Northern Rail Trail

I kicked off the Fourth of July long weekend with a long off-road bike ride.  I’d been interested in the Northern Rail Trail for a couple of years after having done a few short rides and runs on it.  The plan to go from one end to the other evolved as I was looking for good training rides for the Erie Canal tour.  Unfortunately, the tour was cancelled for this year, so my biking mileage has plummeted since I typically only bike when injured (and I’m reasonably healthy right now).  I had been doing enough riding that I hoped I could manage this 58 mile ride. 

I put the word out and Kevin Tilton was the only one who was interested.  Kevin has been doing quite a bit of gravel biking so I was a little nervous about him burying me on the ride.

I got to the southern end of the trail (Boscawen, NH) at 5:45am and headed out for an hour run.  I wanted some miles in the bank prior to the ride.  My 8 mile run was incredibly buggy, the deer flies were brutal.  Kevin was there when I got back and we hit the road to Lebanon, NH.

It took me a few minutes to get all of my gear organized and to take a couple of pictures before we set off at 8:15am.  Conditions were very good for early July.  Upper 60’s, cloudy, although pretty humid.  The only concern was the possibility of some thunderstorms but hopefully we’d be done before then.  I carried a couple of gels, two .75 liter collapsible water bottles and one 16 ounce bottle.  The soft collapsible bottles fit nicely into the back pockets along with the gels.  I had printed up the trail maps and had those in my map case on the handlebars.  There was no navigation involved I just wanted to be able to pick out various locations along the way and feels some progress by moving from one map to the next (each covered about 8 miles of trail).

The first 15 miles took us along the Mascoma river from Lebanon, to Enfield, past Mascoma lake, into Canaan, and into Orange.  This was not only the most scenic section with lakes, mountains, and covered bridges but also the only real climbing we’d do.  There was a little over 400’ of steady climb which really isn’t much when averaged out over 15 miles. We reached the Orange cut (1,000’), which is an impressive rock pass that the railroad had to cut through.  It took us 1:09 to cover this stretch which was about ¼ of the distance we’d ride.  I had guessed it would take us between 4 and 5 hours to do this so we were right on schedule.  The riding was gentle, and we covered almost the entire day riding side by side chatting.  The miles literally rolled by.

The next 15 miles were in Orange, Grafton and Danbury.  We picked up some speed as we dropped about 300’ over this section passing Tewksbury pond and Kilton pond (named for Kevin?).  Then continued along the Smith River.  We didn’t stop in Danbury as we both still had enough water and food.  We covered the 15 miles in 1:05 and passing half-way gave both of us some extra energy.

Next up was closely following route 4 through Danbury, then Wilmot for a very short stretch before entering Andover for a long portion (over 10 miles) before getting into Franklin.  This was another fast part dropping about 300’.  There did seem to be a bit of a headwind on this part but the mile posts finally got down to double-digits (mile posts ran from 138 to 80 miles indicating the mileage to Boston).  I was very happy to get to Webster lake in Franklin as I’d now be on parts of the trail that I’d either run on or bike, so they were somewhat familiar.  Our third 15 mile section was covered in 60 minutes, our fastest pace of the day so far.

The final 13.1 miles would bring us through Franklin and into Boscawen.  We’d drop another 150’ (most of that in the first 5 miles) and then flatten out as we finished along the Merrimack river.  The weather started to look a bit sketchy with dark clouds up ahead.  We lucked out as it never really rained, although it misted enough that I had to take off my shades to see clearly.  I felt pretty good until about 1.5 miles to go when I just kind of bonked.  This was right around the four-hour mark, so maybe I hadn’t gotten as much fuel in me as I could have.  I should have brought some Gatorade instead of the extra 16 ounces of water.  Luckily, we were almost done, Kevin slowed up for me and we reached the end of the trail in 4:07:32 for an average of 14.1 miles per hour.

The entire ride (except maybe the last 1.5 miles) was a lot of fun and went by quickly.  I think we could do it 30 minutes faster just by taking turns leading.  I’m not sure that I’ll do it again but also wouldn’t rule it out.  There are so many cool rail trails out there to ride!  Kevin and I had plenty of time along the way to discuss some of the other ones we want to do.  I’ve got almost exactly one year until the Erie Canal ride.  Game on!