Lake District

Just back from a week's MTBing in the Lake district.
I am now the unofficial cheer leader for the Lake District.
The place is amazing, offroad cycling is legal and encouraged, they have good bike shops with good mechanics for when you wreck the bike, there are easy trails, hard trails, silly trails, untrailed trails, high mountain trails, loads of good cafes, good guidebooks and maps and did i mention the hundreds of miles of trails all filled with good trails?
It's between 3 and 4 hours from Holyhead, depending on your interpretation of the speed limit and the traffic on the M6.
We were only doing xc stuff on the open mountain bridleways and paths but we saw plenty of lads and ladies about with heavy slow bouncy bikes as well :)
Any walkers we met all said hello and smiled - and not just at my dress sense, all the land is open to walkers and bikers and you can go out on loops from 30 minutes to all day to finish at a pub serving cumberland sausage and the slop the English call beer.
A good alternative to the "built" trails of North Wales.
going now when everything is frozen makes the cycling over the mountain chop chop fast, once you get up there of course..

fair play Diddy, great report, any pictures ?

Cumberland sausage is great. And the English beer is grand once you develop a taste for it, just don't expect it to be all gas like the beer here. The trails sound sweet - were they not overrun with walkers though?

Nope, plenty of room (trails) for everyone and plenty of trails too hard for us to cycle up for walkers to have freedom from bikers on but there is a completely different attitude over there. The hills there are for using by everyone, not only walkers and bikers but everyone, even the 4x4 and motocross bikes on some designated areas.
The beer is muck though.

some photos of xc mountain fun very close to home

http://picasaweb.google.com/peterofarrells/Lakes#

thats mad Ted..I see Eoin McHappy and Orla mcEvoy, a Yak ,some lad I vaguely recognise and another lady i don't know..
But my question is ?
Which one of you is kissing Orla ?

Thanks Peter, Looks great, Must make it over there sometime.

Great pics. Trails look nice and varied. Sweet. Now that those crows have a taste for blood though I'd be wary of the place.

Looks a bit cold.

whenever I get stuck in Blighty and they don't have Carlsberg or heineken..I usually go for " half Cider-half guinness " combo..how anybody can drink Ale or Bitter is beyond me..