I headed down to Richmond park in the southwest of London to go for a ride today, I'd read about it as I've been trying to find a replacement for Centennial park in Sydney. So far every park I have been to hasn't been much of a roadie hangout, compared to Centennial which was just choc-a-bloc on the weekends with roadies and other cyclists. It's a touch far from central London, it took about 1 hour to get there from southeast London where I'm staying.
It's known for it's extensive landscapes, woodlands and of course deer. There is a 11km road loop shared with cars along the roads which circumscribe the park. There is also a whole bunch of unsealed trails which criss-cross the park as well as one which loosely follows the road loop. Most of it is hardpacked dirt with a bit of loose gravel here and there which caused one slightly hairy descent. The 28mm Pasela tyres handled it pretty well, although I would have preferred something wider like 32 or 35mm for the unsealed paths. They are shared with pedestrians and have a 10mph limit, there are also some trails which are only open to pedestrians.
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| Oh hai bambi! |
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There are a few internal roads which are only open to
pedestrians and cyclists. |
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| There is a lot of these marshy sort of ground cover |
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| Most of the unsealed trails are hard packed dirt strewn with leaves |
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There are a few small climbs and some
not so small climbs |
All in all a nice day, there is a cafe at the northeast corner of the park near the Roehampton gates which is conveniently next to the bike hire; the bike hire place has MTB's, hybrids and some roadies. It'll probably be a bit too cold to ride here in a month or two, but I'll definitely come back. Thanks for reading.
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