Adventures in
Central & Eastern England.

The flattest, driest, sunniest part of England — with the most extensive forest mountain biking in the south, the country's oldest road as its eastern Cotswolds trail, and underrated paragliding on the Derbyshire fringe.

Central and Eastern England runs from the western edge of the Cotswolds across the Midlands and East Anglia to the North Sea coast at Norfolk and Lincolnshire. Eight spots in the directory cover hiking, mountain biking and paragliding — a lowland mix that doesn't have the mountain stars of the north or the surf of the south-west, but quietly hides some of the country's most efficient outdoor venues.

Thetford Forest, on the Norfolk-Suffolk border, is the UK's largest lowland pine forest and the only serious mountain bike venue in East Anglia — sandy, flat-ish, fast and dry year-round. Cannock Chase in Staffordshire is the most-ridden MTB trail centre in the English Midlands. Sherwood Pines, in the heart of what was historically Sherwood Forest, completes the East Midlands forest network. Together they offer more lowland MTB than anywhere else in England.

The Thames Path Hike (184 miles from the Cotswold source at Kemble to the Thames Barrier) and the Ridgeway (87 miles from Avebury to Ivinghoe Beacon) both start at the region's western edge. The Cotswold Way runs along the western escarpment from Chipping Campden south to Bath. Together they make the western part of the region one of the best long-distance walking surfaces in Britain — well-drained chalk and limestone, civilised inns, manageable in winter.

Paragliding sits in the high ground of the region. Airways Airsports at Darley Moor in south Derbyshire is a flat-airfield site (rather than ridge) that covers hang gliding and paragliding training; Leavesley Aviation in Shropshire teaches on the Long Mynd; Chicksands Bike Park in Bedfordshire is the largest dirt-jump and gravity park in eastern England. Norfolk and the Wash hold their own outdoor scene — the North Norfolk Coast Path, the Broads sea kayaking — not yet in the directory.