Last weekend we wanted to go for a bike ride.  Alden has, just this spring, figured out how much fun bike riding is and we wanted to give him the experience of riding a long distance, instead of just circling around in our dirt driveway.  He hasn’t quite mastered going down hills and using his brakes, so we picked a mostly flat section of the paved bike path in Franconia Notch State Park in Franconia, NH.

We parked at the Lafayette Place Campground and headed south toward The Basin.  The bike path starts off in a softwood forest and meanders next to the Pemigewasset River and other tributaries of the Pemi, eventually transitioning to a mixed hardwood forest.

We crossed over several bridges as we headed south and the forest changed to an all hardwood forest with purple trilliums and trout lily’s flowering in the open forest floor.  The leaves haven’t completely come out yet, so there was plenty of light filtering down to reach these delicate flowers.

It wasn’t until we reached The Basin entrance that we started to see other bikers and hikers.  Alden was having too much fun on his bike and didn’t want to walk to view The Basin so we turned around and started our bike ride back to the campground. You can read about our fun adventure in The Basin here.

We stopped at a bridge over Dry River and flipped some rocks looking for creatures.  Our timing couldn’t have been perfect as 3 different groups of riders passed by us on the bike path.  Other than that we were alone throughout the entire 3 mile round trip bike ride. It’s early season and this bike path probably gets lots of use in the summer. However this early season visit was perfect for a novice bike rider on training wheels.

When we made our way back to the campground and stopped at the campground store for a much deserved ice cream.  Alden wasn’t ready to stop this bike riding day so we hung out in the campground eating ice cream and riding around the campground.

There is much more of this bike path to explore.