Vermont-Quebec “The Flat Parts” Bike Tour, July 2024

If you’re looking for a bike-friendly city, visit Montreal, Canada, which deeply impressed me during my four-night Vermont-Quebec tour. The experience pushes...

Fair Haven to Albany NY on the Erie Canal Trail 2024

On July 3-4-5th 2024, I biked from my mother’s summer camp in Fair Haven NY (a bay on Lake Ontario) to the Erie Canal & Empire Trail bike path thru Syrac...

Mini-Multi-Modal Trip to Europe, April 2024

This week I’m taking a mini-multi-modal Europe with my Brompton bike. My goals are to spend time with family, visit a friend, and to pedal around different c...

Packing Brompton for Airline Baggage

After years of listening to friends rave about their Brompton folding bicycles, I finally bought one for a series of multimodal trips through different citie...

Reconnecting with Old Friends in California, Feb 2024

You can’t make “new” old friends, so find ways to reconnect, preferably by bike.

East Coast Greenway Alternate Route from New Haven to West Hartford CT

Updated maps in 2023

Biking to Burlington VT 2023

Finally got back in the saddle for a multi-day bike tour, from Hartford CT to Burlington VT. Explore the full-screen map and click on thumbnail images for ca...

Biking on the Palouse to Cascades Trail 2023

My daughter Eva and I biked 53 miles on the Palouse to Cascades Trail to Cle Elum, WA, then north on the Coal Mines Trail to Ronald WA, to meet up with our f...

West Hartford Crash Map

Updated links in 2023

BiCiCo West Opens with Celebratory Ride

Jacob Sheppard-Saidel at BiCiCo West, 616 New Park Ave, West Hartford

Day by Day: Europe 2021 Bike Tour

Eva and me on the bike paths and at one of our campsites.

Video: Biking from Amsterdam to Copenhagen

Here’s our six-minute amateur video that summarizes what my daughter Eva and I learned while biking and camping across The Netherlands, Northern Germany, and...

Copenhagen-Hamburg Warmshowers

I’ve hosted many bike travelers at our U.S. home over the past three years through Warmshowers, an international network that connects members for overnight ...

Bikes, Trains, and Quality Time with Eva

Over the past week, Eva and I have loved biking in the Netherlands. As you’ll see in our map below, we began in Amsterdam, rode west to Haarlem, zoomed down ...

Prep to Bike Europe

My daughter Eva and I are preparing to head on a two-week bike tour from Amsterdam, Netherlands thru Hamburg, Germany, to Copenhagen, Denmark to visit my oth...

Biked to the Bakery - The Long Way - For my Birthday

Like many people, my world has been consumed this year by pandemic, the economic crisis, protests against police violence, and the idiot in the White House. ...

Bloomfield Greenway Section 1

This weekend I pedaled along the almost-finished first section of the Bloomfield Greenway Multi-Use Trail. The path runs nearly 2 miles from Day Hill Road (o...

East Coast Greenway: New Bridge in Willimantic CT

Last weekend I biked on a new section of the East Coast Greenway on the west side of Willimantic, Connecticut. Thanks to a new bridge that crosses the gap wh...

Biking to Bakeries in Hartford Tour 2019

25 riders joined our “Biking to Bakeries” in Hartford tour today and gained 0 calories (according to dubious calculations).

A Disagreement Between Body Parts on a Birthday Bike Ride

Last week I turned 54 years old, so took the day off from the computer and headed out on a day-long bike ride. Each year on my birthday I try to take a long ...

Biking from Portland OR to Walla Walla WA, May 2019

Follow my bike tour and bakery hunt from Portland, Oregon to Walla Walla, Washington from May 21-24th, 2019. Click items in the map to view details, or view ...

Lessons Learned from Pedal to the Medal 2018

Congratulations to Chion Wolf and the Hartford Marathon Foundation for raising the necessary funds and organizing the first official Pedal to the Medal event...

Biking from Hartford to Cambridge 2018

For Father’s Day Weekend 2018, I biked from Hartford thru Worcester to Cambridge MA to meet up with my family and visit my son Eli. This was a short 2-day, 1...

Biking from Hartford to Cape Cod 2018

For years I’ve been waiting for an opportunity to bike from Hartford thru Providence RI to Cape Cod MA. I had to put off this trip several times because we u...

Game of Thrones Mixup with West Hartford Center Streets

Contrary to rumors, HBO’s Game of Thrones cast will NOT appear at West Hartford Center Streets.

Biking from Morrisville NY to Hartford CT, 2017

Starting off at the Morrisville pharmacy that still bears my family’s name.

Southern Florida loop 2016-17

Follow my bike tour around Southern Florida from Dec 30th, 2016 to Jan 3rd, 2017. Explore the full-screen map and photo album, and my daily journal entries f...

Sharing Stories with Bike Friday cyclists from Quebec City

Nathalie and Sylve with their Bike Fridays on the Cape Cod Rail Trail

New Trail in Cheshire, and Bicycle History in New Haven

On Saturday I rode south from Hartford to check out a newly-built segment of the East Coast Greenway in Cheshire, CT, and continued on to learn about bicycle...

Willimantic: The Cycling Trail Connector

Hartford “Slow Roll” and West Hartford “Wheels” Rides

If you’re looking for friendly, non-racing bike rides with friendly folks this summer, check out two Hartford-area options.

Reading Outside Lies Magic

Exploring Hartford on the First “Slow Roll” Sunday of 2016

Today marked the first Hartford Slow Roll Sunday bike ride of 2016. These are informal meetups of friendly cyclists who love to explore while riding around t...

Why Bike to Trinity? Interview by Alex Perez

Alex Perez, a Hartford bike advocate and Trinity College student, interviewed me for his blog, Two-Wheeled Hartford, and my responses are re-posted below, wi...

Join the New Britain bike tour on Sunday, Sept 27th

Biking Le P’tit Train du Nord, Quebec 2015

To celebrate our 27th anniversary, Beth and I biked along Le P’tit Train du Nord (The Little Train of the North) rail trail, which stretches about 200 kilome...

Discover West Hartford 2015, with Ideas for 2016

On the C&O-GAP bike trail from DC to Pittsburgh, May 2015

Follow me this week (May 16-20, 2015) on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal - Great Allegheny Passage bike trail. I’m riding from Washington DC to Pittsburgh PA...

Trinity student Alex Perez on Hartford cycling

This guest post is by Alex Perez, an avid cyclist and sophomore at Trinity College.

Thanks to my East Coast Greenway donors

Thanks to everyone who generously contributed to my fundraiser for the East Coast Greenway, a wonderful organization that works with local partners to build ...

How General Andy Hamilton led us across the Susquehanna River

When George Washington crossed the Delaware River, his boats showed up on time. But when the East Coast Greenway Week A Year cyclists tried to cross the Susq...

Biking 30 years back into my past in Chester, PA

Today was the first day of my ride with the East Coast Greenway, the non-profit organization that connects communities from Maine to Florida with cycling and...

East Coast Greenway “One Week A Year” Tour 2014 from Philly to DC

Follow me and forty other cyclists on the One Week A Year tour of the East Coast Greenway. This wonderful non-profit organization works hard to create safe b...

Northwest bike tour, by the numbers

A numerical review of my bike tour, with apologies to Harper’s Index

A 49-year-old adolescent bikes the Northwest

After nearly twenty days and 800+ miles biking around the Northwest, my legs have gone on strike, my brain is ready to go back to work, and my heart is eager...

Oddities on the Oregon bike trail

Here’s just a few of the odd things that happened to catch my eye during my Northwest bike trip through Oregon. Of course, there’s far more out there, and I ...

Biking to meet Trinity alums in Eugene, Oregon

On my Northwest bike tour, I was delighted to receive an invitation to visit one of my former students, Laurie Gutmann Kahn, and her husband Josh, both from ...

My Culinary Guide to Corvallis

My expression when realizing I was on a mountain bike trail

People I Met on the Pacific Coast Trail

Biking along the Pacific Coast Trail provided me with several hours of solitude, huffing and puffing up and down hills while enjoying ocean scenery. But thos...

Biking Hills versus Tunnels

I was worried about the hills, since what they call a “hill” on the West Coast is what we refer to as a “mountain” back East. But they weren’t as bad as I ha...

Biking with Eleanor Roosevelt

Eleanor Roosevelt (Wikimedia). Years ago I saw a quote attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt that stuck with me: “Do one thing every day that scares y...

Follow my Portland-Oregon Coast loop 2014

After completing my Seattle-Vancouver one-week loop, I was puzzling over how to do a Portland-Oregon Coast loop in less than two weeks. The problem was that ...

Biking makes me VERY hungry

My goals for this bike trip are to have fun and lose weight. Well, at least I’m having fun. You’d think that riding 300 miles a week would automatically drop...

Roaming Canadian Roads (without roaming charges)

I love me some maps. Can’t leave home without ‘em. So for my bike tour I sought out a replacement for the Google Maps app on my smartphone, since there are t...

How I Fell in Love with Biking British Columbia

Even the auto mall has a bike lane.

Connecting with BCCampus OpenEd Colleagues in Victoria

While preparing to cross the border into Canada on my solo bike trip, I emailed the only person who I “sort of” knew in British Columbia and asked if he’d li...

Raccoons Foiled at Sequim Bay State Park

Hanging my food bags (and wet clothing) on the wire at Sequim Bay State Park.

Never ride on an empty stomach

My pre-trip weight. Hope to see it drop. Today marks my first full ride, and I’m aiming for 60+ miles up Whidbey Island with my fully-loaded bik...

Follow my Seattle-British Columbia loop 2014

Before leaving on this bike tour, my son Eli kindly helped his old man craft some code to integrate geotagged Flickr photos onto a map with a blue line to tr...

A Northwest adventure begins

My niece Cece and nephew Freddy help launch my ride.

Biking with Eli from Ohio to New York State, 2012

This post describes a father-and-son five-day bike tour that took place in 2012, before launching the JackBikes.org blog in 2014.