Why this ride
425 km from Bristol to Bristol, about 6 h 36 of riding. It goes by way of Stonehenge and Associated Monuments, Stonehenge, Lyme Regis to West Bay and Dorset and East Devon Coast. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Bristol long day · Dorset and East Devon Coast
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 425 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 6 h 36
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
Scenic road chapters
Lyme Regis to West Bay → Dorset and East Devon Coast
Slow enough to look. The surface follows the shoreline, so the corners arrive where the water decided, not where an engineer did. Water arrives beside the road and stays for 14 km. The line follows the shore because there is nowhere else for it to go.
Chapter facts
- Length
- 18 km
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Bristol
Bristol sits at the head of the Severn estuary, which has the second-highest tidal range in the world, and its history is the history of ships. In 1497 John Cabot set sail from here in a small vessel called the Matthew and reached the coast of North America, and for centuries the merchants of the city grew rich on trade, much of it, as the city now admits, on the back of the slave trade. Isambard Kingdom Brunel left his mark: the Clifton Suspension Bridge, which crosses the Avon gorge in a single graceful span, opened in 1864 after his death, and the SS Great Britain, his great iron steamship, is now a museum in the dock where she was built.
Read the complete Bristol write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Bristol is where the day begins. Next is Stonehenge and Associated Monuments.
2. Stonehenge and Associated Monuments
Stonehenge looks smaller than people expect and stranger than the photographs, a ring of grey stones standing alone on a swell of chalk grassland with the sky pressing down. It sits on Salisbury Plain, a high, open expanse of downland that was a holy landscape long before the stones. The monument went through phases from about 3000 BC, with the great sarsen blocks raised around 2500 BC, hauled, it seems, from the Marlborough Downs some thirty kilometres to the north. The smaller bluestones came from the Preseli Hills in west Wales, about two hundred kilometres away, which remains one of the most astonishing facts in European prehistory.
Read the complete Stonehenge and Associated Monuments write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Stonehenge and Associated Monuments comes up about 76 km into the recorded legs. Next is Stonehenge.
3. Stonehenge
Nobody quite knows why Stonehenge was built, and that is part of its power. Begun around 3000 BC as a circular ditch and bank, it was remodelled over the following thousand years, and the great sarsen stones, some weighing more than twenty tonnes, were raised around 2500 BC. The sarsens came from the Marlborough Downs, about twenty-five kilometres north; the smaller bluestones came from the Preseli Hills in west Wales, more than two hundred kilometres away, and how they were moved remains one of the great puzzles of prehistory. The monument is aligned with the sunrise at the summer solstice and the sunset at the winter solstice, and thousands gather here at those times. With Avebury and the surrounding landscape, it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Read the complete Stonehenge write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 77 km into the recorded legs you reach Stonehenge. Next is Lyme Regis to West Bay.
4. Lyme Regis to West Bay
The cliffs between Lyme Regis and West Bay are falling into the sea, and that is precisely why people come. This stretch of the Dorset coast is part of the Jurassic Coast, England's first natural World Heritage Site, and its soft clay and limestone cliffs constantly release fossils from the Jurassic seas of around two hundred million years ago. Ammonites, belemnites and the bones of marine reptiles wash out onto the beaches after every storm, and at Charmouth you will see families combing the shingle with hammers and bags at low tide.
Read the complete Lyme Regis to West Bay write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Lyme Regis to West Bay, about halfway. Next is Dorset and East Devon Coast.
5. Dorset and East Devon Coast
The cliffs around Lyme Regis are made of dark, crumbling clay and shale, and every winter storm brings some of them down. That is why fossil hunters love them. In the early nineteenth century a local girl named Mary Anning, the daughter of a carpenter, found the skeleton of an ichthyosaur on the beach and went on to unearth some of the first plesiosaurs, earning a grudging place in a scientific world that did not welcome women. The ammonites, fossil crinoids and sea-reptile bones that still turn up here are nearly two hundred million years old, and the whole coast from Exmouth to Studland, the Jurassic Coast, was listed by UNESCO in 2001 for its record of Earth history.
Read the complete Dorset and East Devon Coast write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Dorset and East Devon Coast sits at 215 km, about halfway. Next is back through Lyme Regis to West Bay.
6. back through Lyme Regis to West Bay
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Lyme Regis to West Bay write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Lyme Regis to West Bay comes up about 231 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Stonehenge.
7. back through Stonehenge
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Stonehenge write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 348 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Stonehenge. Next is back through Stonehenge and Associated Monuments.
8. back through Stonehenge and Associated Monuments
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Stonehenge and Associated Monuments write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Stonehenge and Associated Monuments, late in the day. Next is Bristol.
9. Bristol
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Bristol write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The route ends here after 425 km.
Leg by leg
Bristol to Stonehenge and Associated Monuments
Bristol → Stonehenge and Associated Monuments is 76 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Stonehenge to Lyme Regis to West Bay
Stonehenge → Lyme Regis to West Bay is 118 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Lyme Regis to West Bay to Dorset and East Devon Coast
Lyme Regis to West Bay → Dorset and East Devon Coast is 18 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Dorset and East Devon Coast to back through Lyme Regis to West Bay
Dorset and East Devon Coast → back through Lyme Regis to West Bay is 18 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Lyme Regis to West Bay to back through Stonehenge
back through Lyme Regis to West Bay → back through Stonehenge is 117 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Stonehenge and Associated Monuments to Bristol
back through Stonehenge and Associated Monuments → Bristol is 79 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
More motorcycle rides nearby
- Salisbury Plain and Shaftesbury · 362 km