritime for some time, attend wedding
  
• take late afternoon ferry back to Porstmouth from Le Havre on Monday, and train back to London on the same evening (my ferry was late so it was a bit tight but I got it in the end)
  
  

That added up to 420 km but could have been made shorter if needed.

Plenty of hotels/bivvy opportunities around, great roads and countryside (with variations depending on if you follow the coast or go inland). I slept at a monastery in Bricquebec and a hotel in Thury-Harcourt.

Best part - you don't need to prep any route. Just get this map and make it up as you go along.

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Your experience may differ, but I found cycle touring in NL boring as hell - too flat and the cycle lanes (which you have to use) can be a pain, although they're obviously very safe.

You can also take the eurotunnel with your bike in the Shuttle and ride down to say Dieppe or Le Havre, or up to some harbour in Belgium or the Netherlands (surely there's one).

Further West there's a ferry to Roscoff too (though it is from/to Plymouth), and you could also throw in a hop on Jersey/Guernsey?

It's more that I want to ease my other half in who is relatively new to riding. This is why I'd rather skip the London > Coast sections because I know what the traffic is like and how much nicer it is on the other side of the channel but you are most likely right! Need a few lumps and bumps.

The London > Coast section can be nice too depending on the route. Just don't bother with going through South London and take the train to Coulsdon South directly :)

Thanks, some great suggestions! Portsmouth is the easiest train/ferry port for us on the SW side of London but as you say, must be lots of ways across that I'm just starting to discover.
A ferry from the East coast to Hook of Holland could open up some routes too, like the EuroVelo.

I did something similar to @cgg in July, with my OH who is also new-ish to cycling!

1. Wednesday 7pm train Waterloo to Portsmouth and the overnight ferry to Le Havre, which was fantastic.
   
2. Thursday to Sunday cycle Le Havre to Cherbourg, 80ish kms per day (first bit out of Le Havre is very crap, lots of big roads and lorries, but after that it's pretty sweet and quite varied).
   
3. Fast ferry home Le Havre to Portsmouth on Sunday afternoon and train back to Waterloo, home by 10pm.
   

Yeah, get in/out of Le Havre is horrible if you want to cross over the Normandie bridge (which is a challenge in itself...) I guess it can be made much nicer if you cross with the ferry at Quillebeuf-sur-Seine, but that's quite a detour.

Normandy is fantastic, scenic, lovely roads, rolling terrain and easy to get to, take the night ferry from Portsmouth to Caen. Getting out of Caen is easy, take the bike path right out of the ferry port to the Pegasus bridge, turn left...
I've got a whole bunch of mapped out routes if you're interested.