I seem to have missed this thread
Carlisle (or Penrith) to Newcastle would make a decent ride of about 60-65 miles, but there are not that many places between the two. I'm actually looking at riding Carlisle to Newcastle this weekend, but probably dropping off of the Military Road into Haltwhistle (centre of Britain

) then on to Bardon Mill, Fourstones and Chollerford to meet back up with the Military road. This gives a few more fuelling options than the road over the top. There is also a railway line all the way along the bottom of that valley so there's plenty of bailing out points.
Another option from Haltwhistle is to ride to Bardon Mill then straight up Fairways past Vindolanda to the Military road near Twice Brewed. It's a bugger of a hill (deserving of the double arrows) but not massively long, and the decent following is long straight and, if the sun has peeped over the horizon by then, very scenic
Riding along the river front in Newcastle gives some nice views with all the bridges, but is not coastal. To get to the coast you'd need to go to North Shields or Tynemouth, which is about another 10 miles (and the same back to the station afterwards)
I was thinking the same
- Northallerton (or Darlington? Hmmm); good connections from London
- to Whitby (probably 50 miles? Passes Little Fryup and Great Fryup

- but 4 trains a day to Middlesborough)
- so on to Scarborough (20 miles along the bike route - runs along a reclaimed railway line down the coast most of the way); good connections through to York for London and everywhere, or through Hull for London and the south?
We're off on a night
Halloween ride from York to Whitby on the 4th November if you're interested
