My wife and I (50s) would like to ride a bike trail, staying at B&Bs or hotels along the way, lasting 4 or 5 days. We would take a bus or train back to our starting point. We are from West Michigan, and desire something in the eastern or midwest states. Paved "Rail to Trails" are really nice. Considered Cumberland to Wash. DC, but heard the trail can be washed out and very bumpy, requiring heavy duty tires, etc. But maybe that trail is now all paved ? Any idea will be considered, and THANK YOU in advance.
Want to do a 4 to 5 day Bike Trail for 200 miles
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I've been thinking about bicycling parts of the Erie Canal trail system this summer. There are a number of brochures and maps available.
http://www.canals.ny.gov/trails/biking.html
http://www.ptny.org/bikecanal/
http://www.eriecanalway.org/explore_things-to-do_bicycling.htm
Take a look!
i can recommend the Erie Canal trial as being very enjoyable and scenic. Last Labor Day weekend we biked for 3 days from Lockport to Palmyra. We stayed first night at Palmyra Inn leaving our car there. We arranged transport for us and bikes to Lockport to start. Next night was in Albion at Dolingers Motor Inn and then onto Rocester where we stayed at the Country Inns and Suites. The last night we ended back at the Palmyra Inn. Those websites Fra Diavolo sited gave lots of info for the route and hotels and restaurants.
The biking was delightful and we did about 30 miles each day. The trail was mostly hard packed gravel with paved trails in and around Rochester. Scenery was rural passing lots of farms and orchards and cute small towns about very 10 miles. We enjoyed the history of the canal and everyone was friendly and helpful.
Over the years I've done similar trips in Vermont, NH, Nova Scotia and Mass. but they all involved biking on roads and not bike trails. Unfortunately there don't seem to be alot of trails long enough to just go for days. There is a nice 30 mile rail trail on cape cod in Mass. It goes to Wellfleet and from there you can continue biking using some roads and hook up with the trails outside of Provincetown.
I've always wanted to go to Burlington VT and do the loop that takes you over the islands in Lake Champlain - Hero and North Hero. But that involves road biking and I'm not sure how comfortable you are with that.
Good luck planning - bike touring is the perfect way to travel.
I've only walked on portions of it, but the KATY trail from St. Charles , Mo. west to the state border is on an old rail bed. It's about 250 miles, some of it along the Mo. River and there are many nice old little towns with beautiful Victorian homes turned into B&Bs all along the way.
There's a ton of information on the web so you should have no problem finding maps and routes.
Katy Trail is awesome! bikekatytrail.com website is a great starting point. Go west to east -- you'd rather go down 'lard hill' west of Boonville. (Otherwise pretty flat) You can get a shuttle to one end, or take Amtrak. Todd at the Defiance bike shop was great for bike rentals and shuttling, Lococo House in St. Charles is a great B&B for the start/finish and also shuttles.
Do you know about the Great Allegheny Passage from Pittsburgh to Cumberland, Maryland and the C&O Canal? The C&O isn't smooth (definitely want a hybrid), and when I'd had enough, I crossed to to Virginia side in Leesburg and took the asphalted W&OD trail to Alexandria/Arlington and DC.
Rails to Trails Conservancy can help with other longer rail-trails.
Have a great trip, whatever you decide!
THANK YOU for your ideas ! Much appreciated. We will check into all of them. We can share a few rides that we did, in case you are interested, we recently did a few shorter rides. Start at Vail Pass in Colorado, and its 14 miles downhill through Copper Mtn., to Frisco. Pioneer Sports in Frisco will shuttle you to Vail Pass. From Frisco, you can go to Breckenridge. We just rode 42 miles in NYC. After riding in Central Park, head out to the Hudson River. A trail goes all the way along the river to Battery Park, and back up the East River. Ride the Brooklyn Bridge to Brooklyn and back. Great views ! Rode up the East River, till we had to cross Manhattan to the get to our hotel near Central Park, during rush hour, which was not scary on the bike lanes. The rail trail in Cape Cod was also nice, althought the scenery along the way, is similar to West Michigan, because the trail is not along the water. THANK YOU again for responding !!