Gwydyr Marin trail

[Parrot of Doom]

Awesome. Just fecking awesome. Although it could do with a few less hills, I'm bloody knackered now!

I wouldn't recommend it for people like me with a hardtail, but I'm only an average rider and I made it around ok, although I ran out of energy and had to walk up a lot of the forest roads between the singletrack sections. Lack of sleep, wrong food, maybe the heat I dunno. My mate was ok though.

http://www.forestry.gov.uk/Website/ourwoods.nsf/LU...

About an hour 40 from Manchester.





Just don't try and show off, or this happens

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_dgOI0oRz4

[Doug86]

Awesome stuff

How long are the rides up there? I know most places have a couple choices of routes.

Whats it like in comparison to Llandegla for example?

[Moose.]

'tis an awesome trail. Did it a few months ago and spent over an hour on that section of jumps alone

[thepickle]

Doug, Marin trail is the only waymarked bike trail there, which is unusual as, like you say, there are usually a few. It's 28km. There is loads more climbing compared to Llandegla so it's much more effort in my opinion. The first climb is almost "Leg Burner" standard and there are a few more good climbs after that. Personally, I prefer the Llandegla singletrack as, in my mind, it seems faster flowing and smoother generally. There is more technical singletrack (rocky) on the Marin compared to Llandegla. Like PoD alludes to, a hardtail would be hard work on the jagged rocky stuff.

[Chris71]

Looks good. Whereabouts is it - Mid Wales towards the border?

I'm long overdue a return to Wales - used to live quite close to Afan and went up to CyB regularly, but haven't been for ages. Essex/Middlesex doesn't really compare for MTBing terrain!

[System-G]

It's near Betws-y-Coed.

We went there earlier this year. 1st ride out in about 6 months. The climbs were propper killer. Loved the single track stuff and those jumps - awesome

If you like the Marin trail, you should also try the North Face Trail in the Grizedale forest, in the lakes. Awesome singletrack with a few forestry roads.

[Darkslider]

It's a good place if you're just getting into mountain biking and fancy a bit of excercise but nothing too challenging. Have to disagree on the hardtail point though, I think the place is ideally suited to hardtails and maybe short travel full sussers. Me and a mate rode the trail on our 8 inch downhill bikes, video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TgynzlWseE
(I'm the faster one on the black Giant that washes out near the start)