This ride was part of our 2011 Fall vacation.
The Fred Meijer Heartland Trail in Michigan is a paved 41 mile rail-to-trail that runs from (near) Greenville to Alma. Since 41 miles is more than we can do out and back in one day we decided to ride 25 miles of it out and back starting at the Lake Road trail-head near Greenville. This was a great trail that ran through farms and forest, a couple stream crossings with small towns along the way.

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Other notes: We stayed at the AmericInn in Geenville which was nice and ate at El Rancho which was really good.
It looked as if they were working on completing the trail from the Lake Road trailhead on in to Greenville. A short section would bypass the rail bed and take a road.

This ride was part of our 2011 Fall vacation.
The Betsie Valley Trailway in Michigan runs from Frankfort to Thompsonville and is a 23 mile rail-to-trail with the first 8 (or so) miles of the trail paved and the rest gravel. We rode it out and back from Frankfort for a total of 47 miles. This was a great trail with a lot of variety. Water, forest, open grassy areas and hills. The trail runs along Crystal lake and then in to secluded forest. The town of Beulah is in-between and has restaurants and shopping and the old depot is a visitors center with bathrooms.

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Other notes: We stayed the night before and after the ride at the Super 8 hotel in the town of Manistee and drove to and from the trail-head in Frankfort.
We ate dinner at the River Street Station in Manistee

Today the youngest Grandson Blake (9 years old) and I rode our local rail-to-trail the Prairie Sunset. This was his first time riding a rail-to-trail. We rode from Garden Plain to Goddard and back for a total of 13 miles. He did great and seemed to enjoy it.

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Kansas's own Prairie Spirit Trail was named the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy's August 2011 Trail of the Month and also added to their Rail-To-Trail Hall Of Fame.
Read about it here.

We rode the trail in 2002. I think it's time we ride it again. Maybe this fall.

In an effort to beat the heat (at least the predicted high of 103) we headed out around 5:00 this morning to ride our local rail-to-trail the Prairie Sunset. The temperature was around 80 and it was a pleasant ride. Along the way we spotted 8 deer, more than a dozen rabbits and a skunk. Deer and skunk in the video below...

Video from our ride on the Medicine Bow Trail in Wyoming.

We're off on a trip in search of cooler places (than the 100+ degrees at home) to ride. Today we checked another state off the map.
The Medicine Bow Trail is a 23 mile long rail-to-trail 30-some miles outside of Laramie, Wyoming. We rode the trail today, staying in Laramie and driving to the Northern most trail head Dry Park. From there we rode to the trail's end the Pelton Creek trail head near the Colorado border and back for a total of 46 miles. The trail has a variety of gravel type surfaces. I rode it on my hybrid which was difficult in a few spots due to soft gravel. The trail has one short detour at the community of Fox Park where the route takes a road to bypass a segment of the former railroad that's still under litigation. This was a nice trail with a lot of beautiful scenery and wildlife. Much better than we were expecting. We spotted deer, a moose and a fox. The only other riders we seen on the trail the entire day were a group of 3 near the lake.
The only downside to this ride was that the mosquitoes were terrible and we forgot repellent. We couldn't linger long anywhere or we would be eaten up. GPS track (one way) here. After the ride we ate a very good dinner at Corona Village

We started out the day by taking my 77 year old Dad on a bike ride. He jogs regularly and is in good shape but only rides a bike a couple times a year. We went to our local rail-to-trail the Prairie Sunset , riding it out and back and then some for a total of 17.5 miles. Along the way we spotted a fox, a deer, rabbits, a snake and a Oriole among other birds.





This evening we went to my parents for dinner and stuffed ourselves on Mom's chicken and noodles. My Daughter got me this shirt for Fathers Day.