Atlantic Coast
- Epic Ride
Lighthouses and lobster shacks, Civil War battlefields, and barrier island beaches, from rocky Maine harbors to the southernmost point in the continental United States.
- Distance
- 2,649 miles
- Surface
- 100% paved
- 3 weeks–2 months
- Route Type
- Point to Point
Ride the Atlantic Coast
This route runs north to south from Bar Harbor, Maine, to Key West, Florida, in seven sections, with alternates, spurs, and ferries easing logistics.
What to Expect
This is a long, varied ride rather than a nonstop beach cruise. The northern half mixes salt air and rocky Maine harbors with inland farm roads, river valleys, and some surprisingly steep hills through New England and Pennsylvania. Traffic builds through the mid-Atlantic cities, and then the route flattens out in the South, trading hills for marshes, live oaks, beach towns, and long stretches shared with the East Coast Greenway. None of it is remote, but the sheer length makes this a serious commitment for riders tackling it end to end.
The ride opens in Acadia National Park and passes Maine’s Fort Knox before winding through historic New England villages. Farther south come the Walkway Over the Hudson, one of the longest pedestrian bridges in the world, Pennsylvania’s Amish farm country, Mount Vernon, and the Civil War battlefields around Fredericksburg and Richmond, Virginia. The South brings Colonial Williamsburg, historic Charleston and Savannah, the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge, and St. Augustine, the oldest continuously inhabited European-founded city in the contiguous United States. The finale is the Florida Keys Overseas Heritage Trail, which crosses the Seven Mile Bridge on the way into Key West.
Western Connecticut, the Susquehanna River area of Pennsylvania, and the country roads north of Richmond are some of the hilliest stretches on the route, with short, steep climbs. South of Richmond, the terrain flattens into rolling and then largely level ground through the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida, where salt marshes, pine forests, and barrier islands take over. The full route includes detailed riding conditions and field notes for every climb and descent.
Services are plentiful along most of the route, and cell coverage is generally reliable. A few stretches thin out, including the rural Lowcountry roads north of Charleston, South Carolina, and parts of the Delaware River valley in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Expect more company than solitude: this route shares long stretches with other cyclists on the East Coast Greenway and with heavy traffic near the cities.
Ride the northern sections from late spring to mid-fall, roughly May through October. The southern sections are ridable most of the year but are most comfortable from fall through spring. Riders tackling the whole route often start in Maine in late summer or early fall so they reach Florida after the worst of the heat and the peak of hurricane season, which runs June through November. Riders chasing fall foliage in the north should call ahead, since many campgrounds close after Labor Day.
Route Sections
Bar Harbor, ME to Windsor Locks, CT, 473.2 miles
From Bar Harbor, the route follows the Maine coast past Fort Knox and Portland before continuing through New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut on quiet rural roads.
Alternates:
- Boston Spur, 30.6 mi, into downtown Boston via the Minuteman Bikeway.
Windsor Locks, CT to Conshohocken, PA, 302.4 miles
This section crosses western Connecticut and passes several historic sites north of Poughkeepsie before crossing the Hudson River on the Walkway Over the Hudson. It then follows river valleys through New York and New Jersey into Pennsylvania.
Alternates:
- New York Spur, 46.9 mi, connecting to train service into Manhattan.
- Philadelphia Spur, 10.6 mi, into downtown via the Schuylkill River Trail.
- Deep Hollow Alternate, 6 mi, a packed dirt shortcut.
- Wallkill Alternate, 19.1 mi, using the unpaved Wallkill Valley Rail Trail.
Conshohocken, PA to Richmond, VA, 368.9 miles
This section crosses Amish farm country in Lancaster County, follows the York County Heritage Trail into Maryland, and passes through Washington, D.C., on the Rock Creek and Capital Crescent Trails before continuing south past Mount Vernon into Virginia.
Alternates:
- Chesapeake Bay Alternate, 47.4 mi, through downtown Baltimore.
Richmond, VA to Wilmington, NC, 379.1 miles
From Richmond, the route follows the Virginia Capital Trail toward Williamsburg, crosses the James River by ferry, and continues through Virginia and North Carolina farmland into Wilmington.
Alternates:
- Outer Banks Alternate, 254.5 mi, along the Cape Hatteras National Seashore with two ferry crossings, including one that runs about two and a quarter hours.
Wilmington, NC to Okatie, SC, 357 miles
The route follows the coast through Myrtle Beach and historic Charleston before continuing south through rural forest and old plantation country toward the South Carolina lowcountry.
Okatie, SC to St. Augustine, FL, 262.1 miles
This section crosses into Georgia along the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge, passes through historic Savannah, and continues down the Georgia and north Florida coast into St. Augustine, the oldest European settlement in the country.
Alternates:
- Jacksonville Airport Access spur, 21.2 mi.
St. Augustine, FL to Key West, FL, 506.3 miles
The route runs urban and suburban most of the way down the Florida coast through Miami before joining the Florida Keys Overseas Heritage Trail for the final stretch to Key West.
Atlantic Coast Photos
Plan Your Ride
This route’s length and city spurs make it easy to break into shorter regional trips, though riders tackling the whole coast should plan around hurricane season and book Keys lodging well ahead.
Trip Planning & Logistics
Amtrak serves many stations along this route, though not all offer bicycle service, so it’s worth checking ahead for both ends of any train connection. The city spurs into Boston, New York, and Philadelphia also connect to regional and subway service for riders who want to detour into those cities.
Ride the northern half between late spring and mid-fall, and plan the Keys crossing with reservations, since services and lodging get tight in the busy season. As a print-and-digital route, this one is available through Adventure Cycling’s Shop, which includes routing, detailed service information, riding conditions, and field notes for trip planning.
This route runs mostly on pavement, shared-use paths, and rail trails, so a standard touring or road-touring bike suits most of it well. Wider tires make the unpaved Wallkill Valley Rail Trail and Deep Hollow alternates more comfortable, and low gearing helps on the steep climbs in New England and Pennsylvania. Pack layers for the range of climates between Maine and Florida.
Reservations are strongly recommended year round, especially in the Florida Keys and along the Outer Banks in season. Maryland has no campgrounds directly on the main route, so campers should plan around the Chesapeake Bay Alternate or book indoor lodging there. Elsewhere, campgrounds and motels are available along most of the route, and Warmshowers hosts are plentiful near the cities.
Services are plentiful for most of the route, with a few thinner stretches in rural New Jersey, the Delaware River valley, and the Lowcountry north of Charleston. Florida beach towns tend to run more expensive due to tourist demand. In the southern heat, carry extra water and refill often. Check your digital route in Ride with GPS for service phone numbers, and call ahead for anything outside peak season.
Traffic increases significantly approaching major cities, including Washington, D.C., Baltimore, and the beach communities of the Carolinas and Florida. Hurricane season runs June through November and can close roads and ferries on the Outer Banks, so check conditions before committing to that alternate. In south Florida, watch for crocodiles along the 20-mile stretch leaving Florida City, and give them a wide berth. Always check Adventure Cycling Route Updates and Corrections before you go.
Routes change. Bridges wash out, businesses close, and construction pops up overnight. We strive to keep routes updated as those things happen. When we learn about a change, we reroute around sections that have become dangerous, update service information as businesses open, close, or move, and reroute around temporary road and bridge closures or construction. Digital routes are updated as soon as we’ve reviewed a reported issue.
You’re often the first to spot these changes out on the road. Help us keep this route accurate for the next rider by reporting anything you notice with our Route Feedback Form.
This Route Is Part of Something Bigger
It’s one piece of the Adventure Cycling Route Network, began in 1976 and built on a simple mission: to empower people to travel by bike. Our team maps and maintains it; our members and donors make it possible.
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Frequently Asked Questions
It’s our flagship, staff-built route network. The one that started it all 50 years ago with the TransAmerica Trail, the route that launched bicycle touring and bikepacking in America. Every route in it is designed and researched by our own team of cyclists and cartographers: months of research and on-the-ground testing go into each one, so what you get is more than a line on a map. Each Adventure Cycling route has detailed logistics, terrain and elevation info, points of interest, camping and lodging, safety alerts, and history, all in one place. It’s the most in-depth of our three networks, available as digital routes and most as paper maps too. It’s the route network we update most regularly as conditions change.
They’re related, but not the same thing. The Adventure Cycling Route Network is made up of routes we’ve researched, ridden, and mapped ourselves, chosen specifically for a great touring or bikepacking experience. The U.S. Bicycle Route System (USBRS) is a state-by-state national system that we serve as technical experts for, made official through each state’s department of transportation. The two overlap in a lot of places, but an ACRN route carries our own on-the-ground vetting; a USBRS route carries official state recognition.
It depends! If you want a route we’ve personally scouted end to end, with services, camping, and terrain notes built in, start with the Route Network. The ACA Route Network has routes of many different lengths and can be a much easier starting place for someone new to bicycle travel. If you’re an experienced cyclist piecing together an officially designated corridor, or riding somewhere the two systems converge, the interactive USBRS map is a good resource to use.
The Adventure Cycling Route Network is a premium network because of everything that goes into it. Unlike the U.S. Bicycle Route System (built by state DOTs) or Short Routes (submittedby cyclists in their own communities), every Adventure Cycling route is researched, ridden, and vetted end-to-end by our own team. Unlike other routes, Adventure Cycling routes come with extensive information on riding conditions, terrain notes, camping and lodging info, logistics, safety alerts, and points of interest. We also keep it current as roads and services change. The price supports that ongoing research and maintenance work, done by a nonprofit whose whole mission is making sure the route in your hands is one you can trust.
Turn-by-turn directions with a bike icon aren’t the same as a route built for specifically touring or bikepacking. Every mile in the Adventure Cycling Route Network has been researched and ridden by our staff and researchers, chosen to avoid dangerous traffic, and mapped with what a touring cyclist actually needs — food, water, camping, hotels, bike shops — spaced out along the way. The Adventure Cycling Route Network was built for cyclists by cyclists, is regularly updated, and comes with the resources and information needed to plan your ride.
No. The network includes routes for a wide range of experience and difficulty levels, from a first multi-day trip to a cross-country expedition. What every route has in common is that it was chosen with a touring cyclist’s needs in mind, whatever kind of trip you’re planning.
Not at all. Alongside iconic long-distance routes like the TransAmerica Trail, the network includes shorter regional routes, so it works for a weeklong vacation or a two-month journey.
For many years, we focused on paved routes, but today the network includes plenty of unpaved gravel riding for bikepacking. In fact, Adventure Cycling mapped the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route in 1998, arguably the most impactful bikepacking route in the world. The Adventure Cycling Route Network also includes the Golden Gravel Trail, Idaho Hot Springs Mountain Bike Route, Arkansas High Country Route, and more. Some routes are a 50/50 mix of pavement and gravel. Some routes follow paved and unpaved bike paths and rail trails. The Adventure Cycling Route Network has terrain for every cyclist.
We revisit our printed maps every three to five years, and push corrections to our digital route data as we learn about changes on the ground. If you have an Adventure Cycling Route in Ride with GPS that we’ve updated, you’ll get a notification when you open the route to update to the newest version of the route. Updating will ensure you have the latest data, information, and points of interest vital to being on route. For cyclists who have Adventure Cycling paper maps, we keep a list of route- and section-specific updates current on our Map Updates and Corrections page.
Change comes from two directions: our own staff research and reports from the cyclists actually out there riding them. If a bridge washes out, a shoulder disappears, a campground closes for repairs, or a town loses its only grocery store, that’s the kind of thing that triggers an update. You can help us keep our routes accurate; fill out our Route Feedback Form.
Most of our Adventure Cycling Routes come as waterproof print maps and digital Ride with GPS navigational data. Our print maps are the #1 longstanding popular resource for traveling cyclists. They are waterproof, highly detailed and always work. For long trips, many cyclists use a combination of print maps and digital routes.
If you’re already comfortable and familiar with a GPS navigational aid such as Ride with GPS or a Garmin, our digital data packages are an excellent choice. We do not recommend GPX data for beginners since there are a few extra steps to installing and troubleshooting.
Once you purchase a digital route, you’ll get an email with a link to unlock it in the free Ride with GPS app — no separate subscription required for basic navigation. From there you get turn-by-turn voice directions, curated points of interest like campgrounds and bike shops, and field notes on the history, geography, and climate along your route, all available 100% offline. If you’drather use a dedicated GPS device, you can export the route as a GPX file to load onto a Garmin, Wahoo, or similar device.
To export GPX files of your Adventure Cycling digital route, use your laptop or desktop to open the email you received after purchasing your digital route. Click on the link that allows you to access your Digital Route. Finally, click on EXPORT ALL at the bottom of the screen. This is the only way to export files that include the route line, points of interest, and services. Files will be exported as one ZIP file.
Adventure Cycling uses abbreviations across its paper and digital routes to indicate particular services, land or road types, route names, direction of travel, and route type. Please see our key to abbreviations.
If you have questions on how to purchase a digital route or about the route content, please contact Adventure Cycling: cartography@adventurecycling.org or 406-721-1776.
If you have questions on how to use your Digital Route in Ride with GPS, please check the Ride with GPS support page or email them at info@ridewithgps.com.
If you’re new to Ride with GPS, please check out the following resources:
Our print map panels aren’t always oriented northwards for space and layout reasons. Refer to the north arrows to help orient yourself if you’re not sure.
No. The Routes and Mapping Department does not do custom routes for individuals. Check out the routes we’ve already mapped, and use the interactive map to piece our route networks together, forming a route that gets you from a point A to point B of your choice.
It started with a single route. In 1976, we mapped the TransAmerica Trail, and more than 4,000 cyclists crossed the country together for Bikecentennial — the nation’s bicentennial cycling celebration our founders organized. That one route became the seed of a network we’ve spent the decades since expanding. Today it’s more than 58,000 miles of mapped routes across the U.S. and Canada, from classic epics like the TransAmerica Trail, Great Divide Mountain Bike Route, and Pacific Coast, to shorter regional routes.