An idyllic ride from Reading in England along the Kennet & Avon Canal to Newbury and ending in Hungerford taking in the North Wessex Countryside.

This is a trail idea I’d written down last year that I planned to do during the summer. While I did this ride in May it had that dusty hot summer feel about it, though with plenty of humidity off the flourishing nettles along the canal tow path.

Could this be one of the most idyllic rides I’ve done to date? It was certainly very beautiful and peaceful, especially around half way through the later trail between Newbury and Hungerford. The trail feels much quieter with less people, calm and with birds of prey over head. It was very special.

Some of the trail has quite rough surfaces where its basically grass with hard-packed dry mud, some which is quite bumpy so it’s worth keeping this in mind though it wasn’t for a particularly long time.

Newbury was a nice Market Town and certainly makes a good place to stop for a few hours with plenty to do and places to grab a coffee. Hungerford is a quiet town and much less tourist orientated but there are things to see and do though its much smaller than Newbury.

I really enjoyed this trail and got a bit of a tan despite using factor 50.

I hope you enjoy this ride.

The route can be found on Strava along with most other rides.
https://www.strava.com/activities/11487246506

10 Comments

  1. Excellent one there..! I loved the celebrationary bottle at the end of it.. I'm so glad you never put loads of them strange noises/tunes in this video… 👍🏻👍🏻

  2. In a way its very relaxing having someone else do all the pedalling while I sit back and enjoy it all. But somehow I miss the enjoyment of being there. Once more, thank you.

  3. Wow – that was quite a ride! A lot longer than the little jaunts I do along the canals! I've never been to the K&A and its unlikely I'll ever take my boat there, but it does look pretty special – so thanks for showing us.
    As always, I really loved the piano playing / composition – at just before, and after, 60 minutes in – it sounds very professional. And what a lovely way to finish – loved the wine glass idea. Altogether, another very well planned and thought-out video which deserves loads of views! 👍

  4. A great video that i really enjoyed Madison, beautiful weather, scenery, wildlife, and fauna. I sure your video will inspire other's to do that route, and as other watchers have said it's interesting that this route could be extended quite a long way, and imagine doing an extended adventure along with overnight wild camps wonderful. Newbury and Hungerford look really nice, so thanks for sharing 👏 👋

  5. And BOOM! She's back with a full length epic that MGM studios would be proud of, took me 2 sittings to consume it! 😉 Glad to see your back to full fitness and out on the bike again. 👍

    I rode a good bit of that path about 5 years ago when I found myself in Burghfield with time to kill (Possibly at the lake you sent the camera for a swim in) , you sure had better weather than me for your ride:

    Very wet and muddy trail and a cold misty day, I rode it as a out and back but didn't go as far as you. Once you get away from the M4 background noise , there's some nice tranquil stretches.

    Blue honey is a new one on me! Heather ? is the only thing I can think of in North Wales.

    I will have pale green honey later this summer, as my bees are going mad for the oilseed rape thats over the back of my Garden.

    Take care.

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