Cycling Holiday Review–West Bay Club–Isle of Wight

This weekend I was given the opportunity to review a stay in one of the privately owned cottages at West Bay Club on the Isle of Wight. I jumped at the chance – who wouldn’t?! It’s a three bedroom, very spacious cottage so I was able to bring the family (including mother-in-law).

I expected a pretty good time, but what I got was one of the best weekends of cycling (and vacationing) that I have ever experienced. It helped that the weather happened to be astoundingly good, but to be honest I would have enjoyed it thoroughly no matter what the weather had in store for us.

The Accommodation

The West Bay Club is conveniently located about 1 mile from the Ferry Port at Yarmouth. It is basically a complex of cottages. The complex is managed and run extremely well by a company who maintain the cottages, manage the shop, reception, swimming pool and spa and so on. But the cottages themselves are predominantly privately owned. The end result is quite a unique experience.

The staff are exceptionally friendly, they offered to take me on a ride around the island (70 miles) as well as do some mountain biking and running. I refused as I wanted to go cycling quite early (6am) so that I could get back for some family time. So they gave me route maps and lots of fantastic advice.

The cottage itself was absolutely first class. Very spacious, light and airy with plenty of bathrooms, a fantastic kitchen and dining space, a very comfortable lounge with 47inch T.V. and an outdoor patio with table and chairs. Needless to say, my wife and mother-in-law immediately declared their desire to move in permanently!

The only gripes about the accommodation was that some of the doors were very creaky – which didn’t matter at all other than late at night when we were trying to sneak out of the bedroom having just put our 19 month old toddler to bed. But it wasn’t loud enough to wake her.

Facilities

This place has facilities by the bucket load:

• Indoor heated pool (very nice pool it has to be said)
• outdoor kiddies pool
• Spa – with treatments available to purchase
• tennis courts
• a great playground
• a baby playground
• a shop
• a brasserie offering lovely food
• loads more that I have probably forgotten about

This is all set in large grounds where the roads are 10mph and hardly any cars are driving around so it’s great for kids wandering around. They also offer lots of coaching services for tennis, badminton, swimming as well as things like yoga and so on. They will also take you out on bike rides if you get chatting to the friendly chaps in the Spa.

You may or may not be bothered about having all these facilities. But let me tell you this – I got in 8 hours of cycling over 2 days. Both times that I came back from these epic jaunts I was met with smiling happy faces as there was so much for the family to do without me. Three members of our part and treatments at the Spa and all came back happy as can be!

The Cycling

So this is what it's all about for me. On day one I decided to take in a 50 mile shortened route of the classic around the island bike ride. I set off at 7:30am to see the sun glowing over the sea – it was cold but I felt like it was going to warm up significantly (it did).

Having only glanced at the route on paper I immediately got lost. Well, you can’t really get lost on the Isle of Wight, but I definitely went off track. However, getting lost is a great way of seeing the sights and that I did.

The first thing I noticed was that the roads are incredibly smooth, with barely any pot holes to mention. Also, what with it being early in the morning and off season in terms of tourism – I was hardly overtaken by cars, and the ones that did were very cautious and courteous – a most unsettling sensation.

I discovered that there are lots of hills on the Isle of Wight but none seem to be too horrendous, there are some 20% hills but they are generally quite short. Similarly there are some long drags but not too steep. There seemed to be plenty of gratifying descents along the ride.

I came back buzzing on that first day. The weather turned out to be cracking so we went down to the beach, had ice creams and a lovely pub lunch in The Wight Mouse Inn which has a fantastic beer garden with a playground including ball pool!!!

So on day two I decided to do the whole 70 miles around the island. It had been a while since I attempted that sort of distance on my own so I was a little bit unsure I would make it. But the scenery and sheer quality of the riding got me round no worries. Without exaggerating – this ride is easily in my top 10 best rides ever! And given that a lot of those top ten consist of rides in Southern France – that speaks volumes.

The round the island bike ride takes in some fantastic hills and lots of beautiful scenery – mostly on quiet country lanes. You can pick up the route from anywhere as it is just a big loop of the island and there are signposts at every turning showing you the way – with a distinction between clockwise and anti-clockwise directions. I went the clockwise way under the advice of the staff at The West Bay but either way is going to be fantastic!

I came back tired but thoroughly thrilled. A quick shower and some food and we went straight to the pool for a swim with the whole family.

The Isle of Wight

There is so much to do on the island, whether you enjoy going to marine zoos, farms, beaches, butterfly sanctuaries or whatever, they have it all, not to mention a vast array of great pubs and restaurants. The best thing is that nothing on the island is more than half an hour away!

The Price

Staying at the West Bay Club seems fairly pricey on paper. But once you get there you quickly realise that it is very good value for money. I will happily book another holiday there.

If however, you find it that little bit too much money then we have just the thing – all Daily Cycle readers can get a discount on the 3 bedroom cottage that I stayed in. We will give further information on this soon, but in the meantime, if you’d like to make a booking there then simply get in touch with me to discuss further. You won’t regret it.