Urban Rides, Bike Trails & Weekend Getaways
Free Bike Maps and Self-guided Bike Rides
Taste and wander your way by bike with Bikabout's collection of the best bike rides in North America.
NYC offers enough interesting things to do to keep you biking for years and it's also a surprisingly easy city to bike around with all the paths and separated bike lanes! If you've always wanted to see NYC by bike, here's your chance. Pack your bags for a weekend getaway! These two routes are a constellation of sites connecting art, architecture, food, drink & browsing found in the West Village, Chelsea and Downtown.
Vancouver is a great place to discover by bicycle throughout our warm summers. However, the city lights up over the holiday season and hosts numerous activities and events to get you into the spirit of the season. For our family, it has become a tradition to bundle up and set out to any number of activities throughout Vancouver on bicycles. With a portable stereo on hand, we enjoy the twinkling lights and get into the Christmas spirit while listening to some of our favourite Indie Christmas songs.
Madison, Dane County, and South Central Wisconsin are home to a plethora of wonderful organizations helping to preserve the environment, get kids outside, and teach students and families about the world around us. Many of these low-cost or no-cost organizations are within biking distance, and Nature Net has put together a bike map to help you get around. What better way to explore these great spots than by biking with your family?
Take a day trip to the epicenter of both the American Revolution and one of the first major American literary and philosophical movements. Oh, and did we mention there's swimming and ice cream? The ride is 24 miles round trip (with outbound train ride) or 38 miles round trip (few hills outbound), so plan for a picnic!
Just about everyone loves pizza but pizza can hang out on your body for awhile if you don't work it off. This ride will allow you to eat lots of yummy pizza and work it off via bike so you can truly enjoy it. Each stop will be a place where you can get a slice or small pizza pie to share with someone so you aren't eating too much along the way. This is a great ride for everyone who loves pizza and not sure where the best places are to get a slice. Each one is also close to a Capital Bikeshare if you don't have a bike with you.
As someone living with Celiac Disease for more than thirty years, all of Erin’s travels have always been gluten-free. She’s been to 28 states, 18 countries, 3 continents, and always 100% gluten-free!
According to Erin, Portland is one of the most gluten-free friendly cities in the world with many completely gluten-free bakeries and restaurants. This tour allows you to embrace your gluten-freedom while trying many delectable and safe, gluten-free treats along the way. Come hungry! While we will stop and admire the beauty of Portland's waterfront, mountain views, and rose gardens, the purpose of this tour is to EAT your way through this gluten-free friendly city.
This ride will take you through Chicago's North-side and place you right out on the shoreline of Lake Michigan. Heading South you will have views the city's looming skyline, rest in it's shadows at Oak Street Beach and cruise back North through Lincoln Park where there are plenty of worthy detours along the way.
This is a route I take regularly in the summer with my son in tow. We get quality father-son time, with the wind in our hair, we see the city and draw inspiration and ideas.
Chicago's motto is "Urbs in Horto" and this ride will take you by a variety of parks and public spaces used for a variety of purposes. Each space is great for people watching and most feature great juxtaposition of city and green space. You'll see playgrounds and gardens, community dog parks, historic buildings, our new skate park, and awesome skyline views. Stop anywhere along the way to explore, play, or observe, or complete the route in just about one hour.
The Boston Brewing Company (Sam Adams) put Boston on the beer map in the late 1980s, and regional powerhouse Long Trail followed not long after. Lesser known Cambridge Brewing Company also started in the late 1980s, and went on to influence countless local startups such as Vermont darlings Hill Farmstead. And while the Boston beer scene largely languished during the the late 90s and 2000s, it has once again awoken and begun to flourish, with vibrant and daring beers coming from downtown and the immediate north.
Boulder has been synonymous with craft brewing for as long as the industry has existed. In fact, we’re the home to Colorado’s first craft brewery as well as the American Homebrewer’s Association and the Brewers Association. Whether you’re into refreshing IPAs, rich stouts, or even something a bit more adventurous, you can bet we brew it in Boulder. Here are a few of my favorite breweries, and why I love them. I’ve picked locations near B-cycle bike share stations in order to highlight the value of one-way trips: Just because you biked to these breweries doesn’t mean you have to bike home.
This route is designed to give you a taste of Inner North Portland; one of three quadrants on Portland's east side. Along this route, you pass many vibrant commercial districts (Williams Ave, Mississippi Ave) city parks (Overlook Park, Peninsula Park) vistas (the Skidmore Bluffs) and historic residential neighborhoods (Overlook, King, Sabin).
The gem of Vancouver’s public space, and our best recreational bike route by far, is the seawall. Construction around the Stanley Park portion began in 1917 and now at 22km provides a continuous public space separated from vehicle traffic along almost all of central Vancouver’s waterfront. It’s pretty impressive — so good one wonders if it’s the reason Vancouver doesn’t have a central plaza or any pedestrian streets, but that’s another matter. In recent years Vancouver has also made great strides in building 8 to 80 (safe for 8 to 80 year olds) accessible separated bicycle infrastructure throughout city streets. This tour aims to give a taste of the seawall and recent separate bike paths, along with a healthy dose of some of my favourite pieces of public art, cafés and watering holes. Oh, and there’s a first rate gelato shop and amazing Chinese garden.
You've heard of Boston. But across the river is Cambridge and Somerville, Boston's "Left Bank." Of course that name references Paris' Left Bank or Rive Gauche which refers to the southern bank of the Seine. But more importantly the Left Bank of Paris was the Paris of artists, writers, philosophers, and more. Similarly, there is a high number of artists and writers in Cambridge and Somerville. This route will be a tour of the artistic side of the city.
Minneapolis is home to so many culinary, cultural, and scenic marvels, it's seems that around every corner you'll find another, oh, I've gotta go there sometime! So how about it? This route is perfect for a weekend meander, or a day you didn't know what to do with. Enjoy a day of exploring some of the best that the city has to offer. Hop off your bike to explore a great restaurant, shop one of the city's many fantastic boutiques, see a show, or take in a view. And when you're all done, raise a glass and toast a great day in a cozy Scandinavian speakeasy. You deserve it.
The Wisconsin School Garden Initiative encourages you to grab a camera and hop on your bike for this picturesque ride featuring youth gardens on Madison's north side. In addition to being great scenery, youth gardens offer a host of benefits. They provide access to fresh fruits and vegetables, create opportunities to be active outside, and introduce children to ecological principles. This route highlights three youth gardens: Gompers Elementary, Lake View Elementary, and the Troy Kids' Garden that all combine produce, education, and fun!
