Eurovelo route quality compared to Sustrans ?

Did my first metric century yesterday following Sustrans National cycle route number 1 and I was impressed at parts but bitterly disappointed at others.

I was most disappointed by missing or incorrect signage which happened on a good few segments of this route. This included signs that we’re facing in the opposite direction, missing signs for turns or signs that conflicted each other completely. I have a great video example for this in Erith with two signs for Dartford about 20 meters apart where were in opposite directions (Luckily I had a gpx file and OsAndMaps as a backup to avoid confusion).

My second gripe would be that the many parts of the route included pavements as cycle paths that are not suitable to classed as a cycle path. It seemed that many sections where simply crappy English narrow paved pavements which someone’s has chucked a cycle path sign on to. Surely it would make more sense to have more road sections to avoid multiple pedestrian crossings at roundabouts and more complex junctions. I felt like I spent a lot of wasted time crossing roads multiple times when riding on the road itself would’ve been far more efficient.

There were some really great parts to it as well so this post isn’t a completely moanathon (4th slide was a lovely section through what I think was a pomegranate farm) and it’s great to see that these routes do exist.

So how does Eurovelo compare ? I would love to get some mileage under my belt in France, Belgium and the Netherlands later in the year but wouldn’t want to be dealing with these kind of annoyances for days on end. Otherwise I would just pick a road only route for peace of mind.

Ta.