The M25 is a large circular tour of East Falkland. It is 193Km and was entirely gravel until a few years ago when they built a 50Km tarmac road between the military base of Mount Pleasant Complex (MPC), and the town of Stanley. The M25 uses about 40Km of this road, however there is still a gravel verge on the side so that the route can be run entirely on gravel.
The route starts at MPC and goes clockwise so that the tarmac road is the last 40Km.
There are no shops, towns, villages, public water points or services of any kind directly on the route. There are occasional privately owned farm houses and rivers.
The route is traditionally known for being a good day trip for people to travel around on a tourist bus.
It is not traditionally known as a running route because the population of the Falklands is small and ultra running is a fairly niche sport. However certain sections of the route are run very regularly, such as the section from MPC to Stanley (50Km), or from MPC up to “Ratty Rock” (5K one way).
Because the Falkland Islands has very few single track trails, trail runners often run on the gravel roads, which do not have much traffic.
The air is very clean in the Falklands, allowing for very good visibility a lot of the time, with vast landscapes and big skies. There are hardly any trees, a lot of sheep, and occasional aircraft crash areas from the 1982 Falklands war.
The wind is often strong, and running a circular route means that you can’t get away from it.
