Just noted Bob did a ride taking in a Roman Road. I cimmented on it wondering which is the longest we know of as it feels like it could be a bit of a challenge riding 10 or 20 miles in a straight line. He tells me that the longest he knows of is High Street in The Lakes (ta Bob).

I google it and it turns out there's a High Street Mountain up there and also a walk called High Street taking you to a Roman fort. That got me wondering wver more about properly broken Roman roads and this thread was born. So, Roman Roads, what do we know and is there some super long mtb ones here and there.

The A5 between London and Shrewsbury Shaf.

The A5 between London and Shrewsbury Shaf.

Yes, Bob mentioned that alpt are probably now busy roads. But I forgot to say I'm talking of the 'not horrible dangerous ones'.

We were actually meaning Roman roads that haven't been reused by modern highways. Look at Dere Street and Watling Street, they "exist" on the ground but modern roads use a large proportion of their length.

Sarn helen? what that one like?

Sarn helen?

The problem with Sarn Heln is that we only know of reasonably short sections for certain. Everything else is a guess.

RIP wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 8:00 pm https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Xad5Rl0N2E

Thanks Reg. I'm gonna click it now. I do hope it's not a Benny Hill sketch or the sort

Andy Curran ( Audax rider) , Andy's Adventures on YouTube, seems to have a thing about following roman roads and has tried to follow a few as closely as he can. Pretty much all road though IIRC

The Fosse Way he's even done on bike sort of dressed as a centurion... https://youtu.be/bhId2TSrrUM

to Reg' vid...

Moder-dye wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 8:24 pm Andy Curran ( Audax rider) , Andy's Adventures on YouTube, seems to have a thing about following roman roads and has tried to follow a few as closely as he can. Pretty much all road though IIRC

The Fosse Way he's even done on bike sort of dressed as a centurion... https://youtu.be/bhId2TSrrUM

Aaah, the Fosse Way. Doing that thsi Tuesday and I was wondering on that...

Bearbonesnorm wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 8:20 pm

Sarn helen?

The problem with Sarn Heln is that we only know of reasonably short sections for certain. Everything else is a guess.

There's the goodly off-road section between Brecon and Neath mapped as 'Sarn Helen' which is a good ride. Like Stu suggests though, you can find bits of 'Sarn Helen' all over the place - for example to the north of Lampeter which is considerably to the west of the above mentioned Brecon-Neath track!

My memories of the Fosse Way between Kemble and Hulavington which is pretty much all off-road is that in wet weather it could be a nightmare, especially sections used by agricultural vehicles. That said, I haven't ridden it for a number of years.

Peddars Way, the North/South one on the map below. Pre-dates the Romans and passes through the homelands of Boudicca and the Iceni who gave the Romans a bloody nose and smashed up Colchester in return for the Romans two-faced behaviour.

An overview map of Roman Roads here ... https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi ... nia-es.svg

There's a byway near me marked as a Roman road

Not that long but pleasant enough.

psling wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 8:30 pm

Bearbonesnorm wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 8:20 pm

Sarn helen?

The problem with Sarn Heln is that we only know of reasonably short sections for certain. Everything else is a guess.

There's the goodly off-road section between Brecon and Neath mapped as 'Sarn Helen' which is a good ride. Like Stu suggests though, you can find bits of 'Sarn Helen' all over the place - for example to the north of Lampeter which is considerably to the west of the above mentioned Brecon-Neath track!

I had a look on my OS maps, there traces of sarn helen coming down from Bronsaint past Lanbeter to pumsaint then heading east through Mynydd bach (roman camp at Y pigwn and a Roman fortlet nearby) before the road head past Sennybridge then starts head south up to Daudraeth Llityd and Fforest fawr then southwest to Neath.

Diesel73 wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 9:49 pm
I had a look on my OS maps, there traces of sarn helen coming down from Bronsaint past Lanbeter to pumsaint then heading east through Mynydd bach (roman camp at Y pigwn and a Roman fortlet nearby) before the road head past Sennybridge then starts head south up to Daudraeth Llityd and Fforest fawr then southwest to Neath.

Yes, the track/lanes past the Roman fort are a convenient route between Llandovery and Brecon avoiding the main road. A real dog leg in the traditional 'straight' Roman road tradition!

Thanks everyone for your knowledge. I also took a look at that vid with the chap in the centurion uniform. I reckon the takeaway message is that they're a hassle to find a really long uninterrupted one but the length of Fosse way I've done every other year is about the length I'm probably gonna get without needing to jump over wall/fences/shrubery.

Might try and retrace some of them on that map shown above and see what it finds me (pardon the grammar ).

Thanks again...

Moder-dye wrote: ↑Sat Jun 18, 2022 8:40 pm An overview map of Roman Roads here ... https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi ... nia-es.svg

This is a real good map Moder-eye and tells me alot of what I need to know for cycling I suppose...

https://shop.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/roman-britain/

This map shows Roman roads plotted over modern road map, albeit at a massive scale of 1:625000

Worsted Street Roman Road, which essentially links Cambridge and Haverhill. It's a restricted byway, so all off road, although not the longest by any stretch.
https://ridewithgps.com/routes/31945160

There are a lot more than you think

https://www.romanroads.org/gazetteer/lancspages.html

West Cumbria is stacked with them

There's one alongside the main road on the south side of the Pentlands in Edinburgh/Midlothian. Forms part of the Capital Trail