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Weather permitting I am planning on doing the Victoria Line and the Uxbridge branch of the Piccadilly line on sunday. Ping me if you want to join me, will be plotting the route tonight.
Pmd
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Might help out with the Waterloo City Line, but not until spring at least.
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Where the hell is the DLR entrance to Stratford International?
It's here,
if you go to the Stratford International rail terminal the DLR entrance is across the road going north towards the Olympic village
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Really enjoying your story btw
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I have plotted the route for the Victoria and Piccadily Lines. The weather is looking ok so far. The route works out at 105KM, I have tried to minimise back tracking to see stations, in Central London have opted for the big and busy roads because I reckon on Sunday it will be fine. I don't like the roads from Kings Cross to Tottenham much, usually bad surfaces, so again I have picked the busier roads rather than using the shortcuts.
http://ridewithgps.com/routes/4050324
The west side route is partially my commute route plus regular routes I use day to day, so I know them quite well. The plan is to set of from Brixton station at around 9am. So far I have sacredhart potentially joining me, if anyone else is interested then PM me.
Looking at the elevation profile this is not too bad, can be done SS or fixed its your call. I am rocking gears tomorrow since the roller's bb is shot at the moment anyway.
Update : Realised on the day I had left out Walthamstow Central off the route, have now added it.
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Ahh thanks Marcomarcos, so it is International Way. I just looked at this on streetview and it looked a bit 'no you cannot come through here'
https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=International+Way,+London+Borough+of+Newham&hl=en&ll=51.545401,-0.00939&spn=0.000667,0.001725&sll=51.528642,-0.101599&sspn=0.341745,0.883026&oq=international+w&hnear=International+Way,+London+E15+2DU,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=19&layer=c&cbll=51.545567,-0.009434&panoid=hzdKS-hvMjnxrOxFq78v_w&cbp=12,88.12,,0,0
So is this an old streetview pic? Can I cycle up International Way to the DLR or shall I go to the end of Roundhouse Lane and walk through?Lovely day for a ride Fasih and Sacredheart, have fun and let me know how the Piccadilly line stretch goes.
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First ride out over a couple month break is always going to be a little difficult but things were more problematic than normal.
I had tried to put the gpx track I had prepared on to my phone the night before however, osmand refused to render the track giving errors. Yet I imported it on to other websites and reader without issue, must be a new bug in osmand, I wish I had not accepted an update last week. Old tracks which worked before stopped working too. Anyway I know the Victoria Line route pretty much up to Finsbury Park anyway, so I figured I would just use Google Maps as needed.
Perhaps I should have stayed in bed on Sunday morning. Had intended to be on the road for 8am, however I didn't get out of bed till 8.45. Once I was ready and got going it was a little after 9am. I hit road works in Battersea which made me decide to take an alternate route to Brixton. I must have missed a turn and ended up by Vauxhall so instead of back tracking to find the turn I figured I would just go via Stockwell even though I am going to be doing the same route 15 minutes later in the opposite direction. This added a few extra kilometers. I got to Brixton at around 9.50am. Took a photo and set off after texting sacredheart who was going to join me at Seven Sisters.
I took a wrong turn a the Highbury and Islington roundabout, and headed towards Stoke Newington (route I take to get to easts) rather then straight up the Holloway Road. Luckily I realised this when I saw the Newington Green turn, so I turned around and consulted gmaps which told me to go down Highbury Park instead, which comes out infront of Finsbury Park tube. From there it is a straight run to Seven Sisters. I got there at 11.10am.
Locked the bike up and headed to Costa to grab a coffee whilst sacredheart appeared. Drinking my coffee took a little bit longer than planned, and way we setoff for the next station. In fact everything went well until we got to Walthamstow Central.
Now since I could not use my gpx track. I decided to use gmaps navigation to get us to Cockfosters, this was my first big mistake of the day.
Riding with the GPS when you don't know where you are going is a slow, you ride slower and you second guess turn instructions. We wasted time taking a route that took us on the A406, so we decided to back track and find an alternative. Adding an extra 7km, thing were looking up again. Unfortunately we got seperated by a light, causing sacredheart to miss a turn. So I patiently waited for him to head back, which he did after a few minutes. It was now 1pm, and the phone was still saying 30 minutes to get to Cockfosters. sacredheart had a time limit, he decided to head back and do some climbing drills instead.
I had put a new set of V-Brakes on the bike during the week, so I was really worried about them not being right. Since I had only ridden a few miles with them. Thankfully they didn't let me down.
The route to Cockfosters is quite up and down. Just as I got near Oakwood station there was a set of big hills, not too much of a problem. Except for the last one when my chain snapped.
Now I had a chain tool with me on a multitool, however I seem to missing the bit that allows you to rotate the bolt, which happens to be another 5mm allen key slot. Obviously you can't use the one on the multitool. So I rolled the bike to the station, and went into the cab office and asked to borrow a 5mm allen key. No drivers were around at the time, so I had to wait a while. Finally a cabbie with some tools showed up. So I was able to fix the chain. By now it was nearly 2.10, and I was not feeling that I could get to Uxbridge before dark.
I was about a mile from Cockfosters, instead of heading there I figured the best thing was to head home. Traffic through Wood Green was really heavy. I hit most of the stations apart from Arnos Grove on the way back. Arsenal were at home meaning that I had to walk my bike down the road on which the station is on. I kept on route till Russell Square, which at that I point I just took the fastest route home, was back home by 4pm.
Not a great ride, but I got some distance in about 80km including the rides to the start point and all the wrong turns.
In a couple of weeks I will give the Piccadily line another try, I will cycle up to Liverpool Street and get a train to Enfield, then cycle along to Cockfosters that ride will be ~65km should be a breeze.
Lessons Learned : Buy a F**KIN Garmin, carry a second 5mm allen key, don't use Google Maps in dynamic route mode.
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^Ooof more than your fair share of drama there, but you got back home unscathed and dealt with the unexpected so it still counts as an adventure.
And bah humbug a garmin helps but is not essential, embrace the tunnocks retro method! Its done me well so far, and of course you get a choc, biscuit and marshmallow bonus, but you can deny it gives any personal gratification (lies) and claim to having to eat teacakes for navigational purposes.
I'm just waiting to hear back from Nic on his availability but have done routes for District and Hammersmith and City lines which I plan to do together, either tomorrow or Friday, starting in Richmond and ending at Hammersmith, which including the ride out to the start should be around 100 miles. And weather permitting I plan to tackle the cols of the Northern Line at the weekend.
Anyone that fancies coming and playing with the traffic pm me and we can arrange meeting up times, exchange numbers etc. I'm happy to meet people on route if you don't fancy all of it. I'm trying to only add the final rides on here not the planned routes as I'm bound to go a bit wrong and it will make much mess and confusion, but I have gpx's of the remaining routes so if you have garmin and want to come along pm me and I'll ping over the gpx files.
I'll confirm if next leg is tomorrow or Friday later today.
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I can't do tomorrow now so the District and Hammersmith & City lines will take place on Friday instead. 9am meet out front of Richmond Station for coffee break and aim to depart at 9.15am
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After a few weeks of cycling inactivity this was back on yesterday with another 2 lines, the District and Hammersmith and City lines. And an extra bonus for this leg, I had some company. Howard from these here parts clearly had nothing better to do for the day, so decided to join in this leg of the urban adventure/nightmare. I was late arriving at Richmond so he was already having a coffeee when I rolled up. A quick photo and we set off on the multi branch District line.
Plotting the District line route is like one of those maths problems you get in school, which branch should I start at and in which order should the branches be done to complete it in the shortest distance? I confess to not doing these calculations, instead I squinted at the ridewithgps plotted route, could'nt tell if there was any significant difference between starting in what I though the best start options, Richmond and Wimbledon, so decided on starting in Richmond as it was likely to have the least amount of headwinds and it just felt better doing the complete line from West to East. Though not the longest line I've done to date it has the most stations with 60, and had by far the longest list of directions, with 13 hand held Tunnocks sheets, here's a sample, District 9. (of 13)
At the first roundabout I must have thrown a dodgy signal or rode a confusing line as I sent Howard off down the wrong road, and shortly after bagging our first stop after Richmond, Kew Gardens, I took a wrong turn, went 'off Tunnocks' and ended up heading up the right road, but in the wrong direction. After that sketchy start he must of been wondering just what he'd let himself in for, but apart from another little moment of navigatory doubt somewhere between Upminster and Barking it all went to plan.After recent months it seems to sky has run out of rain so we were left with lovely weather for February. At one point in Southfields I could feel the bright thing in the sky warming my skin, what is this death ray in the heavens? We had to do multiple visits to Earls Court which was made more problematic by the one way system. I almost got hit in the face by a paniced pigeon and a white van pulled right out across me in a crazy 10 seconds in Victoria but otherwise it was pretty smooth going, apart from the road surfaces which seemed to deteriorate as we went from West to East. It was a long old line, taking just over 7 hours including stops.
And I'm sorry to report I am still crap at taking photos. Upminster has a proper full size ye olde windmill, and despite riding past it twice, and stopping for a post District line pint and food at the adjacent pub called The Windmill I did'nt get any pictures of it, massive fail. The food was underwhelming, Howard's coleslaw did'nt arrive, and nor did any refund or other offer which was a bit poor. I think Howard may also have already contacted Trading Standards to enquire as to what the minimum legal requirements are for the dish known as side salad. And strangely the fries were more expensive than the chips.So after refreshments it was time to head back to Barking for the start of the Hammersmith and City line. As we were losing the sun the temperature had dropped so Howard unpacked his jacket only to find the zip had broken, leaving him rather draughty for the return leg into the headwind, and bringing his drag coefficient a tad closer to my flappy trousers and fleece.
Rather than the A124 I opted for a ride through the Chase nature reserve. The big 5 were notable by their absence, it was'nt the Serengeti, it was'nt even Longleat. Who even knew Dagenham had a nature reserve, or is nature reserve estate agent speak for wasteland? But it had a short section of mud path for some slip slding fun and we saw some moorhens a heron, neither of which we'd seen elsewhere. Though we did'nt see any I've since discovered it has some rare bird visitors such as pine bunting, great snipe and spotted crake, and has notable plants like spiny restharrow, warty cabbage and black mustard. It was definitely better than the A124 and a nice break from the otherwise relentless urban jungle.
We arrive in Barking
...and its total gridlock, loads of rozzers about so looked like something had just gone down. Howard was in for another treat and example of how classy I am as I detoured us down by the bins of a dark dingy back alley where grim criminal things must have happened, and they did again as my rest stop lager leaked out. Not being in a official public toilet I was able to look up and around to examine my surroundings, and saw a 2 pack of unopened sausages on the wall in front of me. Were they for the bin? Had someone got them out of the bin? Did the last person who'd rushed down this alley for a piss get home an hour later and bellow 'fuuuuuu the sausages!' Who knows or even cares.During the course of the day and in doffed cap reverence to the original tube map I made Howard do some seemingly pointless detours and there were a few points where I chose to avoid the road route. At Victoria we dismounted and walked across onto Victoria St rather than do the 1 way system of horror and we did the cycling equivalent of tiptoeing down the cut through from Ravenscourt Park to Glenthorne Road. We took a naughty right turn just after Aldgate East up Old Castle St, so the line loops up and around Algate station like the orignal map and we also did a loop just after Euston Square to ensure the line remained above Warren Street and Regents Park stations like the original map. However in doing this and in my quest to squeeze in a cobbled mews section I'd not ridden before I went down Pelo Place, and I have come uncomfortably close (to me at least) to missing Great Portland St but you can see the station across the road, and as I can't be arsed to ride the line again I'm claiming it.
We finally arrived back in Hammersmith at 8pm, which after leaving Richmond at 9.20am meant another long day in the saddle. My total mileage for the day came out at 116 miles and Howard did 130.
So thats a total so 278 of 381 station stops done so far on 9 out of the 11 main lines, with just the Northern line and Piccadilly line to go.
Victoria line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168039
Central line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168037
Bakerloo line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168035
Jubilee line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179359
Metropolitan line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179362
Waterloo & City line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181152
Circle line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181146
District Line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259166
Hammersmith & City http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259143
Days ridden so far = 4
Distance cycled drawing tube lines so far = 340 miles
Total distance ridden on this project including riding to and from home and between lines = 420.8 miles
P****ures = 1
Traffic lights encountered = seems like all of them
Years taken off life = unknown -
Made me laugh earlier in the story when you said you were going to try and find a decent pub in Barking!
BTW, yes you can cycle down International Way now to the Stratford International DLR.
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^Thanks for the DLR tip.
Yeah I have higher hopes for pubs at the ends of the Northern and Piccadilly lines. In fact the quality of boozer may determine which direction I do it in. Its the Northern line next and I've never been to any pubs in High Barnet, Edgware or Morden, any recommendations?
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Thanks for pub tip but planned Northern line drinks have to be tweaked as this morning as I realised I've missed Lambeth North and Elephant & Castle from the end of the Bakerloo line. There was rich and varied swearing. This will not do and is especially embarrassing as I live in Vauxhall/Oval so know this part of town very well. I don't know what came over me.
So the Bakerloo line has to be done again. Thankfully its one of the shorter lines so I'll probably do it the same day as the Northern line. I'm now likely to start the Northern line in Morden, do the loop around the city, then up to High Barnet and back down and up to Edgware, then over to Harrow & Wealstone for the Bakerloo line. So am now looking for a decent pub stop somewhere between Edgware and H&W.
Two steps forward and one step back. Must concentrate, the thought of doing the Piccadilly line twice is the stuff of nightmares.
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Day 5 & 6, Northern line and groundhog day.
Having botched my first attempt at the Bakerloo line I got up yesterday and planned to re-do that, and have a crack at the mountainous stage, the Northern line. It was a lovely sunny morning for the ride to the start in Morden.
I've been getting some funny looks from people as I take photos of the stations. Some commuters were looking around as if checking for some amazing spectacle they'd somehow missed, and upon seeing none, looked back at me with 'really? why?' expressions on their faces.The first bit was a dodddle as its just A23 and A3 with no potential for errors. I decided on the City branch first so went via Bank up to Camden, before turning around and going back down the Charing Cross branch to Waterloo and rejoining south of Kennington like the original map. It was then back up the Bank branch again to Camden where the tour reached the foothills of the Alps.
As I was doing the Bakerloo line afterwards I decided to finish the Northern line in Edgware as its closer to Harrow and Wealdstone, so it was up the High Barnet branch first. I stopped for a peanut butter sandwich, stripped down to a t-shirt and basked in the sun on the benches at the top of Archway hill. An elderly lady rode by on a lovely Roberts seemingly enjoying the days riding. I hope I'm still regularly riding my bike when I get to her age. If I keep missing stations I will be her age before finishing this. I shouted out 'nice bike' and was blanked, or possibly not heard. Remounting it was up to Mill Hill and back before continuing northwards. There followed a horribly busy stretch up to High Barnet, with the right turn into the station feeling particularly vulnerable as traffic raced up and down the hill.
I got my flask out for a coffee and the heavens opened so I scurried to the covered bike rack and cowered there for 5 minutes as the rainclouds blew over.
That was the first hilly section done, no climbs to cause concern for the mono geared, just gradual inclines. I enjoyed the descent back to Camden before the Galibier of the day loomed before me, the climb up to Hampstead. As usual it was a traffic nightmare with lorries and buses inching past each other leaving no room to squeeze by, so progress was stop start but I grunted to top. A brief, predictably horrific section of Watford Way followed soon after Hendon, before the final push to Edgware.
It all went very smoothly with no wrong turns and all 50 stations visited. I'd guessed the Northern line would the have the most climbing. My version of the Central line had more at 3674ft of ascent compared to the Northerns 3460ft, but the Central line included a 6 mile stint in the wrong direction around Theydon Bois which accounts for 365ft of climbing. Once corrected the Northern line is in fact king of the mountains in terms of ascent . I like the look of the Northern line gpx.
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2282509
It was then 3 miles over to Harrow and Wealdstone for the deja vu Bakerloo line. My first attempt had quite a few wrong turns and looked a mess. The second attempt was 6 miles shorter, half and hour quicker and seemed to go well.
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2282508
I got back to Heffalump and Castle at 5.30 after 93.8 miles for day.
But I checked this morning and NOOOOO! I'd missed Kenton on the Bakerloo line, sob only the second bloody station on route. BOLL. OX. It seems like a case of over confidence combined with brain freeze, seemingly getting confused and taking the same turn I did doing the Metropolitan line. All in all a massive cock.....
...........up.Fuelled by a David Banner-esque inner fury, a pint of espresso and some loud music, I hooned up there this afternoon to do the Bakerloo line for the 3rd time. The condition of Harrow Road is a disgrace, the responsible councils should hang their heads in shame. Its done more than any road I've ridden so far to convince me to get fatter tyres next time I'm in the market for new rubber. I've just checked the gpx and thankfully it seems fine.
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2284876
So what was supposed to be one of the shorter and easier lines turned into groundhog day. Including getting to and from the start and finish points the Bakerloo line has taken 92.9 miles of riding to get right. What a shambles. Unfortunately if I do the overground lines I'll have to visit Harrow and Wealdstone again. I may be waking up in 'nam style flashbacks and be continually haunted by the bloody place.It's becoming increasingly apparent how much of my life is being wasted waiting at traffic lights during the course of this project. I'm not advocating and won't be rjl'ing, but all that dead time is really mounting up. I feel I could be doing more with it, like learning another language or studying string theory or something. I'm doing most of my eating and drinking on the move, so the rain dodging, toilet and photo stops must have accounted for less than 20 minutes of the 5 hour 43 mins it took to do the Northern line. Yet stopped time is nearly an hour and half. By the time I've finished this I reckon I'll have been standing around like a bollard for the equivalent of a whole days riding. What a waste, and nothing but acute diesel poisoning to show for it. I'm surprised advertisers are'nt making use of all this standing around we're doing and bombarding us with adverts and infomercials on screens placed at traffic lights. shudders at the thought
So 11 of the 12 main lines done. I'm off to Wales tomorrow for 10 days with no bike, so my cycling legs will have gone away by the time I'm back for the Piccadilly line. While I'm away I'll try my first tentative steps at getting the gpx's on the same map to get a picture of what is looks like. cough If any budding design students or anyone else wants to have a play with gpx's to see what they map magic they can conjure up, please feel free.
Victoria line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168039
Central line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168037
Bakerloo line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168035
Jubilee line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179359
Metropolitan line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179362
Waterloo & City line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181152
Circle line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181146
District Line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259166
Hammersmith & City http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259143
Northern line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2282509
Bakerloo line, 3rd time lucky http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2284876Total distance ridden so far = 549.7 miles
Of which there's only been brief spells of countryside on the Central and Metropolitan lines. I may need to go and lie down in field for a bit when this is finished. -
This project is awesome. I'll put my father in law to shame with it, he did this last year by tube (although alphabetically) and it took him all year!
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lol at messing up the Bakerloo line again!!
Sorry.
Can't get the staff, honestly.
Backstop
Howard
sacredhart
middleofnowhere
marcomarcos
fasih
Shoosh
.gaz.
ewanmac
user8746
Oliver Schick-
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About
Cycle the Underground,overground,wombling free,making a tube map for a poster for me
Posted by
@blue_fleet
^Hello. I've been in Bristol for 2 weeks with zero cycling and my legs seem to have turned to jelly. The weather has been a bit too 'end of days' for my liking, but the guilty embarrassed looking weathermen and women seem to hint that from Sunday it might just be safe to go outside again.
Sunday may be a bit soon for me though as I've not written out the route notes for the remaining lines yet and I'm a bit busy this weekend, but I am going to be back on this next week. I've just bought a six pack of Tunnocks tea cakes, which together with last nights Magnum Classic 3 pack should provide ample route note cardboard for the upcoming lines.
I've done the Victoria line already but I'd be interested to here any comments on the Piccadilly line as the western section is mostly unknown to me. I think I'm going to do it all in one hit but have'nt decided if I'm starting out in Heathrow or Cockfosters yet.
I'm not 100% yet but I'm likely to do the District line and Hammersmith and City lines next. Likely to start in Richmond then up all the branches and then out to Upminster, and bag the Ham & City line on the way back. The best time for a pub break would be between the serious business of line tracing, so if anyone knows of any good pubs between Upminster and Barking I'd be grateful for any recommendations.
I don't think my phone battery will last long enough for me to do the Piccadilly line and Northern line in one day so they will be given a day each.
After MON mentioned the DLR and Overground I finally sat down and had a look at these yesterday, I've nearly finished the DLR route which looks do-able but finding road access to some of the stations is a tad tricky. Where the hell is the DLR entrance to Stratford International? On google maps I've looked at the roads as near to it as I can get, International Way (surely this is it right?-wrong.) Roundhouse Lane (Family Guy reference pending if its this one) and Hitchcock Lane, but can't see it anywhere. Where is the taxi pick up point, there must be one. Please god tell me I don't have to go into Westfield. It also has another river crossing so hopefully this time the ferry will be open.
And as for the Overground, eeek its mahoosive, and it goes to Watford again, groan. That one I will have to do in sections, it says its in 4 branch lines so I will probably do these individually and then splice the gpx's together.
Anyway by the end of Monday I hope to plot and have full directions for the remaining 4 standard tube lines and will post up on here. I'll then have a butchers at the weather forecast and try and pencil in days for them if anyone fancies joining me, but they will be re-arranged if its raining or hurricaning.
I'm off to the bike show in Excel today so may do a bit of DLR recce'ing.