Airline Trail Redux

In 2011, I rode the Airline Trail and wished I could ride it with Daniel and get dropped off at one end and picked up at another point. Today, Alisa helped me do it.

I put together a picnic lunch and we drove down there — it's a rather long drive. The weather was iffy, but the rain held off as we got on the trail in downtown East Hampton.

When I had ridden before, I'd started outside of town -- there's a nice parking area at Cranberry Pond. But it was fun to start right in town. The first quarter mile is only marginally ride-able. It goes up onto a fill, over a road, and then descends where a viaduct was removed and then goes back up. But then you get on the trail for reals and the riding is good.

The first several miles are generally flat or downhill. This is the part I'd ridden before. I was expecting to ride more slowly to enjoy the scenery, but Daniel seemed to be trying to get the ride over with, so we went pretty fast. We crossed the Rapallo and Lyman viaducts and continued generally downhill until the Blackledge River. For a relatively short period afterward, the trail was very sandy. It was not just loose sand, but was much more difficult and treacherous riding. The trail also began to trend upwards.

There is also a brief section where there's no trail crossing for Rt 2. There are in fact no indicators regarding how to cross the highway. It's not hard to figure out, but more signage -- and maybe some painted signals on the pavement might be nice. In fact, the whole trail could use better signposts and mile markers would be nice too.

As we entered the Grayville Falls Town Park, there's a nice little bridge over Judd Brook, where Daniel took a break for a few minutes as he was getting tired.

I exchanged a few text messages with Alisa, who had found the park, and then we pressed on, arriving just a few minutes later.

We had a lovely picnic using our picnic set and, just as we finished our repast, it began to rain. We got a little damp as we packed everything up and got into the car, but it just added a little color to the adventure. Now, I'll have to look further down the trail for more adventure!