Types of road surfaces:

Mainly tarmac on A & B roads except for two places; The shingle track from Bucklers Hard to Beaulieu Fire Station – 2.5 miles long, and the old railway track from Brockenhurst to Wooton Bridge. I have cycled both tracks on numerous occasions with road tyres (Schwalbe Marathon plus 1” wide) with no problems to date.

Day Ride to Calshot Spit and Castle

There Are Three leaders sharing the route; Philip Hiscock, Andrew Baxter and Roger Cummings. Each leader covers an area they are most familiar with.

The route in brief is as follows:-

1. Starting from Highcliffe Castle at 9.30am on Wed 12th July with Philip leading; head for Lymington via Silver Street and Pennington. Follow through the back of Lyminton, stopping outside the ferry entrance at Undershore Road. Change leader to Andrew.
2. Follow the Undershore Road to South Baddesley Road then on to Bucklers Hard via East End and St. Leonards. We will stop there for brunch. Hopefully lunch will be at Calshot Spit Cafe in the Activities Centre.
3. After our break at Bucklers Hard Phil will lead us on the gravel track/pathway to Beaulieu Fire Station, we then turn right onto Palace Lane heading for Hill Top (this is up a very demanding hill).
4. Turn right at Hill Top Junction taking the Exbury Road which is the 2nd exit on the right. Exbury Rd then becomes Summer Lane. Continue along this road passing Exbury Gardens towards Lepe.
5. We will have a short stop at Lepe and change leader to Roger. He will lead us to Calshot via Stanswood Road.
6. At Ower Road junction turn right towards Calshot, follow on towards the coast and Jack Maynard Road. This leads us to the Activities and Climbing centre hanger where we will be having lunch. Make your way to the back of the old hangar where we can be seated inside or outside.
7. After lunch, we can spend a short while looking around the hangar if you are interested.
8. Off we go again!  Andrew will lead us back to Beaulieu via Calshot village. We then follow the B3053 to Fawley, turning left to Slades Hill Road (signed Beaulieu) then right to Newlands Road, through to Rollestone Road, finally arriving back at Hill Top. We then turn left past Beaulieu.
9. At Beaulieu Phil will lead us past Hatchet Pond on towards Brockenhurst via B3055. (Apologies about the long hill out of Beaulieu).
10. After about 6 miles we turn left at Mill Lane and follow on to Brockenhurst railway station, where we turn left to the cafe.
11. Finally we head for home via the old railway track towards Wooton Bridge and up the Rising Sun Hill (sorry)