Saugerties - NYC
 

I live in Colorado and am planning on biking from Saugerties, NY to Midtown Manhattan next month. I haven't biked the Hudson Valley since I was 15, some 55 years ago when 9W was still mostly rural and safe for bikes back then.

I can get from Saugerties to Kingston easily enough and I know my way around Manhattan, but the 90+ miles between seem daunting. I googled a route that seems to cross the river at Newburgh (converted railroad bridge??) and includes about thirty miles of Putnam and County trailway systems. But I don't trust Google's instructions because they are incredibly complicated (over 4 pages long) and take me through the streets of Manhattan, ignoring greenways along the east and west sides.

Suggestions will be appreciated.

Thanks,
Ron K.

Ron
From the Newburg-Beacon bridge you can take 9D to the Bear Mountain bridge and pick up 9W. 9W will take you down to NJ and with a slight jog put you on Hudson Terrace and then to the George Washington bridge. These roads are pretty well used by cyclists on weekends. I'm sure rush hours will affect the amount of cars and stress on the road.

Just to add to fudilierdan, there is a pile of NYC->bear mountain bicycling info. North of bear mountain, I would suggest you buy a paper map to get the big picture of the route south. Use good judgement about avoiding heavy traffic.

Have you seen http://www.roberts-1.com/bikehudson/. This guy and his wife have cycled all over the Hudson Valley and know several routes.

http://www.walkway.org/

That is the converted walkway over the hudson which is impressive.

You can also bike over the Mid Hudson Bridge on the north walkway....

Jay