Morning Gravel Ride

Ann & I were supposed to do a Friday night gravel ride when she got back from work but she ended up getting back too late so we went out Saturday morning. This was a new route that I wanted to test out for future night rides and routes that are easily memorized. Unlike Connecticut, especially in Fairfield County where I spent the last 21 years riding, Vermont doesn't have as many paved roads to chose so moving forward I am create a collection of routes that I can quickly pull up and ride.

 

This is a 20+ mile route with first dirt being Quarterline Road. Open Source Map shows that it's unpaved (I updated it a couple of weeks ago), Ride With GPS doesn't recognize it as such. I submitted a support ticket to RWGPS to ask them to fix it but in the mean time, I am going to have to manually edit the route, which can be done on RWGPS, only it has to be done using the PC. Now that I have a RWGPS yearly subscription I am going to start publishing routes.

Quarterline Road has some great views of the Taconic Mountain Range and the road itself is actaully on the front of the range. To get to it, you have to climb up Campbell Road and the turn onto the paved portion.

As with all my rides, I always try to find one exceptional view that brings out the beauty of the country side in which I am riding. I call this the Money Shot. This route has some great views of the Green Mountains, where Pico and Killington mountains can be clearly seen but on this route, however from Quarterline Road, right before a 16% descent, is this incredible view of this valley looking south in the Taconic Range. This is the Money Shot of this route.

At the end of Quarterline Road, the surface is paved again as you turn onto Walker Mountain Road. We were rudely honked at by some lady in a white pick up truck and then buzzed by another vehicle, probably coming within 2 or 3 feet from us. The law in Vermont is 4 feet but I suspect very few people in Vermont know the law. There's a climb up Walker Mountain Road and then a really fast descent down into the Otter Creek Valley.  There is a dirt portion of Creek Road at the intersection with Walker Mountain but I don't like trying to incorporating it into any of my routes because of all the speed you have to shed to make the turn.

We crossed over Route 7 and then started climbing Gorge Road, which is an easy dirt road climb up to Airport Road. Along the way you can see the Mill River and when the road turns to pavement there's the Kinsley Covered Bridge, which leads to East Street and a great gravel road to ride Wallingford.

On Airport Road we passed by some classic cars.

We crossed over RT 103 and took East Clarendon Road to Windy Road (dirt) and then to Shrewsbury Road and then dropped down back to Clarendon.

Then it was back to Alfrecha Road and back across the Otter Creek Valley to River Road.

Nice view of Pico Mountain

The cows at the North Clarendon Cow Farm were enjoying a cool drink of mountain water.

And you can't forget Killington Mountain

Riding back through Rutland we got stopped by a northbound Vermont Rail System train.  What are the odds to get stopped in the same place for the a train for two consecutive rides? We got stopped here on our last ride, too.

We stopped at the Rutland Farmer's Market for Goat Cheese Chevre and home made salsa.