Landmark Trust holidays by bike

Travelling to Landmarks by bike is all part of the fun, and many of our locations lend themselves to two-wheeled exploration. Writer, cyclist and Landmarker Dixe Wills shares his favourites.

It was Robert Louis Stevenson who wrote ‘…to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive’. With all due respect to the gifted wordsmith, my experience is that you can do better than that. ’Travel slowly,’ I say, ‘and you’ll really enjoy arriving.’

For instance, I’ve popped my bike on a train and cycled to a number of Landmark Trust properties over the years, and can thoroughly recommend it. On each occasion, the journey there and back has become part of my holiday, keeping my care-free mood going just a little bit longer.

The ride from South Yorkshire’s Apperley Bridge station to Calverley Old Hall is only a couple of miles but introduced me to some interesting local history. In 1856, a developer cut a dramatic sandstone gorge through the wooded slopes below Calverley in order to build a housing estate. The scheme failed to get off the ground because would-be purchasers considered this new ‘Calverley Cut’ too steep to live on. Happily, that same track now provides a gorgeous sylvan shortcut from the station to the Old Hall (and its row of Sheffield steel bike stands). Just remember to engage a low gear at the bottom.

Calverley Old Hall in West Yorkshire 

It’s a similar distance from Kent’s Sole Street station to the jewel-like Cobham Dairy. However, on the way I pedalled past sunny orchards, a National Trust property (Owletts), Charles Dickens’ favourite pub (The Leather Bottle) and a medieval school for priests (Cobham College) before heading along a track right into the heart of Cobham Park and its Marie Antoinette-style dairy, where there's a dedicated bike storage space in a corner cloister room. Find cycling routes around Cobham here. 

Cobham Dairy in Kent, with designated bike storage space 

Down in Devon, the 2021 re-opening of the railway line to Okehampton, means the sumptuous ‘Arts and Crafts’ Winsford Cottage Hospital is now just a 12-mile cycle along gloriously undulating country lanes. Don’t be dismayed by the fact that ‘bicycle accident’ as a reason for admittance is an all-too-common entry in the hospital’s fascinating Patients’ Record (along with ‘ringworm’, ‘horse bites’ and – for reasons I felt better left uninvestigated – ‘scalded buttocks’). Happily, I can report that the roads are no longer the wheel-buckling rutted tracks of a hundred years ago. And there are some lovely quiet cycle routes around the area too.

Winsford Cottage Hospital in Devon, surrounded by bucolic cycle routes 

Meanwhile, up in the Scottish Highlands, I remember the thrill of sneaking out of Fairburn Tower to escape the army of some imaginary enemy clan. Speeding along secret back roads, I crossed a burn just downstream of the Falls of Orrin, headed east along sheltering Faebait Wood, made haste alongside the trickling Allt Fionnaidh and arrived breathless at the Muir of Ord (and its handy railway station). In my defence, my stay at the lofty tower-house had pulled me back several centuries so it didn’t take much to hear the skirl of illusory bagpipes in the wind.

Fairburn Tower in Ross-shire - a mountain biker's paradise

But it’s not just about having the chance to enjoy the scenery above the hedgerows and seeing your accommodation in its natural surroundings. It’s also pleasant to know that, by arriving on a bicycle, you’re causing less of a negative environmental impact. You’re thus helping to protect the building you’re staying in while being kinder to any flora, fauna and people living in the vicinity. It’s good to know that Landmark is doing its bit too – making accommodation greener by installing air and ground source heat pumps, solar panels and triple-glazed windows in a bid to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2045. 

Aside from the properties I’ve mentioned, there are plenty more that would appeal to anyone keen on experiencing a mini-adventure on two wheels. For instance, Llwyn Celyn in the Bannau Brycheiniog (Brecon Beacons) is within pedalling distance of Dirt Farm (dirtfarm.wales), a classic among downhill mountain bike parks. Find more cycling routes in the Bannau Brycheiniog here.

Ascog House on the Isle of Bute is one of an increasing number of Landmarks offering bicycle storage. That said, you’d probably have your bike out most of the time, because the traffic-light island is a delight for cyclists.

Ascog House, on the cyclist-friendly Isle of Bute 

The same is true of Jersey in the Channel Islands. Simply stow your bike on a ferry and make for the bright little folly that is Nicolle Tower. And if you don’t have your own bicycle, you could head for somewhere like St Winifred’s Well near Oswestry, where a local bike hire company will deliver the steed of your choice direct to your door.

Wherever you decide to go, there’s something that feels intangibly pleasing about arriving at your destination under your own steam. Perhaps it’s because it hints at the self-sufficiency that was part and parcel of existence for those who lived or worked in these buildings. Or perhaps it’s because the relatively slow pace and quietness of cycling more closely matches the reality of travel for the numberless visitors to these properties over the centuries.

And, hey, when all’s said and done, arriving by bike gives you an instant excuse to jump into a bath. Now that’s what I call a start to a holiday.

Words: Dixe Wills