Ireland, Scotland and England: The Ultimate Tour of the British Isles

Twenty-three nights around Ireland, Scotland and northern England, combining the operator’s Irish and Scottish tours into its flagship trip. Riders bring their own bike, or hire one from London.

The Irish half starts with the Holyhead ferry to Dublin and Balbriggan, then Belfast and the Titanic Quarter with the SS Nomadic, the Giant’s Causeway, Newgrange and its five-thousand-year-old passage tombs, and Bushmills, the oldest whiskey distillery in Ireland, licensed in 1608.

The Ring of Kerry follows, a coastal circuit rated among the finest road journeys in the British Isles, then Waterford’s Viking Triangle, Kenmare Bay, the peat bogs at Maghera and Woodcock Hill, the Crag Caves, Blarney Castle and the Wicklow Mountains, before the ferry back to the mainland and a night in the Peak District.

Scotland takes the second half: the North Coast 500, Skye and the Talisker distillery, Glenlivet whisky at Tomintoul, John O’Groats, and the hotel where Drambuie is said to have been created from a recipe left behind by Bonnie Prince Charlie. The national parks of northern England close the route. The price is quoted per rider. Three and a half weeks is a long trip to take at home, and the argument for it is straightforward: no flights, no language, no paperwork, no bike to collect at an airport, and two of the best coastal routes in Europe inside a single itinerary. For riders who cannot clear that much leave, the operator sells the Irish and Scottish halves separately, and this trip is simply the two of them joined with a night in the Peak District in between.