With The Lake District and The Yorkshire Dales on our doorstep - KDCS offers an exciting selection of cycle rides throughout the local area and beyond. There are social gatherings including slide shows, talks and supper evenings and members are kept up to date with cycling news and issues through this web site, emails and our Facebook pages. KDCS are an affiliated group of Cycling UK.

KDCS Route 30 - Ambleside to Blelham Tarn, Hawkshead, High Cross, Coniston, Hodge Close, Colwith, near Skelwith Bridge, Drunken Duck and back.

Summary

Start  - by Ambleside Rugby Club, Borrans Rd, Ambleside, LA22 0EN                              GR  NY 373 037
  OS 97 Kendal and 90 Penrith, Keswick & Ambleside

distance - 21 miles (34 km)          1,925' climb  (585 m) grade - hard

Over the past few years a number of linked shared cycle/ pedestrian paths have been created in parts of the central lakes, providing a useful number of off-road routes. Public roads can be used to link them up.
There are numerous mix-and-match route possibilities within this network, and these 5 routes 29 – 32 are just a few of them.
The paths are mostly of hardcore material, good to cycle on and good for most size of bike tyres (28 mm and wider).

Map


To view elevation details please use this link and select "Elevation Graph" from the top left hand side corner of the map.
http://www.mappedometer.com/?maproute=776182

Description

From outside the rugby club, the route goes immediately left on the road signed A593 Coniston/ Hawkshead/ Langdale, but in 50 yds/m follows (left) a wooden footpath sign to Clappersgate/ Hawkshead, over the bridge and left on to the shared path alongside the busy A593 Coniston road.

In a few minutes the shared path ends, and the main road is joined for 30 yds/m, before taking the left turn to Hawkshead (B5286), over the bridge and alongside the River Brathay for a couple of hundred yds/m.

Where the road turns left, away from the river, there is one of the recently created shared paths, more or less  following the road line – blue bike sign NCN 6 Bowness by Ferry. This sign is followed for the next couple of miles (3 km).

The path climbs away from the river, then crosses the public road by the entrance to Skelwith Fold Caravan Park and up onto another bike path, which then runs along on the left hand side for 200 yds/m before again rejoining it (alternatively stay on the road once joined).

In another 150 yds/m a new shared path with a very narrow entrance appears on the left  where the road starts to go downhill. The only sign is a shared use symbol, and is easily missed if hidden by vegetation!

Follow this track down and up (alongside the road) to a small crossroads (where a road junction on the right goes up to Tarn Hows/ Coniston and the Drunken Duck pub). Here the path goes left (Bowness by Ferry/ Wray Castle cycle sign), into a wood, crosses the private road coming from the small crossroads and before long emerges from the wood and drops down to double gates – then crossing the public road to continue on the other side (same Bowness by Ferry sign).

Soon a shared path to Hawkshead 2 ½ miles is taken on the right, leaving the Bowness path, and cycling past Blelham Tarn. This gated track then leads to a steep slope up to a barn, then going right and through open land  to arrive at a public road.

A blue bike sign directs the route downhill to Hawkshead, then in 200 yards/m left onto a track (same sign) and soon right off it (wooden sign Hawkshead ½ mile) to cross a few fields and arrive at Hawkshead. This is about 5+ miles (9 km) from the start.

(Note – Hawkshead can be avoided if required by staying on the public road (not taking the Hawkshead track on the left, in the previous paragraph) to the main B5286 road, where go right (unsigned, towards Ambleside) and uphill for a couple of minutes to the Knipe Fold/ Field Head turn – see below for continuation from here).

Leave Hawkshead on the B5286 Ambleside road, and in about a mile (2- km) go left at the Knipe Fold/ Field Head turn.

The road has a couple of steep sections, and after joining (going left) a larger road the climbs continue before flattening and arriving at the crossroads on the Hawkshead – Coniston road. Most of the climbing has now been done.

(Note - The Forestry Commission High Cross public car park and entrance to Grizedale Forest is opposite the crossroads just mentioned. If preferred this can be reached directly from Hawkshead off – road, by taking the gradually climbing bridleway up through the arch beyond the Co-op (Vicarage Lane), straight on when the tarmac ends, up to the waymarked Green route Grizedale Forest Trail to High Cross. The Green route bears right at 3 junctions, but when the Green route goes 90 degrees left High Cross is reached by turning right -  down to the car park and forest entrance. The bridleway up from Hawkshead is ¾ mile (1 + km), generally ok, but pushing may be needed, and the Forestry Trail is wide and fine. This off – road alternative avoids the steep and sometimes busy road climbs from Hawkshead to High Cross. This is 2 + miles (3 km) from Hawkshead. From High Cross car park simply go over the crossroads to the new path entrance, as below).

The next new path starts immediately before the crossroads, on the right, a wooden sign indicating Coniston/ Tarn Hows. It soon enters a wood and descends (sometimes steeply), following the Coniston signs. Half way down is the Forestry Commission work site, sometimes a bit muddy. Here the route goes right to then go left in ¼ mile (½ km), and thereafter the descent towards Coniston is fine, again with some descents on a good surface.

The path crosses over the public road down from Tarn Hows, and soon the path joins the main road. In 30 yds/m there is another permissive path (behind the hedge on the right) which runs alongside the B5285 road into Coniston. If the path is busy with people the road itself is an easy flat option into nearby Coniston.

Leave Coniston on the A593 Ambleside road through the village.

Just outside the village a sign “Ambleside avoiding the A593” leads to a gently undulating shared gravel path running roughly parallel to the road, crossing straight over the Tilberthwaite road in a mile (2- km) and continuing to the nearby Hodge Close tarmac public road, going left over the bridge and up towards Hodge Close.
(This shared gravel path can be avoided by simply staying on the flat but sometimes busy main road, going left at the “Hodge Close only” turn).

The tarmac road climbs (sometimes steeply) to Hodge Close quarry and ends at gate (“37” sign only) which is passed through, on to a gently descending and straightforward gated bridleway (fine for most tyres) down to Stang End.

At Stang End the route goes right, onto a tarmac public road (wooden 637 sign Elterwater/ Ambleside),
then in ¼ mile (½ km) leaves it by a farm, through 2 gates in the small farmyard (same 637 signs) and then through a gate onto a new gravel path after the farmyard (Cumbria Way footpath sign only at time of writing).

It passes through a couple of gates, and on entering the woods it bears right (where the Cumbria Way goes left), and drops down, sometimes steeply, to the public road at Colwith. Going left here takes you to Elterwater (see rides 29 and 32), but this route goes right, steeply uphill to join, going left, the A593 towards Ambleside.

This main road is quite narrow and can be busy, so take care. It rises at first, then starts to descend and in 1/3 mile (½  km) down from the top bears right off the main road onto an unsigned small lane to Hawkshead.
Great care should be taken here, crossing in front of traffic behind and with poor visibility for oncoming traffic.

This small lane climbs steeply, then drops to a junction at Bull Close, the route here going right (Hawkshead/ Coniston) and right again at a nearby Y junction (same sign).

In a mile or less (1+ km) the Drunken Duck pub is reached. Here the route goes left (Ambleside) for a fast descent to the main road crossroads.

Here the outward route is re-joined and retraced, using the new path towards Skelwith Fold Caravan Park and on down to the new  path end by the river Brathay.

Here go left (NCN 6, Ambleside) on the small riverside lane, and shortly cross the river footbridge (same NCN sign), then going right and follow the road/ shared path back to the rugby club start  (the last 50 yds/m being on the pavement).