Hi Everyone here in the northeast. its spring (it already sprung; 87 here this Friday), but we are still treating it like its a new kinda thing here on the New England riviera. For the third year we are throwing a small bike celebration (much smaller than the fall nutmeg nor’easter) to bring in the sun on the buns as the days lengthen and the heat turns up. there is no mud season here on the riviera, so think of this as the Milan San-Remo of the northeast alt cycling spring classics.
things to know: this event is unsupported on and unmarked course and does not cost anything more than a suggested donation of $20 to the East Haddam Land Trust. future iterations of this even will be partnered with the land trust, but for now we were a little late to coordinate properly.
this is a day ride that will be meeting at 11am at the ferry landing in Hadlyme on the east side of the river. you can park there, or in Chester on the other side and take the $2 cash only ferry across. you can also take your car across, but it costs $6 in that instance. the first ferry runs at 10:30 and goes back and forth every 10 minutes or so, and the last of the day is just before 5, so if you park in Chester, you’d better be fast unless you don’t mind the 10 mile detour north to cross at the East Haddam swing bridge (happens to us all the time).
there are two routes –the same as last year. they both meander down to the beach at Rocky Neck state park on a mix of country roads and a little bit of easy 1 track for a picnic of your packing before diverging for the ride back north. the fender friendly route follows high end country pavement, while the ATB route takes the 12 mile Goodwin Trail in it’s entirety. this trail is incredibly remote for southern Connecticut, and is by my estimation 99% ridable — but its a slow going true rock crawl grinder with plenty of tech sections and New England slick rock. here a minimum of 48mm tires are recommended — and certainly no fenders as we do have something called “stick season”.
speaking of fenders, both rides will pass through or by Peter Weigle’s shop during the first 5 miles as per last years nor’easter.
after the ride I would recommend going to down town Chester for pizza at OTTO and brews at Little House. unfortunately there are few good food options I can recommend on the East Haddam side of the river that would be open — a big reason we have these events is the hope that we can some day attract some of you NYC bike folks to the area and change that!
the routes
I missed the ferry back to Chester!
the free registration so I can keep track of you
as far as camping goes, I cannot legally recommend any camp spots, but there are many of you who already know where they are. find one of those folks! if anything, this ride starts at 11, and we are 2.5 hours from both Boston and NYC.
check out the short video below for a good look at what to expect.
see you on Saturday the 6th of May!!!
XO Ronnie
rons bikes blog dot com 
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