Danby, Fryup, Glaisdale & Lealholm

Heavy rain throughout the week and again overnight prior to our ride, followed by a brief but heavy downpour on the morning too, meant that we pretty much knew what to expect from this ride in terms of the conditions under wheel. What we didn't know was quite what the route had in store for us in terms of the terrain. Tony had planned the route and then dropped out, leaving me to guide it, and a quick glance at the map made me think it was pretty much all stuff we had done before. I was wrong - a good 50% of the off-road sections were stuff we hadn't done before, and some of the stuff we had done before we hadn't done that way round, which made it totally different.

6 of us set off from Danby Moors Centre, heading up Park bank and taking the first left at the brow of the hill. A couple of hundred meters on and we turn offroad to the left and onto the bridleway over Castleton Pits. This pretty much set the scene for the day - it was totally waterlogged, the dual track being more like dual streams.

We stayed with this until it hit the road past Clitherbeck Farm, turned left onto the road for a short section then went offroad once more to the right. This is the Pannierman's Causeway and we've ridden a part of it on the other side of the road, but not on this side. We actually missed the causeway for quite a bit, following an obvious trail on the ground that was not necessarily the right one! Eventually we joined up with where we ought to have been (evidenced by the flagstones that mark this ancient right of way) and descended down towards the crossing of Ewe Crag Beck. Unfortunately here, near a dwelling, we stayed too far right and missed the actual bridleway, traversing a field until we reached the gate at the bottom. The landowner and his wife were both stood at the top of the field bellowing at us that "this is not a right of way". I decided that the only correct thing to do was to go back, face them, and apologise, even though we were just a gate and 4 feet away from where we wanted to be.

We dragged our bikes back up the hill and faced the music. The guy was pretty annoyed, but cooled down when we were apologetic and said we had no interest in going the wrong way, we had just made a simple mistake. He told me we were the first bikers who had ever apologised - perhaps if more did he wouldn't get so irate. Having said that, his own initial attitude left a lot to be desired and was rubbing some of us (yes, you Neil) up the wrong way.

So back on track again we headed for the ford crossing at Ewe Crag Beck, a crossing Tony had commented "might be a bit iffy". We needn't have worried, even with all of the rainfall there had been it was easily rideable and no one got there feet wet save for the splash caused by the wheels cutting through the water.

Up out the other side, a nice grassy climb and then an even nicer nice grassy descent back down to the road near Danby.

We do a sharp right at the road, almost doubling back on ourselves, and take this to the next junction where we turn left. Right at the next junction and we're on Longlands Lane for a while before we turn off down the track that leads up to North End Farm. Just before reaching the farm buildings there's a left hand turn through a narrow gate, and beyond that is a push up a slippery, rocky slope that gains us 200 feet before we're able to remount. We came down this way a few rides ago and I'd forgotten just how steep and rocky it was. Gorgeous views from the top.

A bit more level riding (well, less steep anyway) and we reach the start of the descent - the reason we're up here! The previous time we'd come this way we'd come up what we were now about to go down, and even in the dry it was pretty much unrideable due to the steepness and the technicality that the various rocks and drops added into it.

We threw ourselves off the top as fast as we dared, taking care in the wet and slippery conditions but enjoying the challenge.

Towards the bottom the track swings left, flattens out slightly and broadens out into a more grassy surface. The ideal opportunity to let go the brakes and pick up some real speed. A bad line choice while doing 24mph+ saw me giving thanks to the "Jumps & Drops" course I'd done a couple of months back. The "grassy  slope" suddenly became "4 foot vertical mini-cliff". My mindset is still not quite at the point where I think "Oh good, a jump". It starts off as "oh dear, how do I avoid this...?" followed by "this is gonna hurt a lot...!!" followed by "why don't I just jump it...?" I sailed off the end and landed it perfectly.

At the end of the track we're back at the road. We have a little amusement at Craig's expense. He's already part way up the road climb when we shout him back because we're going to be going the other way. But then find that we're not. Sorry Craig, back up that bank you go!

We do the road climb up New Way, ignoring the bridleway descent that we usually do (around Round Hill) and instead go down Raven Hill. At the head of the climb we meet a group of uppity walkers who try to tell us we have no right to ride this track and that "it has to be 3m wide before we can bring a bike on it". We smile, wave politely and continue on our way.

The walkers must gain a little amusement from the fact that the trail proves to be unrideable. The first hundred meters or so is fine, but after that it becomes too steep, rocky and slippery (and with a stream running down it) to ride. It's hard enough for me to walk!

Eventually the track becomes rideable once more and we decide to consign this track to the "don't bother" list - well, certainly not when it's wet. It may be more of an option when it's nice and dry. At the bottom of the hill the track turns left and becomes a nice grassy traverse that ends at Woodhead Farm.

 We pass through the farm and continue on to reach the road, pass Fryup Hall Farm and turn right towards Street. This brings us to one of my favourite road climbs, up Street Lane towards Glaisdale Rigg. It's a tough old slog, especially near the road junction mid-climb where naturally we take the steeper, right hand option. At times it's hard to keep the front wheel planted on the tarmac.

Usually we take the road all the way to the top - today we're doing a bit of bridleway that cuts diagonally across Stony Rigg. Unfortunately Neil doesn't know this and is almost at the top of the road climb before we call him back. We take a look at the bridleway - it looks like yet another trudge up a muddy hill pulling a bike along, and we decide to bin it and take the road way after all. Sorry Neil.

At the top of the road we turn right and then turn back on ourselves onto Glaisdale Rigg, right by where we should have emerged. A quick glance down makes us glad we opted for the road way.
A fairly quick, loose and rocky blast along Glaisdale Rigg and we take the second waymarked bridleway on the right.

This is a grassy, muddy slope in a bit of a cut that works its way diagonally down the hillside before turning to go straight down across a field and emerge at the road where we turn left.

As we go along the road I keep seeing bridleways coming down onto it - there must be dozens of ways down off Glaisdale Rigg. Eventually the GPS tells me that one of these "ways down" is in fact our way back up! Just before Postgate Farm we turn left onto yet another steep and slippery bridleway, but at least this one's rideable, bar for a few meters of pushing.

Up on Glaisdale Rigg once more we bear left and descend a track that emerges at the road by Broad Leas. Right onto the road then left at the first junction and we follow the tarmac until it runs out and becomes a rough track descending towards what I expect to be a ford. It's nice to see there's actually a bridge there, and Craig takes a bit of friendly ribbing for his well intentioned comment of "what a good place to put a bridge". "Yes, over a river. Where would you put it in Canada?"

Yet more mud and puddles (small swimming pools more like) await us at the other side of the bridge but we're soon out of it and back onto Tarmac. Not much excitement left for us now, just a long, largely road ride back to Danby. Thankfully our route isn't taking us up onto Danby Beacon, a bit of a pointless and boring drag whose only worthiness is as a fitness booster. None of that today, we just want to get back.

We stay on Rakes lane, through Lealholm Side and on to Oakley Side where we turn left for our final descent of the day.This is another track that is washed out from excessive water leaving a lot of bare rock and slippery cobbles, so it's speed and caution in equal measure down to the bottom.

Right onto the road at the bottom and it's just a quick blast of a mile or so back to Danby Lodge.
It's been a good ride, though at times I've cursed Tony and said the "he knew what he was doing, planning this and then bailing out". There's been a lot of mud, but really only the climb to Ainthorp Rigg and the descent of Raven Hill were unrideable, and the rest was good fun and good exercise, and with some really splendid views. A good bit of banter today too, not least aimed at Howard and his constant wardrobe changes.

Only 3 of us bothered with the cafe. I had a culinary first - beans in toast (no, there's no spelling mistake there). Toast cut into fingers and built up into a square, a bit like a sheep pen, then filled with baked beans. It was a trifle bizarre, maybe showing some country influence. They'll be doing dry toast walling next.

Danby, Fryup, Glaisdale & Lealholm, 22 miles, 3300' of ascent in four hours dead, a pretty good pace.

Riders: Steve, Tim, Neil, Craig, Sam, Howard

Full statistics, map and route download available on GarminConnect.

Danby - Glaisdale Rigg - Fryup

No Tony this week so the route planning was down to me. I adopted a bit of a "join the dots" approach, choosing as many steep off-road downhills as I could reasonably fit in and joining them together with (by and large) on-road climbs. It's an approach that sounds OK in theory, but is not guaranteed to provide a satisfying ride in terms of variability (and suitability) of terrain and scenery. In practice I struck lucky and ended up with a ride that had a bit of everything - some lung busting climbs (one of them an excellent off-roader), two of the finest off-road descents in the area, a previously unridden bridleway and copious amounts of mud.

Four of us set off from Danby Moors Centre car park, heading up into the village where we turned left. Down the road, under the railway bridge, sweeping round to the right before eventually forking left at Ainthorpe. Up the road past the tennis courts, we eventually turn off right onto the bridleway that goes up onto Ainthorpe Rigg.

We'd no sooner gone through the gate that leads onto the moor proper than we had to stop. I thought I'd seen enough of mechanical breakdowns with last Thursday's debacle in Guisborough woods, but no, they were to strike us again. Sam's rear dérailleur cable had snapped, frayed away where it clamps to the mech. Fortunately we were able to free up enough slack to re-clamp the cable, leaving Sam with only the four lowest gears to choose from, but given the amount of climbing I'd planned into this route that was three more gears than he'd need.

Off we went again, up the climb to the top of Ainthorpe Rigg, one of the nicest off-road climbs around. It's pretty steady, not so steep as to be unrideable, just enough to be "challenging" and with a variety of step-ups, gullies, ruts and rocks to make it very interesting.

Once at the top it was the first of our good descents, the drop down Crossley Side, one of our favourites that seems to find itself in most of the rides we do from Danby. No photos this time as it's been photod to death, so for once for me it was just the full-on enjoyment of taking the descent in one go.

From the bottom of the descent it's back onto the road, turning right to climb up New Way, the first of our lung-busting road climbs gaining us over 400 feet in just under a mile. At the top of the climb, just as the road bears sharp right, we turn off left for our second big descent. This one drops down a fairly steep but grassy section of hillside to a gate before continuing on, hugging the edge of the hill at first before cutting down it towards another gate.

Through this and then we skirt around the side of the aptly named Round Hill, dropping down it's flank to cross a field and eventually end up by a gate back out onto the road, our 400 feet lost again in nine brisk minutes.

We mistakenly go left at the road, but soon realise our mistake and back track, following the road (to the right from the field gate) to Fryup Hall Farm where we bear left and then right, up Street Lane towards the hamlet of Street and our second big road climb of the day. From bottom to top, by the time we reach Glaisdale Rigg, we've gained 600 feet in just over a mile, and felt every single foot of it. It feels, and looks, like the top of the world.

Turning right at the summit of the climb we go a few hundred yards down the road before taking a bridleway on the left where Glaisdale Rigg joins the road. Here we shoot off to the left along a singletrack amongst the heather. This track becomes so indiscernible that we soon find ourselves off track and have to cut across the moor to get back onto it. What could have been a nice bit of singletrack is spoiled for the moment by having recently been burned, an essential part of moors management. It improve steadily as height is lost before coming to a gate in a wall. Beyond that there is just a dead-straight track down a field, though a couple of gates to the road at the bottom. 500 feet lost once more, not in the most exciting of fashions but hey, they can't all be Top Descents candidates.

You know what they say in mountain biking - what comes down must go up - so we're faced with another climb, up Caper Hill. Surely it can't be as bad as the one at Street? Wrong - if anything it feels worse, a fact that is confirmed at the top by the 25% sign - the climb at Street was only graded 20%. Allied to that is the fact that we've already done enough climbing to last a whole month of rides and our legs are starting to complain! By the time we hit the top we've gained another 600 feet and that must surely be it for the day?

A brief respite at the top as we chat to a guy on a tourer and get our map out to help him with directions before turning right and heading off along the road as far as its junction with the Cut Road Path. Here we turn left but instead of taking that very obvious path we head off at 90 degrees to it in amongst the heather. Two walkers ask us "oh, so that's bridleway is it?" and I'm suspicious of why they're asking. It is bridleway and perfectly legal for bikes, so I give them a curt "yes" as we continue on our way.

Part way along this track we see a rare sight - Tim & bike part company and end up in a heap amongst the heather.

The narrow heathery singletrack ends at a gate through a wall. Beyond this is one of the area's top descents. It starts off in a narrow, rocky gully that is almost always damp to the extent it's almost a stream. This has a few tasty drops, a couple of narrow pedal-catcher sections and a right old boggy bit before it hits a very dry section and turns sharp left. At this point is a triple rock-step. Tim had three goes at it before cleaning it; I had three goes at it before walking it! The body wants to do it, the mind says "no way". Beyond that the trail stays bone dry but steep, grassy and slippery, takes a sharp right down a pretty technical stretch and eventually levels out a bit into a final blast down to a gate.

Beyond this gate the descent continues - in a stream! This section of trail is almost always wet, literally running with water, and I'm regretting leaving my crud catchers behind as the spray streaks up and muddies my face & glasses.

We turn right at the road then first left, past Wood End and Raven Hill farms and back to Fryup Hall up a moderately steep climb (180 feet) that after our previous exertions can only be described as an "undulation" - something this small doesn't pass as a hill with us boys!

Back along roads we've already ridden today we go left at Fryup Hall Farm and back to Stonebeck Gate Farm. Here we turn right onto a bridleway of unknown providence - none of us has ever ridden it before. It proves to be quite a mixed bag - wide, easy farm track at first, a succession of gates sees it gradually deteriorate (or to us, improve) into a more rough and ready cross-country trail. Grassy in parts, it twists its way across the base of the hillside below Danby Crag before entering a wood. This wood has a surprise waiting for us - a quagmire of mud over a foot deep. Thankfully there are stepping stones right across it - if we can ride them. With me at point and Sam (too) close behind, we set off. I'm doing well until near the end when the stepping stones all but vanish beneath the mud and I lose sight of them. The front wheel comes off the stones and embeds itself up to its centre, forcing me to leap from the bike. Sam has no option than to stop/swerve, so it's wet, muddy feet for him too.

We drag our bikes out of the mud, taking the long, unrideable, but dry and clean route around the last of the mud, and head out of the woods on the remainder of this very varied and quite interesting trail.

Eventually the trail emerges by Head House Farm, at roughly the same point where our usual route along the top of Danby Crag emerges. We take the concrete farm track down to the road and then follow the road back to The Moors Centre via the shortest, quickest, driest and most hill-free route. We've had enough climbs and enough mud for today and the scones are beckoning. If there are any left!

Well,  back at the tea room there was only one scone left, which Tim snaffled. I had my usual beans on toast, which the waitress informed me she calls "skinheads on a raft"! The staff did their usual job of getting the food out in double quick time (tea was already on the table before I got sat down!) and we nattered about (of all things) wood turning, lathes and general machining as we basked in the warmth of the afternoon sun. It had been a great day's riding.

Danby - Glaisdale Rigg - Fryup
16 miles, 2800' of ascent in 3 hours 40, 1 hour 15 of which was spent fixing bikes, chatting, eating, admiring the views and taking photos.

Danby: Route One

Yesterday we met up with a group of riders from down south who were up here for a long weekend in God's Own Country. Due to time constraints the plan was just to do a short loop from Danby Village, Route 1 from the fine book "North York Moors Mountain Biking: Moorland Trails" by a certain Tony Harker. An added extension made this route slightly longer and threw in an extra fun downhill.

We decided to split into two groups - fast and not so fast - and off we set. I was in the fast group, so I can't comment on anything that happened to the others!

After the previous four weeks of soggy, shit covered rides that we'd done, this week was looking promising. Bright blue skies and very mild temperatures, the weather was way better than the forecast had predicted.

We left Danby and headed west, paralleling the railway all the way to Commondale. This is a lovely bit of trail. While not in any way challenging it gives great views down over the valley with the river and railway running below you the whole way.

A bit of a climb at Commondale and then we're onto the green lane from Three Howes Rigg. Constant use of this lane by 4x4 has left it deeply rutted, and those ruts were full of water, most of them up past our axles. I rode into some of them with real trepidation, wondering if, in fact, the water might come up past the handlebars, not just past the axles!

A quick right-left-right and we're on The Pannierman's Causeway, one of the many stone tracks laid across these moors in centuries gone by. Fun to ride on a full-suss, bouncy as hell on a hardtail, it's not quite as challenging as The George Gap, which seems to have wheel-catchers placed at regular intervals.

Then it's off across the moor to Castleton Pits, a very indistinct section of moorland singletrack that involves a fair bit of heather-bashing in the early stages.

Heather Bashing

This brings us out at the plummet down Oakley Side and today there's no oversized walker blocking the entire trail, so it's heads down and brakes off all the way to the bottom.

We take the road from there, past Danby Castle (never seen that before) and along Fryup Dale, saying goodbye to one of our group on the way. He's suffered SPD failure and has decided to take the short, easy, road way back to Danby. The rest of us push our bikes up the excellent downhill from Danby Rigg. It's a worthwhile effort on two counts. First, we'll get to do the cracking downhill at the other side that we've only ever ridden up and secondly it makes us appreciate the size of the rocks and drop offs we encounter when we usually ride down this way. Personally I was quite surprised that we tackle such stuff with relative ease - it doesn't look nearly as big on the way down!

It Makes A Fine Downhill!

So all that's left is that downhill - fast, narrow and technical, but with generally good run-off areas if you lose it. But do we ever lose it? Another incident-free ride, we're getting pretty good at this not-falling-off malarky.

Downhill From Danby Rigg In Fading Light

Having split into two groups, the second group had further sub-divided into two and yet by an amazing quirk of timing we all arrived back at the same time for tea & scones in The Moors Centre. Lovely.

Danby - Pannierman's Causeway - Fryup Dale:
15.2 Miles, 1854ft Up/Down, 2hrs48mins

Glaisdale

Having had 10 of us out on our last ride we were back down to the hardcore of 4 again for this one. I do hope the extreme weather of the last ride hadn’t put anyone off.

Departing from The Green in Glaisdale the ride starts with a nice easy downhill road section that leads through the village and down towards the railway bridge. Turn right before the railway bridge to cross the stream via a footbridge and realise that the downhill start isn’t the good news that it was cracked up to be. You now have to go back up, up a steep, muddy, horse-churned track that would be rideable in summer but is only 50/50 in winter. It gets more rideable nearer the top, though not really any less steep and eventually reaches a road where we stop to check the map.

Turning right onto the road it’s still steep for a few hundred meters before thankfully levelling out a bit. 4k of roadwork eventually brings us to a bridleway off to the right, past Wintergill. This largely level piece of doubletrack eventually comes to a gate in a wall after which some fun begins.

From the wall onwards the track plummets down the hillside, at first in a narrow rocky ravine, it eventually opens out onto a fast, grassy track down to Mountain Ash Farm. Unfortunately this section of hillside was well shaded from the sun and there was quite a bit of ice around. I hit an icy section right at the bottom which sent me tumbling, right in front of the waiting camera. Only my pride was damaged.

You lose over 150m of descent on that downhill but you have to make it all back up again (and then some) at the other side. What followed was the longest consistently steep climb I think I’ve ever done. It just never levels out, even for a few meters.

Not even half way up yet!

It goes up and up and up, climbing 200m in 2k, the only good point being that at least it’s on tarmac and not slippery mud. It took us about 20 minutes to do the climb and for the first time ever I saw Rob stop part way up a hill!

Finally there!

Turning right at the junction at the top of the hill we went along the road for about 700m to the point where the Cut Road bridleway joins the road. Here there’s another bridleway that heads off at about 90 degrees to the Cut Path which none of us had ever done before. Another journey of discovery then, no doubt into an unrideable bog or another muddy field. But wait, what’s this? A lovely bit of singletrack, half hidden by heather and bracken and rarely used by the look of it.

It starts off gentle enough but evolves into a full on plummet across some steep contour lines, losing about 80m in 400m of travel. Too hairy in places for most of us, not helped by the mud and ice, but damned good fun and one for a drier day.

The descent ends, after a gate, with a blast down a track that was doubling up as a stream, to eventually come out at the road again. 15 minutes of really good fun.

Right at the road and then first left takes us onto a gentle downhill road section that passes many a farm, including those of Wood End, Slidney Beck and Fryup Hall. Eventually, at Stonebeck Gate Farm we end up missing our turning and going along the wrong bridleway. Thankfully the back-tracking doesn’t involve us having to do any steep muddy climbs or there’d have been a mutiny form at least one of us! Taking the bridleway that starts BEFORE Stonebeck Gate Farm we’re once again soon pushing up a muddy bank before levelling off and following the contours along the hillside.

A bit of “right to roam” ensues just past Walker's Plantation as we follow a path on the ground that isn’t on any map, which eventually leads us around the top of Crag Wood and a nice, but fairly slow (was it icy again?) descent which eventually hits the road. At this point “slow bloke at the back” switched bikes with “young pup at the front” and underwent some kind of transformation. Slow bloke no more, we were soon struggling to keep up. I hope he never buys a bike like that one!

Almost 4k of roadwork then takes us straight back to Glaisdale where, with the end in sight (in fact past the sign saying “Welcome To Glaisdale”) we somehow turn right onto yet another muddy uphill slog that adds 2k onto our final distance and gives us a lovely fast downhill road finish that ends literally beside our cars. Perfect.

No tea rooms in Glaisdale (how can that be?) so we stop at Beck View in Lealholm instead. Scones not up to scratch, no all-day breakfasts and crumpets not as tasty as some other places. At least the tea was wet.

Glaisdale - Egton High Moor - Great Fryup Dale
16 miles, 2700' of ascent in 4 hours dead, of which 1½ was spent admiring the views, taking photos and eating bananas.