The Bicycle Adventure Club - Come Ride With Us!

Northeast Kingdom of VT 2025

October 1st to October 10th

Ride Director: Julie Leever
Ride Co-Director: David Rich
Report by: Charlie Schultz

On October 1st, 23 hardy BAC riders gathered for happy hour at the Best Western Windjammer Inn in South Burlington to meet, greet and start an eight day tour through the rolling, tree covered hills of northern Vermont.

Earlier that day, participants either assembled their own bikes or picked up rental bikes from the local bike shops. A few folks arrived a day or two early, and were able to enjoy several local rides.

Ride director Julie Leever was leading this tour for her seventh time. She and co-director David Rich were well organized with cue sheets, GPS routes, bike tools and lots of local information.

Our daily routine was breakfast at our hotel, luggage to the trailer by 9:00 am, and on the road somewhere between 8:30 and 9:30. Our daily 5:30 pm happy hours were excellent. We were well supplied with local cheeses, fruits, and micro brews, as well as soft drinks, sparkling waters, and red and white wines.  Julie and David discussed the next day’s route and provided time and activities for the participants to get to know each other.

The tour took us in a loop to the small towns of Montgomery Center, Newport, Lyndonville and Stowe before returning to Burlington. Other than near Burlington and approaching Stowe, the traffic was low on quiet backroads. This was definitely, as advertised, a 3B tour. Northern Vermont consists of a lot of rolling hills: some of them short and steep, some long and moderate, and a few long and steep. But for every uphill there was a fun descent. Every day we were treated to the beautiful fall colors of the deciduous forests covering the hillsides, dairy farms, and pumpkin patches. On Day 2 we had three ride options, two of which took us in and out of Quebec.

Accommodations were mostly at local inns. We spent three nights at the Wildflower Inn outside of Lyndonville.  It’s located three miles out of town on a ridge with panoramic vistas, and right next to the Kingdom Trails mountain bike trail system. On one of our layover days there, three of us rented mountain bikes from a nearby shop and rode the trails. Two nights were spent in Stowe, which provided the opportunity to ride to and visit the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream factory and/or the von Trapp Family Lodge and Bierhall.

Hats off and a big thank you to Julie and David for organizing and leading this great trip.