h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: The Isle of Wight's Round the Island Cycle Route - A87830175
Author: Bluebottle - U43530

A brief look at the Isle of Wight's Round the Island Cycle Route.

This is dedicated to SashaQ, who continues to be enthusiastic about the other bike ride articles I've written.

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Yay! This is really good - the information links together well

I like the Q reference

In the Isle of Wight Randonee section, would you like to link to Audax? A87816810

Excellent

Good suggestion, now added

You've probably noticed that this is the, ahem, deflowered version

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Good stuff, Bluebottle. How many IoW entries have you written now?

I wouldn't mind having a crack at this one day. Either that, or circumnavigation by walking.

"The route followed uphill, passing Bembridge High Street and the Grade II Listed K1 Telephone Box." - followed uphill?

"a field where an episode of Time Team where they were looking for a Roman villa was filmed." That's slightly clunky I think, what about "a field where the team of archaeologists from the television programme Time Team once hunted for a Roman villa."

"Borthwood Copseand" Needs a space.

"You will passAmazon World" Ditto.

"Cross the A3056 road ad" -> and

I was left wondering how much of a challenge this is to a cyclist. At 62 miles I imagine a practiced cyclist could complete it in a day, but it might be useful to discuss that a little. Things like how hilly it is, where the best places on the route to buy food and drink are, etc.

I've written one or two now, over a hundred anyway. I'm not sure whether the Island's overtaken Scotland yet, but there are more entries about it than most countries in the world except Mainland England and America.
Yep, you can cycle this quite easily in a day – that's what I've done. (Mind you, during the Isle of Wight's walking festival they've held a 'walk the Wight challenge' in which you walk the 80-mile coastal path within 24 hours. I've done it in 4 days, which is less suicidal.)
I've added your suggestions to a bit at the start – let me know what you think.

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Wow!

That looks great, thanks.

This Entry is heavy going, Bluebottle. Do you really need to lay out every turn, bend and corner, when the route is signposted all the way? Would it be better with just summaries of what you will encounter on each section?

Some detail:

"23 miles wide by 13 miles tall"

Tall is the wrong word here as it normally means altitude. I think you should say "23 miles long by 13 miles wide" - it is normal to use long for the longer dimension and wide for the shorter dimension.

"This contains a wide number of different bike rides that cyclists can enjoy, from bike rides for toddlers around the Isle of Wight shaped paddling pool at Ventnor, to the Hill Killer Challenge, a 52-mile route including 14 of the Island's steepest hills."
--reword this to avoid "bike rides" twice in quick succession.

Isle of Wight shaped paddling pool -->
Isle-of-Wight-shaped paddling pool

You'll have to work a bit to reduce the repetition of "Isle of Wight" throughout this entry. For example, the sentence starting "The Isle of Wight's Round the Island Route" has "Isle of Wight" later in the same sentence, and it comes up again in the next sentence. You don't need to keep repeating it - we know you're talking about the Isle of Wight.

The route undulates, but not gruelling -->
The route undulates, but is not gruelling

Avoid using "also" to introduce each new idea. In the section Following the Route, there are four paragraph, and the second and third of them have "also" in the first sentence.

Randonnée is spelt with two n's. You have this misspelt in many places.

is when the Isle of Wight Randonée2 is held --> is during the Isle of Wight Randonée2

"They would then cycle the short distance to the floating bridge and, arriving in such a large group, caused chaos and confusion."

-- the grammar and punctuation of this is mixed up. If you put "arriving in such a larger group" between commas, the sentence has to make sense when you lift this bit out, but you've got "They would then cycle the short distance to the floating bridge and caused chaos and confusion. " The "caused" doesn't match with the "would then cycle". You could change the "caused" to "would cause". Alternatively, you could split it:

They would then cycle the short distance to the floating bridge. Arriving in such a large group caused chaos and confusion.

using on the floating bridge --> using the floating bridge

undulating up and down various small hills - the path may undulate but the cyclists don't, unless they are belly dancers.

The route then descends down Wootton Hill -->
The route then descends Wootton Hill

where the Wightlink car ferry to Portsmouth, docks -- remove the comma

the route crosses the route of National Cycle Route 23 -->
the route crosses National Cycle Route 23

Ascend up to Wroxall --> Ascend to Wroxall

St. Mary and St. Radegund --> St Mary and St Radegund

principle highways --> principal highways

the England's oldest theme park -->
England's oldest theme park

and a short distance leave the Military Road -->
and after a short distance leave the Military Road

From Yafford the road pass Thorncross Farm -->
From Yafford the road passes Thorncross Farm

the Back of the Wight's largest village -->
the back of the Wight's largest village

takes a different loop than the anti-clockwise way -->
takes a different loop to the anti-clockwise way

(never say different than)

passing Dimbola Lodge, the statue of Jimi Hendrix, the Norman All Saints Church -->
passing Dimbola Lodge, the statue of Jimi Hendrix, and the Norman All Saints Church

flat, gravely ground -->
flat, gravelly ground

the route heads East --> the route heads east
(use lowercase for directions and uppercase for locations such as the West)

heads uphill to Porchfield and turning left -->
heads uphill to Porchfield and turns left

"At the end cross Park Road and zig-zag into Victoria Road ahead until reaching Mill Hill Road, where you should descend, following the road as it curves right into Medina Road, at the end of which lies the floating bridge which will transport you back to East Cowes, and the start of the Round the Island Route."
-- too long. Break it up into two or three sentences.

He later published and the article -->
He later published the article

Please add a link to A668397 Mary Whitehouse.

I'm puzzled by your illustration, with signs pointing to Sandown and Alverstone. Surely Alverstone is not on the coastal route?

Ah, it is. I see. The coastal route goes quite far inland.

Initial changes made.

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I have to say I enjoy being taken round the route with detailed descriptions as I cycle vicariously with Bluebottle.

"the Back of the Wight's largest village -->
the back of the Wight's largest village"

The Back of the Wight is a place on the Island, isn't it?

One thing I am a bit confused by is why alternating the direction of travel caused a problem at the floating bridge... Was it because there was only one start point for the route?

I understood about the direction causing a problem, but I've been around the Island many times by sub-editing Bluebottle's entries.

Thanks for dropping by, SashaQ

The Back of the Wight is a place on the Island, isn't it?
It is an informal nickname for an area of the Island. On the whole, I think I'll change it back.

One thing I am a bit confused by is why alternating the direction of travel caused a problem at the floating bridge... Was it because there was only one start point for the route?
As a circular route, you could start anywhere, as long as you complete the circle and get all the checkpoint stamps. In practice, if you are coming from the mainland there are (at present, a new ferry company, Nauti One, is being set up and hopes to offer Cowes to Portsmouth sailings soon) only 5 ferries/hovercraft routes that carry bikes.
Lymington to Yarmouth (Lymington is a difficult place to get to on the mainland for those outside the New Forest), Southampton to East Cowes, Portsmouth to Fishbourne or Ryde and Southsea to Ryde. Portsmouth and Southsea are easy to get to, but only accept about a dozen bikes maximum on their services to Ryde. You can fit lots of bikes on the ferry to Fishbourne, but it doesn't go very close to the route.
If you were coming from the mainland, the ferry from Southampton to East Cowes is easy to get to from London and you will disembark a few yards from the route. So let's assume that 1,500 cyclists come to the Island from the Mainland, and the vast majority of these go via Southampton and are on the early morning ferry. If they want to travel anti-clockwise, a thousand plus cyclists cycle the short distance from East Cowes ferry terminal to the floating bridge (which is a chain ferry). You can't fit a thousand bikes on the Chain Ferry in one go, so it would take several trips to ferry all the cyclists across the river.
If instead of all heading to the floating bridge at once they travel the other way round, by the time they've travelled 100k to get to the floating bridge, the cyclists have spread out considerably, with only, say, about a dozen bikes wanting to be carried on each crossing.

I thought I was being quite succinct for once, which is why this is only one article and not the 5 that the walking the Isle of Wight Coastal Path ended up being...

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Ah, so it's not the alternation that caused the problem, but the anticlockwise route starting at the floating bridge rather than finishing at the floating bridge, I see

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Another link in the chain of Isle of Wight entries - as no-one's two-tyred of the Island, may the cycle continue!

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