Bikes and Stansted Airport

Stansted is the biggest airport for european budget airlines. If youre flying in cheap from europe, or flying out to dublin theres a good chance youll be using stansted. Stansted is great because its cheap. Its also in Essex, about 60km/40 miles outside london. If you think thats bad, check out Vienna Bratislava. At least Stansted is in the same country.

Anyway, you just got off a plane, and now youre 60km from Londons Calling. The quickest and most expensive way into town is the Stansted Express train.

However, Stansted Express does not like bikes. If your bike is still bagged/boxed from the flight you should be okay. Usually. Unlike many other third world countries, bribing officials does not usually work in the UK. So if you cant get your bike onto the Stansted Express, and the bus wont take you either (yep. theres a bus. they hate bikes too), you're going to have to ride.

10km away is the town of Bishops Stortford. Regular trains into London from there are much more bike friendly. The quickest way out is to ride the 6 lane highway called the A120 (the green road across this map).

Despite its size, its perfectly legal to ride a bike on an A class road in the UK, although I once got stopped by the police because everyone else jumped a red light. (I apologised and told the police the cyclists were Australians. They told me it was dangerous to jump red lights. I agreed. They let me go. I don’t think they knew how to ticket a cyclist anyway)

I should probably warn you that it’s a fast, dangerous road, especially at night or if youre used to riding on the other side of the road (Europeans, North Americans and pretty much everyone else). That said, theres a wide hard shoulder to run away to, and if anyone can cycle in traffic safely its you guys. Just don’t get killed before the start. If you do want to die, I hear MillportLoco is a good location.

Alternatively, if youre planning on riding all the way, a much quieter ride is to take the tiny local road south (the yellow one in the middle square here that goes through Takeley)

Take the B183, then the A1060 Chelmsford Road. Remember,its just over 60km into London from Stansted.