The Oyster Wheel provides a series of Day rides designed for hybrid touring bikes and easily accessible from the Oyster/contactless rail and tube networks.
It consists of two sets of rides:
- A loop of eight rides together creating a complete circuit of London, with each day starting and finishing at an Oyster station – the Oyster Loop
- Eight rides back from those same stations to Tower Bridge – the Oyster Spokes.
The menu at the top of the page provides access to those rides, whilst the blog provides updates on progress.
I created the Oyster Wheel whilst supporting my wife who is suffering from Pancreatic Cancer. If having tried out the Routes you would like to donate to Pancreatic Cancer then my donations page can be found at Oyster Wheel Donations. Thank you.
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Featured
The Oyster Wheel
When the spirits are low, when the day appears dark, when work becomes monotonous, when hope hardly seems worth having, just mount a bicycle and go for a spin down the road, without thought on anything but the ride you are taking. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle I thought I was reasonably lucky to have survived… Read more
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Half-Spoke circuits 1 and 8: Wandle and Waterlink Ways
Tuesday was a sunny day so I decided to enjoy the good weather and go off for another half-Spoke circuit – circular rides that head up one spoke cut over and then down another. This allows me to maintain social distancing policy by not using public transport and still get exercise. I set off on… Read more
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Half-Spoke circuits: 1 and 2 via Wimbledon Common
One of the challenges of the Corona virus outbreak is that it affects more severely those with underlying health conditions. Given that my wife is still having chemo for her pancreatic cancer, then we’ve been advised to minimise public contact, such as the use of public transport. Riding the Oysterwheel and Spokes is predicated on… Read more
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Thank you so much for ‘inventing’ and sharing this. It looks great – an excellent project for 2020 (and such a clever name/concept). Very best wishes to you and to your wife.
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Thanks for your comments and your best wishes. Thankfully the chemo is keeping the tumour at bay for now, let’s see what next year brings. Happy Christmas.
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This looks great – been wanting to do some mixed-surface riding in easy reach of London so this looks like it’ll be perfect. Quick question about the surfaces – on the off-road bits would you suggest a more knobbly tyre (cyclocross rather than gravel)? Also with the sections you’ve marked as more difficult – is that because of the surface / technicality? Thanks
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Hi Paul. My bike has just gravel type hybrid tires and I managed to cycle all of the Oyster Wheel in summer. That said, in winter it might be a different proposition and there might be a few areas where more grip would be useful – in particular the MarDyke on Day 5 which was several km of grass track. Generally speaking the harder routes that I’ve highlighted are where it was more physically challenging – either short steep uphills with poor grip or else the Mardyke. I’m not a technical cyclist so that I’ve cycled it is evidence that it’s not that technical…. Have fun and let me know how you get on – be good to get some feedback. Tim
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Paul, Thinking about it more – the other section in addition to the Mardyke where more grip might be useful is the Pilgrims Way section of Day 6. Some of the track is on the chalk so could be slippy after the rain we’ve had.
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