28 Mile Ride Along the Old Erie Canal
Wednesday, July 5, 2006
basic info about Old Erie Canal State Park trail
photo slideshow
One of my favorite places to ride in central NY is along the Old Erie Canal between Dewitt (just east of Syracuse) and Rome. The towpath between Dewitt and Canastota is fairly smooth dirt and packed stone dust, and during the day it tends not to see a lot of use (it can get quite busy on a summer evening, though!) There are also a number of parking areas along the trail, which makes it easy to choose the distance travelled. And parts of the old canal are very, very pretty... for some reason I often find that riding and running next to water resonates for me. I rode there numerous times several summers ago (actually, I managed to ride almost the entire length between various rides!) but this summer I've hadn't gone there yet. So it was good to have a chance to stop on the way back to Albany and get in one of my longer rides of the summer. (Sadly, I've focused more on running this summer, and my cycling distance has definitely suffered... at this point last summer I was doing 40-50 mile rides.)
Parked at the relatively new (only several years old) area off Manlius Center Rd, near Green Lakes State Park, and headed east on the towpath. It was a great day for riding - warm and sunny, but not too horribly hot. Saw a number of folks out fishing. I didn't worry much about hammering out the pace - this was meant to be more of a relaxing ride, just at a longer distance than I've been doing this year.
Apparently the geese also like this park, because sections were absolutely swarming with them - adult pairs with goslings that are sufficiently grown that they're gaininng their adult plumage. Apparently they're quite used to people - I had to dismount and walk the bike through each group for fear of hitting one of them (or getting attacked by one of the adults!) A bit of a hassle, and goose poop everywhere, but I like geese, so it was kind of neat.
Took the path down to Canastota, then turned around and headed back. All in all, a great afternoon, even though it meant getting back to Albany late in the evening. Maybe I'll get another chance to ride or run this path before summer's over.
JMH
