Trail Advice

[spike]

Four of us are heading to Brown County from Madison, Wisconsin. We will be staying in the park Saturday thru Wednesday.


We need advice on other must do trails in the area. If the trail is deserving we are willing to travel 2 - 3 hours.


We have no other responsibilities for 5 days so, we need to have enough Mountain biking diversions to help keep us away from the beer at least for most of the day.

[MikeVK]

Versailles is an hour to an hour and a half away and definitely worth the drive for a day.


Nebo Ridge Trail is actually biking distance from BCSP


Valley Branch Retreat and Gnawbone Camp are both privately managed trail systems very close to the park.  I haven't been to either of them recently, but they would certainly be worth checking out.


And for the beer, Big Woods Brewery in Nashville seems to be the current preferred destination for BC mountain bikers.

[MikeHufhand]

1)Versailles State Park - 17 miles+a swimming pool, so spend a day.


2)French Lick Resort(9 AWESOME miles+a shower)


3)Nebo Ridge/Hickory in Hoosier National Forest - lots of miles, some rugged, old school stuff.

[gnawbonelefty]

Must do's: Nebo-Hickory,  it's close 10 miles away and you can easily get in a 50+ mile ride there.  Nebo has a great flow and Hickory has some huge hills.  Get the Mountain bike tourist map at the bike shops in Columbus or Nashville

Valley Branch Retreat  5 miles from the park entrance and 20+ miles of trail with a totally different feel than Brown County.

Gnawbone Camp is closed to riding  for the next 5 weeks for the summer camp  operations.  Otherwise it would be tops on the list.

French Lick is great but a two hour drive 1 way. as Is Versailles. 

If I had to choose  I'd plan on 2-3 days riding at Brown County,  A day at Valley Branch, a day or 2 in Nebo-Hickory , and then maybe a trip to French Lick or Versailles if you want a change.  It's hard to imagine doing 4 hours round trip in a car after driving that far to ride, but french lick may be worth it.

[spike]

Thanks for the Ideas, keep them coming!!


It may be a long drive but, this is a shorter than our first destination. We had plans to do the Maah Daah Hey in North Dakota (twice the distance of Brown County for us) but, they have been having monsoons. The water crossing has 11' of water usually 2' or less this time of year.




With the heat we kinda wussed out and are staying in the so called rustic cabins, we thought the AC might allow us to recover better and get in a few more miles.




Thanks for the beer advice we may want to venture into town. We will be bringing our own kegs of craft beer (ran out of home brew).




If you're in the park stop by, look for the white Suburban with American Family insurance plastered on the sides.

[Otter]

I read the article in Mountain Flyer on Maah Daah Hey recently...sounded awesome but the part about all the rattlesnakes kind of freaked me out.  Still, that would be an epic adventure. 
 
One suggestion I would give is to ride BCSP later in your trip.  While it's not horrible, the weekends can get fairly crowded, but Monday-Wednesday will be wide open.  The other trails (Nebo-Hickory in particular) won't have nearly as many, if any, people on them. 
 
Enjoy the ride and drink lots o' beer!

[Paul_Arlinghaus]

HMBA volunteers will be in the BCSP Rally Site 4 on Saturday night.  Stop by and trade beer for local knowledge. 

[Guy]

If you're heading over to Versailles State Park I'd recommend checking out Muscatatuck County Park also. It's between Brown Co and VSP and has 10 miles of recently built and rehabbed trails.
Signage is really shaky yet, so you need a sense of adventure.

http://www.muscatatuckpark.com/

[spike]

We are on the road. On the trail by 3. We'll try to stop by the group camp site tonight.

[spike]

Our group had a great time on your trails, thanks for all your hard work.


We did 110 miles over the four days. Went to French Lick our first day out and got caught on the back side of the trail when the rains started and rode it out during the monsoon. That was very entertaining. Got lazy and spent the rest of the time in Brown County. You can tell the local businesses we are planning family trips to Nashville because of your trail network.


Paul, thanks for stopping by the Cabin, we all appreciated your advice.


Jay