Arabia Mountain Bike Trail - Lyons Road Dead End to South Rockdale Park (Rockdale County, Georgia)

 

For a while now, I've been intending to check out the Arabia Mountain Bike Trails, which offer over thirty miles of paved and boardwalk paths for road bike enthusiasts. When one of my friends posted a Meetup event to do this, it seemed the perfect opportunity to finally get down that way.

After loading my bike onto my roof rack, it only took me about 45-minutes to make the drive to our intended starting point at the end of Lyons Road. Some of the riders were already there when I arrived. The group is planning to ride 25-30 miles, but I warned them that I probably wasn't in shape for that much and would probably turn back at some point. This will be my first ride in several months, as I'm not the biggest fan of riding my bike when it's very cold. To that end and given the early spring-like temperatures this morning, I wore several layers, including a windbreaker that I think will save me from most of the chill.

Shortly after the last rider arrived, our small group started peddling south along the paved trail. It felt pretty good to be riding again, but I knew my legs would not be up for the mileage these folks were planning. The wind whipped around my face and even with my Oakley sunglasses protecting my eyes, I felt some tears starting to form from the cold air. The ride was mostly smooth and downhill at this point, and of course the descents were really fast. 

We soon came to Alexander Lake and crossed a well-constructed horseshoe-shaped bridge across its western end. It was a nice view. From there, the trail weaved through the woods offering some uphill sections, which I struggled with a bit. Eventually, we started riding parallel to the South River. At one point we stopped to walk over a small extension bridge and get a great view of the muddy river below us. 

The group planned to ride all the way to the Monastery, which is another six miles or so, but as my legs were feeling like spaghetti, I told them I would likely turn back sometime soon and they continued on with their ride. I made it a little bit further to the entrance to the South Rockdale Park and then decided my legs had had enough. I turned my bike around and began a slow ride back to where we started. 

I'm really impressed with the quality of the bike trails here and I hope to be able to do more of them this summer. I'm only disappointed that I wasn't in better riding shape for today's adventure, but I still managed to ride about 11.8 miles in total.