Cycling Scotland and England

http://www.c2c-guide.co.uk/

You can do sea to sea on England for 3 or 4 days...

We will do Hadrian’s Cycleway on April or May...

I greatly enjoyed cycling Sustrans Route One. So far have ridden Newcastle to Inverness. Just have the most northern section to do. Easy cycling, lots of fish and chips and friendly places to stay. Certainly take good rain gear, you'll need it!

The route between Manchester and Liverpool could well be very built up and unattractive. Why not cross at say the Lake District using the well used Coast to Coast route or a bit further south via the glorious and under explored Forest of Bowland. Then ride south down the Lancashire coast to reach Liverpool. Much better route. Then leave Liverpool via the Mersey Ferry, the Wirral then down through Cheshire. Glorious countryside and avoiding big sprawling towns like Manchester.

Gaétan. Believe me, cycling in English cities is generally horrible. Except maybe in London. And it's dangerous. Especially in London. Enjoy our lovely countryside and villages. Stop in an isolated pub for lunch and a beer. Chat to people. Tell them where you've been (they'll be amazed; most people have no idea that it's physically possible to cycle more than 6 miles!) and ask them where is good to visit. These things are much harder to do in a city. Even in Liverpool, which is a fabulous city. Much better to explore these urban areas by bus, train and on foot. And these days by tram also! Cycling in Manchester is particularly dreadful. Ditto Birmingham. Avoid these places is my strong advice!

If you do decide to cycle in one of these big cities, try to phone or email their main tourist office beforehand and ask them to send you their bike map of the city. Most of them have one, even if it's usually out of date. It will save you much grief (and time) if you look at it in advance and follow it once you cross the city boundary and start real urban cycling.

hiya gaetan,
I live in Manchester and love the city.
I love cycle touring.
when i'm cycle touring I like to be outside of cities mostly for many of the reasons stated above, however I just did a cycle tour in morocco and mixed it up a bit by going to Marrakesh for 5 days, and ourzazate for 3 - and staying off the bike -- because I also wanted to see the cities and a couple of tourist attractions.
it sounds like you want to be mostly on country roads (delightful for touring) and visiting cities.
why not work out your road route down the country, then find a rail link to take you into one of the big cities, and find a host from this site?
if you don't want to ''cheat' any of your miles (not everyone thinks that way but sometimes complete journeys are great), you could always get a train back out to exactly where you came in from and restart your route.
this way you have the joy of cycling in the countryside, but you get to visit cities too
if you do want to visit Manchester (this also goes for Birmingham's canals of different names) there is actually an ok cycling route out south along the ashton canal (going east), then the peak forest canal (south) to marple, then there's a trail you can pick up to Macclesfield
you can look at the leeds - Manchester- Liverpool canals and see if they're cyclable (be aware that parts in cities will be quite industrial and full of broken glass though! but I go running along the canal right where I live in central manhcester and I love it for what it is).
i'd also try and work out what it is that is attracting you to various places, so you can get the most out of it. if you want to do something like see some live music or a football match (which are the primary reasons most people in England visit Manchester!) - consider tying yourself to specific dates and booking these in advance.
if it's a feel for the city and the arts scene, the art gallery, whitworth gallery and Manchester museum in Manchester and the lowry in Salford are all free of charge and open on weekends (check the times though). you can wander around the northern quarter and it's quirkier bars any time you fancy.
Manchester is one of the centres of the left in England - the people's history museum documents a lot of the working class and women's movements' struggles, and you can wander around parts of ancoats and see the workers cottages and mills (now converted to apartments).
what I love about living in Manchester is -
literature events (I LOVE hearing authors speak and this is probably my main reason for wanting to live near enough to get around easily) - this doesn't happen all year though
the grassroots literary scene (poetry slams underneath afflecks palace, prose and poetry readings in the back rooms of pubs)
I go to some talks and protest organising at the uni and love living in a university town

I cycle absolutely everywhere I go so i'm always looking for little secret routes across the city. I love my bike (don't have a car) so I don't have problem with this - but compared to other parts of the UK and certainly other countries, Manchester ain't built for bikes! My comparison would be - I didn't find cycling in Marrakesh all that scary (and I CLEARLY SHOULD HAVE DONE!!!!!!!!) because cycling in Manchester is pretty hair-raising on a day to day basis.

hope that helps you! I work at lots of festivals in the uk in summertime so am on the road a lot myself, but if you're dates fall when i'm at home i'd be happy to host you :) my applications open next week so will have an idea of dates after that,

best,

cathy

Hi Gaetan - further to info already sent, we found the most useful thing, if you have a smart phone, was to download this App which allows you to navigate on both roads and bicycle routes. http://osmand.net/ We also had a Garmin Edge on which we pre-planned our route, but the larger screen of the smart phone was much better in cities.

This app has all UK bike routes and roads and was excellent for navigating through, or around cities. Dave