Eastern Half of Georgia Bike Route 5

[Badbob]

We set out to ride the western portion of the Bike Route 10 to see if it connected to route 5 in any meaningful way. Signs where you need to turn onto the next bike route. I had ridden part of it before and plan to ride it all eventually. If you have maps that show bicycle routes you should check these roads out. I found most of the good road in my area by following bicycle routes.

This was a nice ride with most of the route winding down 1.5 lane chip seal through southern Georgia farm country. The speed limit is mostly 45 mph and there little or no traffic. As you get closer to Lake Seminole the choices of roads decreases and we ride GA253 west. There isn't much traffic on this road but it seemed busy after what when had been riding for most of the trip. If your used to the big city it would probably seem deserted. The bike route ends suddenly at the intersection of GA253 and GA374. There was no sign of the bike route 5 heading North. We pulled off on the side of the road to look at my directions and damn near got suck in some fine gravel. I had to push my wifes bike out and had a hard time getting mine out. My front wheel sank almost to the rim in the gravel.

While we were stopped two men in a pickup stopped and asked us if we need some help finding something. Tuned out that they both had bikes and were working the Bainbridge GA Bike fest next weekend cooking BBQ. Yum. We headed down a road recommended by our two helpers and eventually wound up in Donaldsonville GA and headed back toward Bainbridge GA on US84 US84 Is an Interstate want-to-be. It has four lanes big trucks and lots of traffic. By the time we got to Bainbridge GA I'd had enough of this. We gassed up and got back on the bike trail. Ahhh thats better. We stopped briefly in Cairo GA for ice cream and decided it was getting to hot to ride much more and headed home down GA93 to Midway GA . From hear home its county roads all the way.

I have a thermometer on my bike cable tied to the brake line. It was 88 in Cairo GA. From the Florida state line into Tallahassee FL its all canopied roads. Live Oaks and Spanish moss with hanging over the roads. The temperature dropped as low as 79 under the trees.

The round trip was about 190 miles.

Next time we get a chance we are going to ride the easter leg of the bike route.