Going to be in Charlottesville this weekend and I’m looking for a place to do a fifteen miler… I’d prefer a rail trail or running path of some sort where I can get in some distance. Thanks for any suggestions!
Going to be in Charlottesville this weekend and I’m looking for a place to do a fifteen miler… I’d prefer a rail trail or running path of some sort where I can get in some distance. Thanks for any suggestions!
Check this out. The Rivanna Trail is a trail circling Charlottesville, it’s almost 30 miles I think but I’ve only run about 7-8 of it because it disappears in places and picks back up .3-.5 of a mile away in a totally different location…It’s easy to get lost in places. The loop I frequently do is out Barracks road to the trailhead, then run til that trail ends and run across Old Garth and across railroad tracks and 250, then find the fire station and the trail starts back up again to the right of the station. If you take that, you’ll eventually end up on top of Observatory Hill and I don’t know where it goes from there (never actually tried to find it), but you can run through the UVA grounds, which are awesome. If I were there, I’d take you for a run…
https://maps.google.com/...375&t=m&z=13
Alternatively, check out the Ragged Mountain trails and Walnut Creek trails (google them both for directions). Never run on RM trails but have been on the WC ones (not running but playing frisbee golf…crosstraining??) and they’re good. I’ve only heard good stuff about the RM trails though.
Edit: Sorry just realized you wanted 15 miles…My Rivanna Trail run is barely 7…the others should be longer though.
I used to live in Charlottesville and would do my long runs out here:
Just drive out and park on Garth Road and Ridge Road and run out Ridge Road until it dead ends. I can no longer remember how far it is, but I seem to remember it being about 8-9 miles round trip. Then, I would cross the street, go down a quarter of a mile and run out Decca Lane until it deadended at Meriwether Lewis Elementary. Round trip that way should be another 5-6 miles. Just around 15 miles total is my guess.
Both roads are entirely unpaved, crushed gravel–you’ll see an occasional car, but it’s generally pretty quiet out there. The roads are mostly gently rolling (at least for by Charlottesville standards!) but have a couple of pretty decent hills.
Oh! On your way back into town, don’t forget to stop at Bodo’s on Emmet Street and grab an after-run bagel!
http://www.bodosbagels.com/
I’d agree that running on Ridge rd is not to be missed. It’s 8 if you do the out and back all the way to free union - and I think about 11 if you loop around on free union, back to garth and back to Ridge. That takes you on some busier roads with no shoulders, but I always found C’ville drivers to be pretty courteous. Relatively speaking, anyway.
Another option would be go past ridge road about 3 miles and park across the street from the second country store - Wyants. You can run out the rest of Garth road from here with almost no traffic. Plus you get to run into sugar hollow, complete a category three climb, have a kickass swimming hole to cool down in and have another 6.5 mile run back to your car. Once you pass the reservoir dam and get to the sugar hollow parking lot, don’t go right into the national forest but rather immediately cross the river and climb the foot path up. From there the trail is wide and easy to follow. You will know when you’ve made it to the blue hole. Carefull running back down. Whatever you choose to do the weather looks like it will be awesome so have fun.
Many thanks for the excellent suggestions, all. I hit Ridge Road for a run on Saturday followed by a glorious bagel breakfast sandwich from Bodo’s. Took a nice long ride in beautiful weather out Garth Road to White Hall and down to Free Union (did the loop twice) this morning and went back for more from Bodo’s. Great weekend in Central VA