For those who don't know, there is no 'official' route for cycling LEJOG, it's not an organised event. There isn't even an official way of doing it - people have walked it, done it with skateboards, walking, running, walking backwards, swimming, on road and off-road, in the nude (or tried to - google the 'naked rambler') and probably all manner of other ways for which they have not tried to claim a record. And of course cycling. It's just the iconic British road trip.
Cycling UK, formerly known as the Cycle Touring Club or CTC, has three routes for doing it - a fast route using A roads, a b&b route, a hosteling route. In fact they've now added a fourth, an off-road route. The hosteling route might be problematic these days as many rural youth hostels have closed in recent years or only open weekends, which is a shame. Anyway, our route is none of these. Our route is based on the 'Google route', as amended by someone called Royston Woods, who wrote a book about it. Royston had the bright idea, at the time when Google began implementing a cycle route option on its mapping system, of dropping a pin at Lands End and another at John O'Groats, and letting Google decide the route. And then following it. It turned out, in his opinion, that Google didn't do a bad job - for most of the way - but occasionally made some bad choices. So he changed it a bit, and that's the basis for his book, 'End to End - a safer way'. This seemed appealing because it's not fun - at least I don't think so - cycling on busy roads with lots of traffic. Who can argue with 'a safer way', at least so long as it's not too slow or unsuitable for road bikes.
This route does seem to take in a lot of canals and cycle trails as it wends its way up through England, so we won't be sticking to it all the time. Already today we cut out a couple of short sections because they deviated from a more direct route for no real purpose, and in one case in a way that wasn't even cyclable on a road bike, but on the whole it's been good so far. A lot of quiet country lanes. Definitely not the fastest way but pleasant riding on the whole.
Update: After finishing England.
The worst bits seem to have been on a path beside the Severn, and a short distance before Wigan. I didn't cycle either of them but Nick did both. I abandoned the Woods route before reaching the Severn because of rain and wanting to get to our destination asap, before the Wigan section because one of my pannier clips broke and I needed a smoother surface to ride on. I also left it on the way to Kendal because I finally got fed up with the slow pace on the last section of towpath. There were some other 'strange' bits here and there, poor surfaces on many cycle tracks and canal paths, I didn't make a note of where they were. The main thing is, it's the safe but "scenic route". No good for getting anywhere fast, but plenty of opportunity for taking in your surroundings in a way you probably wouldn't on the roads because of going faster and the presence of traffic - and because there's often less to see.
Final update: Scotland
The route through Scotland was almost all fantastic, right up to Tain. Cycle routes were usually minor roads running close to A roads going to the same place, reasonably direct and well surfaced. There was no feeling of being sent round and round the houses just to get off the road at any cost. Unfortunately from Tain the route takes the A9 and in my opinion that's definitely best avoided. It doesn't carry a lot of traffic and couldn't be said to be 'busy' just considering traffic volumes, but the traffic that there is wants to keep travelling at dual carriageway speeds on single carriageway roads, sometimes narrow. Highly unpleasant and sometimes downright scary.
Would I use this route again? No. Not as is. I'd certainly be happy using a lot of it, but in England there were too many poorly surfaced tracks and paths for my taste. In Scotland I wouldn't use it beyond Tain. I'd try using the English section as the basis for a purely on-road route - ie using the minor roads as is and bypassing the canals and dedicated cyclepaths whereever possible, and try a different route, probably via Lairg, from Inverness.
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