A Grand Day Out
This is definitely a route I would recommend, with some caveats. The section along Lobethal Road to Ashton is a bit busy. It didn't feel dangerous, but it wasn't pleasant.
It was my birthday a few days ago. One of the gifts I got was from the biggest kid. A single Power Point slide:
I got planning straight away, because I'd wanted to go for a ride up to Norton Summit with him for ages. Now I finally had leverage to get him out of the house. My idea was Norton Summit, Ashton, Summertown, and Crafers with lunch at Mt Lofty summit. A little bit of gravel. Mostly quiet roads. Something like this:
It was a perfect day. 22℃, very light winds, and enough cloud coverage to keep the UV right down. Magnificent.
In the end we didn't make it to Mt Lofty - we came directly down Greenhill Road from Summertown. It didn't detract from the day, because we went and had Banh Mi for lunch on the Parade instead. We did manage ice cream and sorbet from Springwood Farm's little stall.
It was Mr17's first "big" ride on his new Breezer Doppler Pro+ that we picked up a while ago from BMCR. He loves it.
In the end it was around 30 km and 700 metres of climbing.
This is definitely a route I would recommend, with some caveats. The section along Lobethal Road to Ashton is a bit busy. It didn't feel dangerous, but it wasn't pleasant. Fortunately it's only a couple of kilometres. The bit from Ashton to Summertown has some quite steep bits. I didn't have to get off and push at any stage, but my riding compatriot did. It doesn't matter, but keep it in mind if you plan on doing the same thing.
Here's the planned route on Ride with GPS (not the shortcut Greenhill Road bit):
And some photos from the day:
