The North Beach rides are very popular with local cyclists. The roads tend to have little traffic, the scenery is varied and interesting and the terrain is moderate in difficulty. The rides begin at the Park-and-Ride at the Davidsonville exit from route 50 and on a Saturday or Sunday morning you are almost sure to meet other cyclists at the start point. The basic ride is a roughly 60 mile loop with North Beach/Chesapeake Beach at the midway point. North Beach is a terrific place to take a mid-ride break with a lovely boardwalk on Chesapeake Bay. There is a public beach at the north end of the boardwalk and benches looking out over the Bay at the quieter south end. There is a good convenience store and gas station, Fastop combined with Citgo gas, in Chesapeake Beach which adjoins North Beach to the South. The Fastop usually has a good selection of both Gatorade and energy bars and it also tends to have frozen Dole fruit bars which we find to be a great midride snack, especially on hot days. We typically ride down to the Fastop, bottle up, ride back to the boardwalk and take a break.
For a more challenging ride you can add an approximately 15 mile extension to the basic loop. Heading south on the main road from Chesapeake Beach you hit 4 miles or so of big rolling hills. They look intimidating and the first few times through you might feel like they’re never going to end but they’re really not that tough because you can often build up a lot of speed on the downhill that precedes each uphill. The extended route loops back to Chesapeake Beach.
For more miles you can ride down to Dares Beach. We’ve only done this once and don’t know the route all that well. From what we’ve seen, Dares Beach appears to be a small community on the Chesapeake Bay that has no retail stores so make sure you bottle up in Chesapeake Beach on your way through. The route does the big rollers in both directions and includes some more hill climbing to add both distance and challenge. The Dares Beach ride is about 85 miles.
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