| Peak forest is a
windswept one horse town in the middle of nowhere. I discovered it
on the map looking for a shorter drive to this classic peaks
mountain bike heartland. There is a pub but don't bother trying to
park your car there, the landlord is none too friendly on this
point. Anyway there's plenty of parking on side streets for free
which makes a refreshing change.
Like a lot of Peaks rides this one
has almost no warm up. It begins with a few hundred yards of steep
tarmac then turns down a short farm drive before going through an
iron gate and on to the climb proper. Straight up now on a
characteristic rocky double track, there's a play area in the trees
here but we usually only stop for the nature. Call of nature that
is, facilities in Peak Forest are non-existent.
This route is passable even in deep
snow, when farmers 4WD's cut parallel trenches through the frozen
drifts. On up you go through two more gates, as you approach the top
the solid rock trail bulges and dips then finally drops a short way
to an old iron gate. Bearing left over the grass then right after
another gate on to the quarry road.
A couple of bends then engage warp
drive for the Kamikaze. As wide as a main road the surface of this
500 yard MTB motorway gets cut by water tossing up limestone
boulders that hammer rims and shred inner tubes. One fateful day I
blew front and rear, finding six holes in the front tube. Carry
spares and up your tyre pressure, slowing down is for the week and
sensible.
|
The
Kamikaze leads straight on to 200 yards of tarmac, turn right at the
line of trees then left on to the dentist's grade. This is the top
of the Pindale valley, once an old quarry rocks are the name of the
game. Moving fast I take the long view, swap sides a lot but make
the wrong choice and we're talking Bronco Billy. Out from between
the walls and in to the quarry proper head straight down over the
single track drops avoiding the rhino sized boulder at the bottom of
the second.
This is still not quite the end of
this awesome descent as a storm cut tarmac road affords a couple of
flying drop-offs then ride the left bank for the fast line towards
the cottage at the bottom of Pindale. If you're not laughing now you
were going way too slow! Straight ahead on the tarmac and a high
speed road hill catapults you in to Hope village, turn left for the
Woodbine cafe. A five star legend in it's own lunch time this ultra
MTB friendly cafe has a roaring log fire in winter. Left out of here
then left again continues the route on tarmac for half a mile or so
and on to the bridle road to open country.
Through an iron gate this long rocky climb gets more difficult in
stages. Stage one is just steep, followed by a flat and sandy
section leading to stage two which is a jumble of rocks. The right
hand line is a little easier and if you keep your butt off the
saddle it's rideable all the way up. Through two more gates on a
pretty waterlogged trail then turn right and you're at the top of
the beast. This awesome forest road descent starts as it means to go
on with boulders, logs and flowstone (solid rock sections)
> Page
2
 |
This is a really top photo of the beast. As
with nearly all pictures on MTB Britain, Click on it to see more. |
|
