Scenic Cornwall coast road from Bude to St Ives
This route was brought to you by:
RouteXpert Nick Carthew - (MRA Master)
Last edit: 04-03-2025
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Verdict
Duration
7h 57m
Mode of travel
Car or motorcycle
Distance
162.30 km
Countries
RouteXpert Review I believe that this is the best coastal route in England. I have ridden this route many times and I still find the views breathtaking. It is just short of 100 miles and I would allow at least 7 hours to fully enjoy the day. There are not many opportunities for fuel, so this route starts at a fuel station; Morrisons Supermarket in Bude and soon takes you onto the scenic coastal road along the spectacular North Cornish coast and finishes at the picturesque harbour town of St Ives.
This route has incredible views along its entire length and although some of the roads can be very narrow and twisty with plenty of loose gravel, it is a very rewarding route to ride on a clear day. There are plenty of places to stop to take pictures or have a coffee. Widemouth Bay has a good beach cafe giving you great views of the coast while you drink your coffee. I would recommend stopping at Boscastle, there is free motorcycle parking and plenty of things to see in the village - including the Museum of Witchcraft. The village suffered from a devastating flood in 2004, a good deal of the village was washed into the sea but miraculously, no life was lost.
Tintagel is next, famous for Merlin the wizard and the legend of King Arthur. A new suspended footbridge was opened in 2019 giving easier access to Tintagel Castle for those that are brave enough to cross on it (£14.50 in 2021). The site of Tintagel Castle has been inhabited at least since the late Roman period, and a community flourished here in the 5th to 7th centuries. In the 12th century Tintagel gained literary fame when Geoffrey of Monmouth named it as the place where King Arthur was conceived.
Next stop is at Port Isaac Harbour, a small and quaint fishing village made famous by the TV series Doc Martin.
The route stops for lunch in Padstow where you can choose to eat at the famous TV chef Rick Stein's fish and chip shop (in the large car park, turn right on the hairpin bend ) or any one of the many harbourside restaurants. You can easily spend a couple of hours looking around here. After lunch the route will take you through more fishing villages but it avoids the very popular and mostly busy surfers town of Newquay before ending up at the very picturesque harbour town of St Ives where you can enjoy a well earned ice cream. If you are looking for a scenic coastal ride, with plenty of things to see along the way, this is the one.
My advice is to choose a clear day to fully enjoy the coastal views.
To return to Bude via the A30 and A39 is approximately 2 hours.
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Disclaimer
Use of this GPS route is at your own expense and risk. The route has been carefully composed and checked by a MyRoute-app accredited RouteXpert for use on TomTom, Garmin and MyRoute-app Navigation.
Changes may nevertheless have occurred due to changed circumstances, road diversions or seasonal closures. We therefore recommend checking each route before use.
Preferably use the route track in your navigation system. More information about the use of MyRoute-app can be found on the website under 'Community' or 'Academy'.
Changes may nevertheless have occurred due to changed circumstances, road diversions or seasonal closures. We therefore recommend checking each route before use.
Preferably use the route track in your navigation system. More information about the use of MyRoute-app can be found on the website under 'Community' or 'Academy'.
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The points of the compass are an evenly spaced set of horizontal directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and geography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each separated by 90 degrees, and secondarily divided by four ordinal (intercardinal) directions—northeast, southeast, southwest, and northwest—each located halfway between two cardinal directions. Some disciplines such as meteorology and navigation further divide the compass with additional azimuths. Within European tradition, a fully defined compass has 32 'points' (and any finer subdivisions are described in fractions of points).Compass points are valuable in that they allow a user to refer to a specific azimuth in a colloquial fashion, without having to compute or remember degrees.
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Enjoy Wales.
There are some great attractions to visit too, as well as having more than it's fair share of fantastic castles and historic buildings, there is the worlds fastest zip line, a balcony road used for world rally stages, mysterious caves and magical waterfalls and a museum of land speed records. All of these can be seen on the routes in this collection.
Although each route in this collection is a separate stand alone route, they will all link up seamlessly to make a 6 day tour that you will remember. The tour starts and ends in Gloucester which can be easily reached in a day from any of the Channel ports.
Enjoy Wales.
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Top 10 Downloaded UK routes by RouteXpert Nick Carthew
Hello and welcome to this collection of the Top 10 MyRoute app downloaded routes in the UK.
There will be a great new event to be announced soon, where all these routes can be ridden.
Download them all now and place them in a new "Top 10" folder, so that you always have them at hand.
If you are going to drive one of these routes in the meantime, track them with the MRA Mobile App or with MRA Navigation. Take some photos (moments) along the way as these will come in handy.
Create a travelstory of your Top 10 driven routes and add the recorded track to it.
There will also be some great prizes on offer, so keep an eye on the MRA-RouteXperts page and your email.
There will be a great new event to be announced soon, where all these routes can be ridden.
Download them all now and place them in a new "Top 10" folder, so that you always have them at hand.
If you are going to drive one of these routes in the meantime, track them with the MRA Mobile App or with MRA Navigation. Take some photos (moments) along the way as these will come in handy.
Create a travelstory of your Top 10 driven routes and add the recorded track to it.
There will also be some great prizes on offer, so keep an eye on the MRA-RouteXperts page and your email.
View Route Collection