In September 2021 (25th to 29th) myself (Gary Biles) and Richard Edgeley completed the King Alfred’s Way off road cycle around Wessex. This blog entry has the story of our ride, photos of the places we went to and shares some of our experiences of riding the KAW .
General notes about the KAW:
The route is approximately 220 miles depending on the exact route that you take, for various reasons we took a few of short cuts. We did 15,500ft of climbing over the 5 days. It is 75% (ish) off road so speeds will be well down compared to what can be done on tarmac. After a pro-longed dry spell the tracks were in very good condition for our ride, but after significant rain some of them will be difficult unless you have the right bike and more importantly the right tyres.
Our daily mileage split was very much dictated by the campsites that were still open at the end of September. At that time of year we also had limited daylight, about 7am to 7pm, do it in late spring or summer and you will have many more hours to play with. We did it in 5 days with 4 overnight stops at campsites on or just off of the route. We weren’t interested in doing it as fast as possible, it was all about the journey not how quickly we could get to the destination.
To see all the sights on the route I would suggest that you need more more than 5 days as some of them are off of the route and you will need to allocate time to get there and look around. As an example, although you can (just about) see Stonehenge from Larkhill Camp road about 1.5km south of the route, time to ride there and back and look around could easily cost you 45min to an hour. Not much I grant you, but do that for 2 or 3 detours in a day and the time quickly mounts up. Not a problem for some, people have done the route in two days (!), but definitely something to consider for others.
We had a support vehicle, driven by Richard’s wife Karen with her co-pilot Islay their dog, taking our heavy camping gear between camp sites, but if you are self supporting then that will add time to your journeys and needs to be considered carefully. The vehicle we took is a VW T6 camper so Richard & Karen had a comfortable bed each night while I was in my one man tent.
This is not, in my opinion, a route for the casual cyclist and you need to be bike fit to a reasonably good level. The route has some long steep climbs, some very gnarly downs, every kind of surface you can imagine in the UK from smooth tarmac to potentially deep mud and sand, it sometimes goes on busy main roads thru towns (e.g. Amesbury) and doing 40-50 off road miles for 5 consecutive days will test most people’s stamina and endurance. Richard and myself were at the time 60 and 65 respectively, but we are regular (circa 25 miles twice a week) mountain bikers as well as doing several other sports. You should also have the skills, tools and parts to make repairs to your bike while on the trail. There are quite a few places where you will be a long way from help and even further from a bike shop.
In terms of our bikes I rode my carbon Specialized FS Stumpjumper 27.5 with 2.3 tyres. Richard rode his steel Bombtrack Beyond 29ner with no suspension and 2.5 tyres, the bike on which he had ridden the Great North Trail earlier in the year. We didn’t carry much gear with us, our usual tools and spare parts, a jacket, plenty of fluids (Richard took two bottles and I had a 2l camel back and bottle) and of course lots and lots of trail snacks. The good weather forecast in the first few days meant we didn’t have to worry about extra layers or wet weather gear, at least not at the start!
Our planning was fairly minimal and mainly consisted of reading the KAW route book, downloading the .GPX files from the Cycling UK website to our phones and identifying potential camp sites based on doing roughly 50 miles per day. Originally it was going to be a Monday-Friday timeframe to avoid weekend traffic. However with bad weather forecast it became Sunday-Thursday and then on the Friday afternoon the forecast for the end of the following week got worse “sh*t, we need to leave tomorrow!”. So it became a Saturday-Wednesday ride which did leave us a little underprepared. Richard and Karen spent a few hours on the Friday afternoon booking camp sites which were rapidly closing up at the end of summer, not all would have been our first choice, but beggars can’t be choosers and in the end we picked some very good sites.
Day 1 – Winchester to Tilshead – 45 Miles, 3117ft climbing
So we set off on the Saturday morning a little underprepared and wondering what we had forgotten to pack, but confident we (probably) had everything we needed. Earlier in the year Richard had completed the GNT with another mate, 800 miles over 3 weeks, so 220 miles over 5 days and being close to civilisation most of the time would be a breeze, we hoped!
We started from near the golf course (south side of Teg Down) on the west side of Winchester, my wife Janet had no desire to drive into the town centre at 9am! We headed north and via a BW picked up the KAW route as it exited the built up area of Winchester. In hind sight we could have gone from the cross roads where we started straight on west to Farley Mount Country Park where (on the map at least) there is lots of parking to unload the car and a BOAT (Byway Open to All Traffic) going north which joins the KAW about 1km west of Sparsholt. One thing we didn’t do was stick rigidly to the KAW route, if we found a good short cut we took it, this was especially true on day 4 when the weather was definitely against us.
This section of the route is a mix of quiet lanes and BW’s all the way to Old Sarum, roughly the halfway point on day 1. Lots of nice houses to look at and very much the quintessential south of England countryside and villages. Crossing the A345 road at Old Sarum was a bit of a lottery, but we eventually found a gap in the traffic and made it across. Its similar countryside after leaving Old Sarum as you go north along the Avon River valley. We were going to stop at the pub in Great Durnford, I had a left my car there on a Sunday MTB ride a few years ago and it seemed a good place to stop for an ale or two. Alas The Black Horse is no more and from the look of the site it will never be a pub again, so we carried up the valley towards Amesbury. Amesbury was messy as you join the busy A354 and cross the A303, its not for long, but you need to be careful, the traffic was heavy and fast.
The next village is Larkhill this is where you can exit the KAW to go south on a BOAT and see Stonehenge. We have both been there before so didn’t feel the need to visit the stones. You can see the henge thru the trees from Larkhill, so if you are just ticking the “I’ve seen Stonehenge” box that may be enough. I may be doing it a disservice, but Larkhill reminded me of one of those “mock up” towns where the army practice street to street fighting! From Larkhill we joined a very busy and fast C road to taking us the 2 miles to Rolleston Camp. Be careful on this road, apparently (we read later!) there is a track on the grass verge, but we didn’t notice it at the time as we were too busy watching cars go past at 70mph.
Just after Rolleston Camp We stopped at The Bustard Inn for refuelling. It’s no longer a pub more like a village hall, but it was run by three very nice ladies who couldn’t wait to serve us as there was no one else there! We had soup & fresh hot rolls and what seemed like a never ending pot of tea!
Take care navigating in this area as some of the obvious routes and short cuts may well be closed (as it was for us) if the army are training. Because of this we couldn’t take the obvious tarmac route into Tilshead via Westdown Camp, but rather had to do the other 3 sides of a square, south to Orcheston, west to an un-named point in the fields then north to Tilshead. Easy to get lost there with a plethora of tracks going in all directions. Disappointingly we didn’t see or hear any tanks or gunfire while making our to Tilshead.
The campsite at Tilshead, Brades Acre, is only 100m or so off of the route so easy to get to. A nice site, quite small so I would book ahead if planning a stop there. The Rose & Crown in the high street is apparently very good, but we (actually Karen) cooked our own food. So 45 miles done at a reasonable pace, no major navigation errors and ending at a nice campsite for a shower, a few beers, pasta and a whisky night cap (or two!) before bedding down for the night. A good start to the ride.
Day 2 – Tilshead to Wantage – 50 Miles, 3619ft climbing
Day 2 dawned with blue skies and was probably the best day’s riding, in pure mountain biking terms, of the whole route. It started with a long exposed trail across the northern part of Salisbury Plain. The route is usually done in a clockwise direction for good reason, i.e. to take advantage of the prevailing winds from the south west. You really wouldn’t want to ride this section into an easterly wind, there is no hiding place. From Chirton you cross the Vale of Pewsey before climbing up to the Mid Wilts Way, the bulk of the climb (400ft of the total of 550ft) being from All Cannings up to the trig point, but then there is a very fast and fun (especially on a full suss MTB) descent to Beckhampton.
Its a short flat route into Avebury, roughly the halfway point on today’s section, where we stopped for some lunch and a beer at The Red Lion. We shared a big bowl of Nacho’s with various toppings as well a very nice ale. It’s interesting to look around at the stone circles, but it is a tourist honeypot and can get very crowded. Personally I am not sure why people get so excited about Avebury as someone could have arranged the rocks in circles yesterday and only Tony Robinson & The Time Team would know. You only have the archaeologists word that’s it neolithic and wasn’t built by some Victorian gent in the 19th century who wanted to fool future generations.
From Avebury we climbed up to the Ridgeway, dodging dozens of kids doing their Duke of Edinburgh awards, it’s great to ride with big views in all directions. We stayed on the rolling Ridgeway for the next 26 miles taking in the views and enjoying a great ride. We should have stopped when we got to the A338 and dropped down to our campsite for the night at the Court Hill Centre. However we looked at the map and decided to go thru Segsbury Hill Fort, descend down the hill and then cut across on a small road/track to Court Hill. Its a steep fast descent and then we found that the cut thru is a private road! We spoke to the nice lady working in the field and she said we could cut thru her land, but then it was a steep climb up back up to the campsite which is actually close to the top of the hill we had just descended! It’s really more of a hostel than a campsite, but they let us park the camper van in the car park and I set up my tent on a lawn a short distance away. We ate at The Greyhound pub in Letcombe Regis which is just over a mile away. If you walk there its a very steep hill to come back up afterwards most likely in the dark! The pub was excellent though with good food and ales and well worth the visit, we drove down there.
Day 3 – Wantage to Riseley – 38 Miles, 1529ft climbing
It rained heavily overnight and wasn’t due to stop until about 8am, so we stayed in bed with a coffee until the rain stopped almost exactly as forecast. This was, on paper at least, our “rest day”, a nice easy ride with no serious hills, so we decided to have a lazy breakfast and wait until the clouds started to break up before packing up and departing.
We re-joined the Ridgeway which went on for a further 14 miles before descending into Streatley and the River Thames. Once again the views were stunning in all directions. Even if you never do the whole route, the 40 miles of the Ridgeway is well worth a day out on it’s own.
In Streatley we stopped at a nice riverside hotel/restaurant/cafe complex for coffee, perfect timing as we missed a passing rain shower. We did notice some nice coffee stops in Goring as we passed thru. From Goring to Reading we followed the Thames Path for 9 miles and while lacking the vista’s of the Ridgeway it does have a lot of interesting places and buildings to look at as you pass thru the woodland areas on the way to Reading.
Follow the route carefully when passing thru the centre of Reading as its easy to get lost as you wind back an forth along canal tow paths before you find your way your way to Shinfield Court and the woodland track that runs just to the east of the A33. There were a lot of road works just south of the town making finding the route not particularly easy and we found the best course was to follow the NCR 26 signs. Once clear of Reading we followed the KAW south to Riseley stopping at Wellington Country Park for the night.
The camp site is very good set in many acres of woodland with a huge lake. However they are a bit officious, no cycling on site and made us pay for two pitches (which were very large) for the camper wagon and my one man tent. This was even after we pointed out that other larger vehicles and caravans had closed in awnings that would easily accommodate the T6 and my tent inside them! One thing I also noticed was the noise from the A33 which seemed busy even at 2am, but I do live in a very rural area and perhaps my ears are sensitive to traffic noise.
Day 4 – Riseley to East Meon – 61 Miles, 4708ft climbing
This was our big day, 100km and 5000ft of climbing to get to the next campsite, everywhere else we tried in-between was closing down for the winter. The weather wasn’t playing ball either with heavy showers forecast all day. You need to follow the map carefully on this section as it snakes back and forth for 20 miles down to Farnham. We stopped at Bill’s in Farnham for second breakfast, there are plenty of other places to go to, but time was of the essence and we stopped at the first place we saw where we could sit outside with the bikes (we weren’t carrying padlocks with us). Luckily we were under a large awning as twice the heavens opened and torrential downpours turned the high street into a rushing stream.
We took a few liberties with the route on this section and bypassed some trails where we could do just one side of a triangle instead of the other two where the KAW went. About 12 miles after Farnham we came to Thursley where we started the 4 mile 550ft climb to the top of the Devil’s Punchbowl. While it’s all ridable you just seem to keep going up and up and up, but its well worth it for the views at the top, even on a wet grey day it is a great sight.
A further 20 miles of meandering south from the punchbowl saw us reach South Harting where we picked up the South Downs Way. This made navigating a lot easier as we had completed the SDW over two days in 2016 and it is very well sign posted.
There was a sting in the tail though. I hadn’t been paying much attention to the map and suddenly realised two things, one that we had arrived in the QE Country Park car park and two that having covered 60 miles and nearly 5000ft of climbing we had to do Butser Hill (!) before getting to our campsite at Upper Personage Farm near East Meon. We managed most of the hill, but walked the last 100m of the steep chalky section to the gate, the wind, rain and mileage having taken its toll on our legs. We did bike the section after the gate though and then had a nice downhill to reach our last campsite of the trip.
The site was very good with nice pitches and facilities and there was only us and one other chap on the site. It only has 10 pitches so best to book in advance. Luckily for me Karen had arrived early and in a lull between the rain showers had put my tent up for me. So its was hot tea, a shower and dry clothes before adjourning to the local pub for dinner. Don’t be fooled by any “the pub is only 1 mile way” comments, it is just over 2 miles and it is all on road. We drove to the Izaak Walton which had good food and nice range of ales.
Day 5 – East Meon to Winchester (Sparsholt) – 28 Miles, 2536ft climbing
Although mileage wise this was our shortest day at around 26 miles to the finish in Winchester it was the hilliest with an average of 90ft of climbing per mile, for comparison the previous day was 77ft per mile. We also decided to start the day by riding thru the Meon Valley rather than going straight back up to the SDW via the very steep hill that we had descended the previous evening. This gave us a gentle start to the day riding on the flat narrow country lanes. After 5 miles of easy riding we did eventually climb up to the SDW at Winchester Hill Fort. From there it was another 13 miles of rolling hills and countryside to Cheesefoot Head. Following the SDW is easy as its well marked, but do keep an eye on the map just in case.
When we got to Cheesefoot Head, where you cross the A272, you have a choice to either follow the KAW route south across Fawley Down or continue on the SDW towards Chilcomb which is the most direct route into Winchester. We choose the former and while the 2.5 mile descent to Hazeley Down is great fun you do have to climb the Pilgrim’s Trail up Twyford Down, go over the M3 and around St Catherine’s Hill Fort before making your way into the town to King Alfred’s statue and the end of your ride. If you lose the trail in the built up area just follow the signs to the town centre and you will bump into Alf.
It wasn’t quite the end of our ride though as we were meeting our wives at The Plough pub in Sparsholt for a celebratory lunch. The girls didn’t want to drive into Winchester to meet us and I don’t blame them, it was packed with the people and the traffic was horrendous! Not easy to find your way out of Winchester, but we made it to Sparsholt and can heartily recommend the pub, the food and the ales.
So ended our 5 days on the KAW. I would definitely recommend it to anyone and would like to do it again, but at a even slower pace with time to visit all the places/cafes/pubs and the like that get mentioned on the Facebook page.
Resources we used:
MANY THANKS to Cycling UK for getting the route together and publishing all the route information. The KAW book and the website: https://www.cyclinguk.org/king-alfreds-way
is a mine of information and should be the starting point for anyone thinking of doing the route. The book can be download as a .PDF file, but that doesn’t include the OS maps, to get them you need to buy the book. The book is 100 pages long so printing at home probably isn’t cost effective (printing it at work might be!).
OS Maps: We downloaded the 9 .GPX files from the KAW website and used them with the OS Maps app on our phones. We only used one phone at a time, so that we had a back up, keeping them in “flight mode” to preserve the battery life. It is easier on a phone’s resources (memory, etc) to use the nine section maps rather than the whole route one.
Rough Rider Guide: I didn’t find out about this until after the ride, but it is a great resource and well worth a look as is the Rough Ride Guides website.
https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer?mid=1oWVjQK_wRcOmlrOGriD9Xa8mZZaJW965&ll=51.09136649186714%2C-1.0244713759399648&z=9&fbclid=IwAR11YPFyZxgoL7MK4Jo9xSwnBv8D37pXyCcwgbQaxLEaH0n3EFv3TgWoMjE
Author: Gary Biles – Last Updated: 7th December 2021
Our Photos. roughly in date/time order …………………………
Ready to go on Day 3
Dorset MTB 