Has anyone ridden a route from wharncliff woods to Stanage? Was it mostly off road? Could you describe it to me so that I might try to do it.

Thanks Giles

would be a piece of piss to do pretty much totally off road - have a look on the dark peak OS map, it covers from bransley all over the dark peak

I disagree
It's do-able - but would be quite a round about root to do almost totaly off road becase your trying to curumnavigate sheffield and not many paths, or roads do that- you could go out to via stocksbridge and cutgate to ladybower then back to stanage via hathersage - that's a big route though. Plenty of the road sections are fairly quite if you want a more direct route.

Get the new large scale explorer map of Sheffield (got mine from Lagsett Cycles)it shows more of the sheffiled side than the old Dark peak, and I am faily sure it covers stanage - I'll have a look tonight.

Sounds like a fun ride though

i've done it the other way..... roughly here we go:

from bottom of fast track @ wharners (most obvious point i can think of)

turn L, follow firetrak past bottom of diamondbak, take R fork in fire trak, follow until you can drop R over railway (CARE), through cul de sac to road, R, past pheasant pub.... bottom of hill turn L into housing estate, at end follow trails into beely woods.

out of beely, i'm afraid you'll have to consult the A-Z to get rightish through hills borough oneway system onto to the road that meets up with the snake....

dont follow it - on your L is the rivelin woods (oldest place in sheff that metal was worked - riddled with tracks & paths with many small dams)

ride up through this - not legal but used by loads of recreational mtbers and families.....

keep on going up -you'll get lost but as long as you go up you'll be fine.


at the very end you find yourself actually at the road fork where the snake road meets the hillsborough road.

follow it about 3 km....

big dam on the L, (rivelin crag on the R)cross it,

know you are about to enter wyming brook woods

dont

turn L, up s'trak for an age, steepens a lot.... once on crest / crag turn R on awesome, narrow, drops to the R s'trak... at obvious gap in wall on the R cross lawned area to back of 3 merry lads pub. through playground of pub (really!)... onto road, turn R..... next L.....R...... straight on then to redmires and stanage!!!!!


not all legal in wyming brook section though....nite ride perhaps???

far better the other way round... all the off road is DH!!

Thanks for the help, might try it the other way round then, just wanted to include either going down the causeway or the steps at stanage, I was hoping it would be an epic, going to encourage some of the other guys at uni to give it a go.

if you want to make it a epic ride go out via endcliffe park or eccalsall woods to make a big loop, depends if your fixed on starting from wharncliffe.

Not sure I understand? I want to include wharncliff, anyway most of the rides I do start from hunters bar. Just wanted to include both stanage and wharncliffe because they have technical downhill sections that I like.

By the way what do people on here call, the "steps" bit a stanage, you know if you approach from the reservoir end, past the pole then cut down on your left a bit further on rather than doing the causway?

OK - looked at maps - Shefield Expolorer does NOT cover stanage - its just outside, Dark Peak does cover the area needed, sorry. but if you want a map to go west of the Dark Peak map or show Sheffield area all in one then the Expolorer is the one to go for

Have bought some maps, now thining of including cut gate as well

That sounds like a F-in huge route, take plenty of sarnies. Cut gate is supposed to be a v ggod route (on the todo list for summer)- ask the guys on peak mid week thread I think they did a 50 miler from glossop side of the peaks a while ago.

The steppy bridleway off stanage before the causeway is called the salt road. Fantastic bit of technical riding - formerly used by ponies transporting salt to Sheffield.

Watch out for the wheel grabbing gaps between the rocks on the middle section. I've had a vey painful over the bars incident there and the rocks don't give much when you hit them.

BTW - on topic - from Wharnecliffe, you need to go through Beeley Wood to Claywheels Lane which brings you out st the far end of Hillsborough. From there you can get to Rivelin Dam in about 15 minutes either on the roads (Penistone Rd, Holme Ln, Rivelin Valley Rd) or - if you don't object to 'special' bridleways - you can ride the Rivelin Nature Trail to the post office and then 1/2 a mile road to the dam wall road into wyming brook. From there are loads of tracks to Redmires and ultimately Stanage. If you follow the main byway, it brings you out further up Redmires Rd than the 3 Merry Lads route. My fave route is to follow the byway up to a junction and turn right. Just before it spits you out on to the A57 there is an unclassified singletrack on the left up the hill. Follow this (steep and technical) until you hit a T junction on open moors. Turn left and keep going until you come to a gate. At the gate, you can go on the legal trail to the left which goes through about 3 gates and comes out next to the reservoir, or you can go straight ahead on a footpath over the hill which drops you on to the road literally 500 yards from the Stanage Pole climb.

Used to be my usual solo evening ride as an out and back from Wharnecliffe, out on the route and then down the salt rd and back up the causeway and home on the same route. Great Ride.

Ah, the salt road, good to know, I ride it all the time just wasn't sure what it was called, like you say fantastic bit of track, have to watch for walkers though, they are often convinced it's a footpath and try to give a lecture, fools. Also nearly came off the other day at the first corner, bike looked like it was going off the edge.

Yeah including cut gate would be mental, haven't done it seperately yet either, was told it was pretty hard to ride this time of year, muddy, so will make that a summer ride.

Thanks for the route FAM, sounds good that, how long did it take you?

I used to live at Wadsley Bridge and rode from home up Penistone Rd to Grenoside Woods, then up the hill to Wharnecliffe, down to Beeley (by various tracks) then the route as above back to Wadsley Bridge on tarmac. On a good day I could nail it in about 2hrs 45mins but usually it was about 3hrs.

I'm going to start riding there. The track looks really good. Went to it last week.