Local ride in southern Connecticut
Mar 26, 2023
(~352 miles)

Despite the cool rainy weather yesterday, we’d been getting hints of warmer temps lately to jump start the sprint season. Today promised to be one of those days in southern New England. Char had been going through some stressful times at work, so a long motorcycle day-ride was a welcome plan to get out and forget about the “W word” for a few hours.

Temperatures were still cooler in northern New England, with even some recent snowfalls in places, not to mention the salt and sand. Connecticut usually makes a good early-season riding choice, and there had already been some rain (which I rode through to yesterday’s RTE) to clear the roadways off a bit. This seemed like a great opportunity to get down to south central Connecticut and check out a fairly newish NER route (the New Haven – Middlesex Ramble).

We hit the road around 08:30, heated gear on medium, and beelined it straight down I-95 through Providence. Cruising easily halfway across Connecticut, we arrived at the route’s starting point, a Dunkin Donuts in North Branford, just under two hours later. After a 15 minute coffee break (with a cheddar bagel twist), we were feeling refreshed and ready to explore the local roads.

The GPS led us south on CT 740 towards the coast, through downtown Branford and down to the coast of Long Island Sound. Though this is pre-season and still early on a Saturday, there was plenty of local traffic on the roads, more than we are accustomed to on most NER routes, but to be expected near a coastline. We quickly understood that this was not going to be one of those remote woodsy hooligan rides – you can tell that this area gets extremely congested in the summer months, based on the amount of restaurants and shops we passed, so we were at least grateful to be riding it in March.

The sleepy coastal morning atmosphere, salt smell, dbright blue sky, and scenery made this section enjoyable to cruise. Continuing down to the Sound via CT 146, we hit the shoreline for our first view of the many privately owned islets dotting the Connecticut shorelines.

It’s a beautiful little area without the crowds, and we wondered what the folks owning/living on these islands do in the winter. Probably staying on the mainland in their primary residences rather than their “rustic” seashore camps. Indeed! We continued to follow 146 parallel to the coastline, enjoying the tight roadways and beautiful old colonial houses that seem to be everywhere along here.

Continuing on through Guilford, we crossed back north of I-95 into more “crinkly” topography, which surprised me a bit, being this close to the coast. Steep little hills rose to either side of us as we cut our away through the valleys on small roads, weaving north and south a few times between CT 80 and I-95 while moving gradually eastward. You have to wonder at the nomenclature origins of a street named Roast Meat Hill Road. We were feeling a bit roasted in our gear from the slow pace of traffic in this area already!

Luckily, the riding began to get more engaging and fun, leaving the busy coastal section behind. We enjoyed nice curves through farmlands, woods, and rural residential areas as the route headed more directly east on an intricate series of different roads and lanes.

I was regretting not finding a restroom when we were near some shops, and began looking for the nearest likely tree to use. We finally pulled into a small empty town park on the outskirts of Essex at Comstock Pond, (locally Clark’s Pond) which was apparently once part of a larger dammed waterway for ice harvesting by a local company, formerly situated on the hill above. Here we stopped to stretch, watch the geese fight for territory in the pond, and stroll along the small babbling outlet brook.

The pond was a nice little unexpected stop. Often, things as mundane as having to pee can lead you to slow down and take a look at something from a new angle. 👀

Proceeding east into Essex proper, the route brought us briefly through the harbor area on the Connecticut River before arcing north on some lovely small lanes close to the river, but without any views. CT 80 was a bit of a bore leading westward for several miles to Roast Meat Hill Rd, which jogged us north to CT 148. Back east again into the quaint little town of Chester, for our lunch stop.

Our friends, Gerry and Marc, had agreed to meet us there around 13:00 for lunch at Simon’s Marketplace, a general store & deli right on Main Street. This village is apparently a draw for the area. Pedestrian traffic was lively, and the local brewery was running a brisk business today, with plenty of customers enjoying the outdoor patio seating in the sun. It had become an absolute peach of an early spring day. Loved the motorcycle-only parking area as well!

Simons is a classic modernized New England general store, with a comfortable coffee house vibe, bookshelves, baked good, etc. We found an open table inside and enjoyed some very tasty sandwiches. There was a lot of great catch-up conversation with our friends (and speculation about the upcoming Iron Butt Rally in June) after the long hiatus of winter.

After a nice meal, we headed across the street to Little House Brewing Co. where we picked up four-packs or growlers to bring home to sample as post-ride refreshment. Bidding our friends so long as we all split to pursue our separate plans, Char and I continued along to finish out our route, heading north to parallel the Connecticut River again.

Ed had saved the best twisty roads for last in this route. In Haddam, we flipped south again, returning to CT 148 which we followed many miles west and northwest up into Durham. From here we proceeded on the last leg of the ride, a giant counter-clockwise run, south and east, following another series of state highways and fun local roads that eventually brought us back to the finishing point in Durham again, at another Dunkin.

It was now about 16:00, and we fueled up for the ride home while eying a very popular ice cream shack across the street. There were waaaay too many people there however, and we still had a couple hours left to get ourselves home. Sadly, we instead reset the GPS and motored north towards the bridge crossing in Middletown, taking a local road into town rather than route 17, picking up CT 9 and avoiding the congested downtown strip. Getting onto the bridge was easy peasy and we had it made from there, following CT 66 and US 6 to the interstate system in Rhode Island, and the short remainder home.

Any day on the bike following back roads is a great day, and we’d had fun exploring this new-to-us section of the Nutmeg State. The coastal scenery, old architecture, and hilly topography made for a very nice day in the saddle. Overall road conditions were pretty good, though there was still leftover sand in many corners from the winter. Probably not a great route for riding mid-season due to the proximity to the shore areas and general congestion of that part of the state in general, but late March had worked out perfectly and the weather couldn’t have been better.

 

As always, special thanks to Ed Conde for designing this fun route.