About a month ago, I decided that with winter starting to set in here in the U.K. I should plan a ride that would excite me. Doing this, would help to make sure I ride out on the roads regardless of the weather. Deciding I would like some company for this adventure, I sent a message to a friend to see if they would like to join me. Thankfully they did! We picked a weekend that worked for both of us, then set about trying to work out where to start the ride.

Picking the meeting point

We live about 115 miles apart, so we picked somewhere roughly halfway, Saffron Walden in Essex. I know the town. I often ride the 120 km round trip when I want a longer day in the saddle. There is an excellent cafe there called Waffle+Coffee that do very good coffee.

We set the meeting point as Saffron Waldon, the start time as 08:30 and agreed a rough total distance. The next step was to plan a route. We had agreed roughly 110-120 km with a stop as close to half way as possible. I spent an hour or so researching potential coffee stops by putting ‘coffee’ into google maps and scrolling through the results looking for good ratings and pictures of coffee. Good coffee is hard to find in Essex. I was lucky and managed to find a nice looking cafe just outside Sudbury called The Foxes Den, Coffee House and Rooms.

Planning the route

I then took to Komoot to plan a route, setting the start at Coffee+Waffle with a way point for the Foxes Den and the end point at Saffron Walden. After a quick check to make sure that the route avoided major roads, I then checked the roads looked suitable using Google Maps Street View. The main check was to confirm they were appropriate for our road bikes. Sometimes the minor lanes can have very poor surfaces and I wanted to avoid any issues on the route. With the route planned, I shared the gpx files with my friend and we set the date in the calendars.

The route

The day of the adventure

The day of the big adventure came. We met as planned at the cafe, dressed in our winter cycle gear, but leaving the bikes in the car. The first mission of the day was to load up on coffee and bacon sandwiches. We had to make sure we had consumed the necessary calories for our tour of Essex! The coffee at Waffle + Coffee is proper barista made coffee. The kind you find easily in London but struggle once you get into the wilds of Essex. Once fuelled we ventured back to the cars to set up our bikes, make sure we had all our nutrition and water bottles and set off for the adventure.

The ride itself, was a mix of A roads and back roads, all very quiet and traffic free. The terrain around Essex is typically rolling. The kind of terrain, that on initial inspection appears flat, but after you take in over 100 km your total elevation figures are still impressive none the less. You never really ride flat roads in Essex, you are always either pushing up a slight slope or riding down one trying to carry speed to the next one. The time flew by, with us arriving at the cafe stop in great shape.

The cafe stop

The cafe stop at The Foxes Den, Coffee House and Rooms did not disappoint. The coffees were good enough, but the cakes were excellent. The home made Bakewell Tart was the stand out winner, but all options looked tempting. The service was what really stood out, the staff were incredibly friendly and attentive. They even filled our water bottles for us before we set off again!

The ride back

Fuelled we hit the road again and took the road out from the coffee stop towards Sudbury and back to Saffron Waldon. The roads on the return route were even better than the way out. The route back, the elevation changed even more frequently and the roads twisted and turned like a roller coaster. That combined with the very low number of cars on the roads made for huge smiles all round.

I posted a video of this ride to my YouTube channel, so check it out here if you are interested to see a little of the route!

All in all a hugely enjoyable day on the bike!