An all comer’s welcome beginner friendly bike packing weekend in Groton!
We’ll take our bikes packed up with gear and have a slow ride down the rail trail from Plainfield to Groton or for a longer trip out, we’ll have a group starting from Vermont Bicycle Shop too! The routes are 15 miles and 22 miles respectively. The route from Vermont Bicycle Shop includes some pavement and gravel roads and a few climbs out of Barre and into Plainfield before meeting up with the Plainfield rail trail where the second group will be starting from the Plainfield park n ride. The ride from the park n ride to the campsite is entirely off road on rail trail, dirt packed and mostly flat elevation wise. We’ll end up in Groton State Forest at Discovery Cove where we’ll have three sites with lean-tos available for folks to sleep and hang out at Saturday-Monday. On Sunday we’ll have the day to explore by bike or if you’d rather, there’s a lot of really wonderful hiking too. So join us to bike, camp, be in the woods and in the water. On Monday we’ll ride back along the rail trail to end at our cars either at the Plainfield park n ride or at the bike shop. Registration for the bike packing trip is required since we are limited on how many folks can be in each camp site.
Click the link below to register:
https://www.vermontbicycleshop.com/groton.html
The details about the weekend
We will gather at Vermont Bicycle Shop, (42 Summer St. Barre, VT) at 9:30 AM with a planned departure of 10:00 am.
There will be a car on site to collect camping gear for those who do not want to carry gear but want to ride the whole route.
We have a goal of arriving at the Plainfield Park and Ride (65 Main St. Plainfield, VT) between 10:45 and 11:00. This is where we will meet riders who want to participate in the shorter mileage/less hills version of the ride. Barring any sort of issues on the ride between Barre and Plainfield we will plan to depart at 11:15 sharp. Be early for the meetup, enjoy some Positive Pie or stop by the coop for some snacks.
From the Plainfield park and ride we will be on our own in the woods, the terrain will be a mix of short, smooth single track to rough and muddy back road. We may have to hike-a-bike through the woods or lift our bicycles to get around fallen trees or flood washouts. Otherwise this can be a somewhat easy ride for experienced cyclists who have a background in mountain biking, with minimal climbing (there is one uphill at the end).
We aren’t setting a time to arrive at camp. It’s much more fun to be able to stop and smell flowers, look at the amazing views and poke frogs with sticks.
That night we will discuss activity options for day 2.
Either way the goal for the ride on day 2 is to depart between 10 and 10:30am from the camp site
I’ve prepared two ride options for folks for day 2. The first ride could be described as more of a mountain bike ride as it is 60% on single track. The condition of the trail is unknown post flood. In the past the terrain was similar to the experience of riding the Plainfield rail bed between Plainfield and Marshfield and some folks have ridden it with gravel bikes. It is a 12ish mile ride in total with no snack or water source along the route.
The second option is more of a gravel ride with a short section of class 4, abandoned road. It is a 30 mile ride with a couple of significant climbs. There are also tons of options for riding shorter rides along the rail bed that runs the entire length of the park as well for folks
Day 3. Pack up, clean up, and ride home! It’s at our leisure. We plan to get packed up and leave in the AM,our goal is to be pedaling bikes by 10:30 at the latest.