The top ten scenic drives in the UK
Picked on scenery alone Scotland’s North Coast 500 has been voted the most picturesque road trip in the UK in a survey of 2,000 drivers.
The study for Fiat put the 500-mile round trip from inverness in first place for scenery, followed by Kendal to Keswick in the Lake District and Cheddar Gorge in Somerset.
St Ives to St Just in Cornwall took fourth place, with Snake Pass in the Peak District rounding out the top five. Filling the final five spots were the A169 and A170 in Yorkshire, Cheltenham to Stratford in the Cotswolds. the A82 towards Loch Ness, the A39 from Minehead to Barnstape and the Black Mountain Pass in Wales.
According to the survey 78 per cent of drivers questioned said they prefer to take the scenic route to their destination – The Longer Way, as we say at Detour.
To find out more about these routes just click the highlighted text or visit Fiat Scenic Drives.
A roof-down road trip along the Kent coast from Margate to Dungeness reveals a gallery of art, nature and science.
Did you know that London has a string of seven beaches? Neither did we until we got hold of a beach car and went exploring the city.
Across the flat fenlands of Lincolnshire you’ll find some of the straightest roads in the UK, but if you know where to look there are brilliant bends to be discovered.
Time travelling in a futuristic MG Cyberster, John Mahoney returns to a road full of memories.
Tranquil, mysterious and packed with cracking driving roads Orkney is awesome in any vehicle – even a broken one.
The Wye Valley lays claim to being the first place ever described as picturesque. Detour discovers why – and Wye.
Griff Gough-Walters drove a tiny Hyundai i10 2,500 miles from London to North Africa in four days, and then a month later, did the return journey in three.
What better way to explore Bentley’s London history than in a modern interpretation of his most famous model?
Now home to the highest distillery in England the cat and fiddle has a sobering reputation.
Rosedale Chimney Bank is so steep that cyclists call it The Chain Breaker, but what’s it like to drive?
It’s good to take your foot off the pedal once in a while. To slow down and take in the surroundings instead of watching them rush by in a blur, and a drive across the New Forest will force you to do just that.
A half-million-pound Jaguar and some delicious diner food make this road trip on the edge of the Chilterns even more charming.
The A616 Stocksbridge Bypass in south Yorkshire is widely believed to be the most haunted road in the UK.
If it’s got wheels then it’s fit for a Detour, we say. Putting that theory into practice Nik Berg explores Snowdonia by Caterham, Morgan and Norton.
Howling along the moorland roads in a race-ready classic Porsche, Nik Berg seeks out the legends of Dartmoor.
There is no beach at Beachy Head, but there is a fabulous road with commanding coastal views and cracking corners.
Scotland has the North Coast 500, England has the South West 660 and Wales weighs in with 440 magical, mythical miles of the Wales Way.
Golf, mountain bikes and electric cars come together on a road trip to Scotland’s most scenic links.
Britons don’t need to travel far from home to find the very best drives say Getty Images and Alfa Romeo.
Can there be a better way to spend a summer’s day than driving a roadster through rural England?
Squeezed between Yorkshire’s urban centres of Leeds and York, its busy east coast holiday resorts and the open spaces of the moors is an under-appreciated region rich in history and cracking driving roads.
Our first fully electric Detour takes Nik Berg on a shore-hugging tour of Norfolk. Will the battery end up as flat as the landscape?
Spearing across the border between Cambridgeshire and Norfolk is the B1098 and nine miles of arrow aligned road.
The South West 660 is a new and soon-to-be iconic route around the British coastline from Dorset to Somerset. Simon Heptinstall helped plan it so who better to be our tour guide?
A team of acoustics experts has named the finest-sounding road tunnels in Britain by driving an Alfa Romeo through them and recording the sonorous soundtracks.
If you’re heading up the M6 this Halloween you might want to call Ghostbusters.