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.
Last edited by redefined_cycles on Sat Jun 18, 2022 7:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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.
Better weight than wisdom, a traveller cannot carry
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
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 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!
We go out into the hills to lose ourselves, not to get lost. You are only lost if you need to be somewhere else and if you really need to be somewhere else then you're probably in the wrong place to begin with.
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.
We go out into the hills to lose ourselves, not to get lost. You are only lost if you need to be somewhere else and if you really need to be somewhere else then you're probably in the wrong place to begin with.
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.
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Peddars Way Map
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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!
We go out into the hills to lose ourselves, not to get lost. You are only lost if you need to be somewhere else and if you really need to be somewhere else then you're probably in the wrong place to begin with.
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 ).
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
