North Wales

FatBurt

I live in Manchester and me and a handful of mates are looking at heading over North Wales in the First week of August with the intention of hitting a trail.

As there is a vast array of options on where to go, I'd like an idea of where you rabble would recommend going on our first biking day trip to the land of the vowelless.

The only trails I'm really aware of are the Marin trail and Llandegla so pro's and cons for these would be nice along with other recommendations

The riders range from intermediate to very experienced and fitness level would best be described as average.

Cheers

scale20

All these trails in North wales cater for riders of all abilities, the marin is good for that, not too gnarly. have sent you a pm.

delcol

try this link.
http://www.mbwales.com/

or a quick google search found.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q= ... CcountryGB

there a few good places in north wales llandegla is ok but coed-y-brenin is way better and is only a 2and half hour drive from manchester,
i was up at coeady the other week its truly awesome place,.
you wont be diasapointed with a trip to wales...

you could also take a trip up snowdon

iggs

The trail centres are fine but get off the beaten track a bit



Awesome riding





Others here - http://picasaweb.google.com/ianganderto ... BikeRoutes

Loads more to be found ith the aid of the number 17 1:25 000 OS map

Hope this helps

Anonymous

Marin trail sucks. Worst trail I've ridden.

Mancunianfightingcat

There was a diversion on the Marin trail last weekend, it cut out one of the best bits too, I would think it will be open again by August, but might be worth checking.
Also, bear in mind there is no visitor centre at Gwydyr (Marin trail). But despite others comments, the singletrack there is excellent, it's a lot more natural than Llandegla and takes a bit more concentration to negotiate, although the fire road climbs are rather long!
Penmachno is not far away either if you've got energy left.

Llandegla's good for a blast and has a visitor centre, cafe, bike wash etc. It suffers less in the wet as well. The trail is more rollercoaster like, and doesn't take much pedaling, so you should be able to do a couple of laps of the red/black routes or mess around on one of the jump areas if that floats your boat.

Anonymous

what annoys me about the marin trail is that it doesn't flow. You constantly seem to be climbing, and never seem to get any descending as a reward.
The two notable bits where you lose altitude are on straight fireroads, not even any corners to drift round.

Apart from that, there's a section that's unrideable unless you're hans rey. Riding up stairs is one thing, but riding up 3 foot+ rock steps?

And as for the trail feeling "natural", since when have fireroads, which makes up nearly three quarters of the course, been natural features?

It stinks of a trail that wasn't thought out.

kr1s

The marins a great trail - theres plenty of descending and some good free flowing sections, excellent scenery and a good taster if your a newb.
The fire roads and climbs exist to link it but arnt these part of being out there ??

:?

Anonymous

they're a part of it, yeah, but they shouldn;t be the only part.
As far as the scenery? meh, compared to what the surroundings have to offer, the views on the Marin trail are average at best.

Stu 74

Personally if you want to make a day of it I would do Penmachno loop 1 in the morning (get there early if you want a parking space!) followed by Llandegla Black in the afternoon. Penmachno is more rocky / technical while Llandegla is smoother and features more man made jumps etc. Completely different experiences with something for everyone!

I would recommend stopping at Rhug farm shop for lunch when travelling from Penmachno to Llandegla.

As yeehaa said, I wouldn't bother with the Marin. There are some good downhill sections at the end but there are loads of boring fire road climbs.

Don't discount CYB either as it is a fantastic place but its a little further away and I think you will get more variety by combining Penmachno and Llandegla.

Let us know where you go and how you get on!

Stu