Mid-Mitten Cycling

Welcome to The Best of Mid-Mitten Cycling. Here you’ll find a guide to some of the best road and bike path routes in the middle of the state (about an hour’s drive from Lansing). They’re broken down into the following categories:

Family Rides: Great bike path routes for the whole family. Two so far, with more to come.

Scenic Rides: Road rides with great scenery, mostly on rural roads. Three so far (and the hilly rides are pretty scenic too).

Hilly Rides: If you want a serious workout, these routes on paved roads are the ones for you. There are nine  so far, from Grand Rapids to Ann Arbor.

Each route description gives you the distance, total elevation gain, a link to a MapMyRide route, directions and a Google Maps link to the start of the ride, and a description of the ride itself. Plus there are some nifty pictures, and some of my cantankerous opinions thrown in for free. Here’s a post on how Mid-Mitten Cycling came to be. One day, I hope to publish these as a guidebook, in both print and electronic form, but for now, you’re welcome to enjoy them for free. To receive alerts when new rides are posted, follow the instructions at the end of this page.

If you’re interested in my other writing, please explore the menus at the top of this page (or under the menu button if you’re on mobile). You’ll find excerpts of a couple of stories, one long fanfiction novel, and (coming soon) info on my current novel, all under “Fiction;” info about my environmental history of the Anza-Borrego desert under “All the Wild and Lonely Places;” and essays on writing and the natural world under “Essays.” Under “Blog” you’ll find all my various ramblings from biking to politics to books to video games to the writing life.

If you’d like to keep up-to-date with Mid-Mitten Cycling and receive alerts when new routes are posted, please fill out the form below. If you’d like everything bike-related, choose “Mid-Mitten Cycling.” If you want to subscribe to just a specific type of route (such as “Family Rides), check the appropriate boxes. And if you’d like to receive everything posted on the blog, choose “All categories.”