An Inquisitive Visitor's
Guide to the
Ohio & Erie Canal and Towpath Trail
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An Inquisitive Visitor's
Guide to the |
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Despite getting a whole four hours of restless sleep the night before, I was up early on Saturday morning to get ready for the big adventure. I got everything packed, loaded up my brand new bike, and headed for Vince’s house. I arrived around 8:30 or so and had a piece of strudel that Vince’s wife Mary had prepared for us. We were expecting Vince’s brother Dom to take us to Cleveland to start the ride, but since he had worked all night for the Barberton Fire Department, he sent his wife Monica instead. We were ready to go by our departure time of 8:45, but Paul and Jeremy didn’t arrive until around 9:15. We quickly got everything loaded and after a few snapshots, were on our way to Harvard Avenue.
Our first official stop of the day was Thornburgh Station near Lock 39. We took a break at the Park City Diner and had a celebratory beer. We figured if the old canal boat crews could stop for a beer at a lock, so could we. We had ridden almost 6 miles at that point and were ready for a brief respite from the trail. We were back on the trail shortly thereafter and entered the northern section of the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. A mere 1.8 miles later, we stopped at the Canal Visitor Center at Lock 38. We enjoyed a quick look around the museum and Vince and Jeremy bought their 2005 Towpath Tags. Dom agreed to provide the transportation for the weekend as long as we supported the trail by buying the tags. Unfortunately, we were a bit too early to enjoy the operating of the lock outside the center as we resumed our journey on the trail around noon. After passing by Lock 37, Wilson’s Mill, and the Frazee House, we entered the Pinery Narrows for a quiet ride through one of the more scenic sections of the journey. We also experienced our first mishap of the day as Vince fell off of his bike while looking for a bird that Paul pointed out. He wasn’t hurt and we were quickly back on the trail. We passed by Locks 36 to 32, the Brecksville Feeder, the Station Road Bridge, and the Jaite Paper Mill ruins before arriving at our next stop, the Boston Store. We toured the building which focuses on canal boat building since Boston was one of the largest boat producing towns on the canal in the 1800’s. The stop was brief and we were back on the trail for the final leg of the first half of the day’s ride. We passed Locks 31 and 30 before arriving at the Lock 29 trailhead in Peninsula, where we were met by Jeremy’s wife Tracy and Paul’s wife Becky and their daughter Elena. We all convened at the Winking Lizard and enjoyed a delicious lunch. Paul decided to buy a mirror for his bike at Century Cycles after the meal and then it was back to the ride. I found this part of the journey to be a bit harder. We had already ridden over 20 miles and the break had allowed my legs to tighten up in the air conditioned restaurant. It took awhile to get them loose again. We rode past Locks 28 to 24, the Hunt Farm, and Beaver Marsh before arriving at the Botzum Trailhead. It was imperative that we rest up here as the next section of trail was not to be the most pleasing to our olfactory senses. Paul affixed his mirror as we encountered the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad train for the first and surprisingly only time on the trip. We rode hard through the next mile of the trail as it passed by the Akron Composting Facility, more commonly known as the sewage plant. The fact that it was a hot day didn’t help matters. But we were soon in the Merriman Valley and reached the northern terminus of the Portage Path. We again encountered a very pretty section of the trail as it wound through the Little Cuyahoga Valley. After a quick stop at the Memorial Parkway Trailhead to reload our water bottles and Camelbaks, we made our way to the Mustill Store.
We passed by Locks 3 to 1 and again had to detour off the non-existent trail behind the Spaghetti Warehouse. We again followed Main Street to Bartges Street where another short section of the Towpath took us to Summit Lake. From there, we made our way down Lakeshore Avenue to Kenmore Boulevard and then to Manchester Road. We expected this part of the ride to be worse than it was and in no time at all we were at the Manchester Road Trailhead near the southern terminus of the Portage Path. We were then ready for the final 4.3 miles of the Towpath for the day. We reached Lock 1 South in Barberton and then rode a short way to Vince’s house where we enjoyed a much needed cookout with our families. We were tired, but invigorated by the day’s journey of 46 miles. We were eager to start out the next day on sections of the Towpath that none of us had ever experienced. I for one, slept very well that night!
Four became three on Sunday as Paul couldn’t continue the journey with us due to family obligations. But Vince, Jeremy, and I were ready to go and set off down Van Buren Avenue on our way to the next trailhead at Center Road. We all agreed that the southernmost section of the Towpath Trail in Summit County is one of the prettiest. We passed by Locks 2 and 3 and the Clinton Guard Lock before entering into Stark County. I made good time riding to Canal Fulton, distancing myself from my riding companions for no other reason than I was “in the zone.” When Vince and Jeremy caught up, we rode into town to find somewhere to eat breakfast. We found the VFW hall and ran into a fellow alum’s mother before sitting down to a delicious and very inexpensive meal. The trail south of Canal Fulton was virgin territory for all of us. We stopped briefly at Lock 4 Park before heading down a very pretty section of the trail on the way to Crystal Springs. We continued following the Tuscarawas River until we reached the outskirts of Massillon. We went off road a bit to pick up the trail heading into Massillon. In downtown Massillon, we had to follow a pedestrian connector bridge to the Lincoln Way Bridge and then through some back streets before picking up the trail again. I didn’t find this section of the journey to be particularly scenic or enjoyable, especially since we came up on the Massillon Waste Water Treatment Plant unexpectedly. The trail is not covered by trees either and the mid day sun was hot. We took a break at John Glenn Grove at the Warmington Road Trailhead. The next trailhead would be at Waterworks Park in Navarre. Being a resident of Cuyahoga Falls, when I hear “Waterworks Park,” I think of swimming and water recreation, which sounded good to me since we were pretty hot from the ride. I was disappointed to find that the aforementioned park was merely an old water pump house for Navarre. I was further disappointed to find a chain across the trail stating that it was closed south of the trailhead. So we rode through town until we found another place to hop on the trail. It said it was closed there too, but we didn’t see a reason why and got on the trail anyway since I wanted to look for the remnants of Lock 6 below the Nichols Bakery loading dock. I wasn’t successful, but the trail posed no problem for us and soon we were on our way out of Navarre. We took a quick break at Craig Pittman Memorial Park because the next leg of the trail was long and without convenient stopping points. 5.4 miles later we arrived at the end of the established Towpath Trail in Stark County. I found Stark County to be mostly enjoyable, but there was a distinct lack of waysides explaining canal and local history on the trail. Cleveland Metroparks, the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, and Metroparks, Serving Summit County have all done a fantastic job of putting up the informational waysides on their sections of the trail north and I find that they add a nice touch to the Towpath journey. Since the trail had ended, we rode on State Route 212 east to Bolivar. We rode down into their Historic Canal District, passing by the old junction of the Ohio & Erie Canal and the Sandy & Beaver Canal. We stopped at Yesterday’s on the Canal for a late afternoon meal of pizza and beer before tackling the next leg of the journey. To say that this section of the journey was the least enjoyable is somewhat understating matters. Because Interstate 77 runs in the old canal bed, it is not easy to follow the canal’s course to where the last part of the trail begins again. We cut across at the intersection of 212 and 77 to a canoe livery that advertised parking for the Towpath Trail. We rode what we thought was a trail to the Towpath before realizing that we were going in circles. A police officer suggested that we ride down into Zoar on the road to pick up the trail again. But I didn’t want to do that because that meant we would miss about 3 miles of the trail in Tuscarawas County, not to mention 4 locks. So we found a blue blaze mark on a tree that denoted the Buckeye Trail and decided to follow that to the start of the trail again. The Buckeye Trail is not meant for bikes - at least not the types of bikes we were on. This particular trail was meant for horses and the last ones that had passed through had left large divots in the soft ground that had now hardened. We also had to walk our bikes across a number of small water ditches with steep sides. I hit one of the aforementioned divots which stopped my bike in its tracks and nearly spilled me completely over my bike. Although I wasn’t hurt, I did draw first blood and we had to spend the next 20 minutes fixing my back wheel and brakes. We got started again and found the Towpath Trail again. But we weren’t thrilled with what we found. The ground was soft and almost sandy which wasn’t good for riding. The good news was that there had obviously been very recent work done on clearing the trail for a new surface, most likely crushed limestone like the parts of the trail that we had enjoyed further north. We stopped to photograph each of Locks 7-9. I was also pleased to find waysides at each of the locks explaining their histories. Lock 8’s wayside was broken and Vince and Jeremy promptly got to work on fixing it, setting things straight for future hikers.
Finding that last part of the ride more difficult than we had anticipated and also that we were behind schedule, we decided to end the trip there and call Dom to pick us up. But none of us had service on our cell phones despite three different carriers, so we had to continue on. We rode down State Route 800 as originally planned, past the Dover Dam, Lock 11, and into Dover. Luckily the ride was mostly downhill. We crossed over the Tuscarawas River and made our way into New Philadelphia. It seemed like we had been riding forever and still hadn’t reached our ending point at the town square in New Philadelphia. So we stopped to try to call Dom again and this time we were successful. We told him to drive up SR 800 to pick us up as we continued along. It turns out we were only a few blocks from the square and we met up with Dom for our ride home.
We would like to thank everyone who supported us on our journey, including our families and friends, the Cascade Locks Park Association, and everyone who donated to our fundraising efforts. It wouldn’t have been nearly as enjoyable without your support. The following people donated or plan to donate money to our fundraising event:
Rena Amawi |
After
a lively conversation on the way to Cleveland, we were ready to
embark on the journey by shortly after 10:00. The first part of the
journey was very easy as the Towpath Trail is paved through the Ohio
& Erie Canal Reservation run by the Cleveland Metroparks. It was
also surprisingly scenic. There were numerous waysides explaining
various aspects of the surrounding areas and their histories. There
were also a number of side trails that we didn’t follow but will be
worth checking out in the future.
We
were pleased to find a sign in the window acknowledging our ride and
wishing us luck. Thanks Bridget! Paul bought his Towpath Tag and we toured the visitor center.
We then
prepared for one of the two hardest parts of the two day ride – Howard Street.
Since the trail ends for the first time at the Mustill Store, we
were forced to detour on city roads, roughly following the CanalWay
Ohio National Scenic Byway.
Howard Street is steep and after riding 30+ miles, the ride up the
street was taxing. A friendly lady in a convertible at the
intersection of the Innerbelt and Howard Street told me she was
proud of me for the ride up the hill as I tried to catch my breath
before continuing on. We followed Main Street in Akron to the Lock 3
Live amphitheater where we picked up the trail again.
After
Lock 9, the trail changed to a standard hiking trail. This was
better than the part under construction that we had just passed
through, but it still wasn’t the best for riding. We passed Lock 10
and continued down the trail for the last few miles of the Towpath
Trail as it currently exists. Vince nearly rode off the trail into
the Tuscarawas River
at one point, but we made it to the end of the trail without much
more difficulty.
All
in all, we rode 98.93 miles over the two day trip, averaging 10
miles an hour. Our max speed was 23 miles an hour and we actually
rode for 9 hours and 51 minutes. Although we were tired, we all
agreed that we had thoroughly enjoyed the experience. We might even
make it an annual event. If so, we look forward to riding along new
sections of the trail next year. This will hopefully include the
section south of the Mustill Store through the Cascade Locks, a
section north of Manchester Road, and a section north of Center
Road, not to mention the complete trail through Navarre. The trail
in Tuscarawas County
promises to be more agreeable to riding as well. Someday, hopefully
soon, we’ll be able to ride from Lake Erie
to New Philadelphia on a completed Towpath Trail.