Yorkshire Wolds Cycle Route: 146 miles of secondary roads and vast sky

A new cycle route runs over the least visited part of Yorkshire, along the empty roads and spectacular coastline. And you will not be the Tour de France appropriate to do so

It is mid-morning, and wild flowers smell fresh after the first rain in six weeks. I bike out of the village Thixendale and the narrow road climbs gently out of the valley below the high hills covered with trees can be. Suddenly, I command great sweeping views of distant hills and green fields punctuated by groves of summer-happy tree. The sky is huge.

No wonder David Hockney loves this part of Yorkshire. "He was out with his easel as recently as last month," Steve, the landlord of Thixendale Cross Keys (01377 288272, B & B £ 30pp), had told me at dinner the night before, "painting the terrace of houses and the pub. "

But I'm not in the Yorkshire Dales or even the North York Moors, but in the Wolds, least known of Yorkshire's three sisters. A large boomerang of calcareous hills in sensuous curves, perhaps it owes its Cinderella status to his outdated position in the eastern part of the county, just above Hull. But when I went to the modest peaks – the highest is only 250m – I still felt that I was on the roof of the world. In cycling terms, you get a lot of value for low-gear buckled.

And the icing on the cake was that I was the first player to try the Yorkshire Wolds Cycle Route, a 146 mil circular romp around the small back roads, a smidgeon of the Yorkshire Wolds Way and a short section of the popular Way Of The Roses coast to coast ride , created by sustainable transport charity Sustrans.

For someone who does much of his bike in a city, such as quiet roads provide something of a head rush. A few miles from Beverley I found the way not only silent but deserted. A glide through Market Weighton and Pocklington warmed my leg to climb into the Wolds correctly. Fairweather cyclists will be relieved to know that the Alps are not. A long but fairly quiet hill drew me to the village Huggate, where Hockney spent two summers as a young, stacking corn, cycling and "fall in love with this part of the world."

And it's a world of your own. Type in some respects – big arable farms dotted with fields of eye-stingingly bright rape – but with some subtle Yorkshire thing going on. Maybe it's the cool white stone houses, or the sense that if the farmers here turned his back more than a second, would Wolds return to the wild and prohibit hiding out it once was.

Nowadays it is a hide out for a surprising number of wild animals. I saw the magnificent hares bounding around the fields, plus goldfish Yellow Hammers, gray wagtails and bullfinch. One hot afternoon, a couple of lapwings jumped up and berated me for a few minutes to ride too close to the nest. On another, ran a couple of deer across the road a few yards from my front wheel.

In the Elizabethan Burton Agnes Hall (burtonagnes.com) I was excited to know that two new visitors to the Norman house in the grounds had taken a photo which showed the presence of the ghost of a young girl. I nodded, masking my skepticism, as displayed image. Sure enough, there was a spectral figure sitting on a staircase. Later, in the Gloaming, I took several pictures of the same place. Unfortunately refused the Wraith to display.

After two days of happy hill hopping, I sank down to the coast. One can hardly wish for a more spectacular stretch than Bempton Cliffs RSPB reserve. More than 200,000 sea birds living on the 100m chalk cliffs. I stared entranced at kittiwakes, gannets and fulmars in me. A Birder friendly name is Martin lent me his magnifying glass and I spent a few minutes in the world of a Razorbill busy picking chalk from the cliff to make a high-rise living. Gripped with the agony of hunger on the witness this industry, I retired to munch on a delicious vegetarian burgers on the rocks "eco-friendly food trailer.

Some breezy miles later I was in Bridlington as unpretentious a seaside resort that you could want and close neighbor to Sewerby Hall. I resisted the zoo and Pitch and Putt golf course, but nose around The Bijou museum of local girl and doomed flying ace Amy Johnson, before heading back to Burton Agnes village and my bed at Boutique Blue Bell (01262 490050, bluebellhotel.net, doubles from £ 65).

Accommodation on the route is rich enough. I plumped for two pubs, a small hotel (Wrangham house in Hunmanby, near Filey, 01723 891 333, wranghamhouse.com doubles from £ 95) and a former Dominican friary, which now serves as Beverley's hostel (0845 371 9004, yha.org . uk, dorm beds £ 14.40). "It is from 1330," I was told by Helen guard when I arrived, "but in your place in the modern part." My heart sank. "When was it built?" I asked. "Oh, 1560. Your place haunted, by the way."

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Submited at Tuesday, July 19th, 2011 at 7:00 am on Hotel by samantha
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