lakeland loop
The first place in England my wife and I went to on our way south from scotland on our Great Britain roadtrip in 2018 was the lake district national park in the northwest. A beautiful area with lakes and mountains, a wide variety of vegetation and lot of sheep. On the internet we found a route called "lakeland loop" which was promoted as one of Britains most beautiful cycling routes. So we thought, let's give it a shot. A small side information for the region. Not far from the lake "Winderemere" there is a small commercial area with a bikeshop called "Wheelbase Cycles" if you need anything. Also there are some small restaurants/cafes. We did have delicous breakfast at a place called "More? The Artisan Bakery". This gave us strength for the ride. We started the tour at a small town called "Lowick" heading north. The first 25 km were rather easy following the small backroad along some fields, small forests and a lake called "Coniston Water" with very little traffic and only one short climb at the end of the lake. But as we already learned on the roads of scotland the days before, there seems to be no such thing as flat roads in britain. It was the same case on that route too. A constant up and down of small ramps during the whole ride. After this more mellow first part we arrived at the bottom of the "Wrynose Pass" going west. A huge sign saying that the road gets up to 30% gradient made it clear for us that we are going to have some work ahead of us. In the beginning we rode into a small picturesque valley and it wasn't that steep yet but once we've reached the end of the valley with some sort of a wall in front of us we knew this is the enemy. The ramp is only about 3 km long but one extremely steep ramp until the top, meaning that you really shouldn't stop because getting back on the bike starting from zero is almost impossible. We somehow made it up there alive and the view from the peak was our reward. From there the road runs over a plateau with another brutal climb, the "Hardknott Pass" at the end, but for us one of these beasts was eough at that time so we turned south at a place called "Cockley Beck". From there it was a fun  10 km decent through another valley and some forests until "Hall Dunnerdale". The last third of the loop consisted of a series of small climbs and decents through a wide hilly farming landscape with a lot of sheep and through some cute little towns. The loop is about 65 km long but you can definitly extend it up to over 100 if it's not enough. There is plenty more of cool roads and beautiful scenery around the area. If you are intersted in the route here is the roadmap of our ride.