Sunday, July 9, 2023 Dorset, Vermont

Dorset, Rupert, Sandgate, Manchester

7/9/23

Beautiful loop with one very tricky mountain pass.

This ride began like a bunny, and ended like a bear! A big, burly, scary bear! This ride is also definitely fun because you get so close to the NY state border.

The first half of this ride is all on pavement, but don’t be put off by that, since we saw almost no car traffic.  I’ve seen way more cars on many gravel roads across the state.

We ended up parking on Dorset West Road. There’s a slight pullover at the end of the road where we were able to land, unload and begin our ride.

We started our ride by heading out of Manchester on West Road, riding by opulent residences, with names like Maple Acres or Shire Green. These are large, sprawling estates with elaborate rock walls, (Grecian Temples (?)) and extra “carriage houses” that would rival the most beautiful of Vermont homes. Several seemed to even be unoccupied second homes.

There’s plenty of opportunity for gawking, since at this point the ride was a simple, gentle up and down – the bunny part of the ride.

We turned left on VT 315 which took us into Rupert, with a steady gradual climbing ride for several miles until you reach the top of the ridge, and then you get a glorious glide down into and through Rupert and West Rupert. We stopped at the West Rupert General Store and got a sugar boost, that I realized I needed.

We rode toward West Rupert on East St, which turned into Kent Hollow Rd. West Rupert is a cute little community, with colorful older, renovated houses, funky, farms, and, sweet little residential neighborhoods. 

Heading out of West Rupert the plot thickens, however.  You take a left onto Rupert Road toward Sandgate and onto the first gravel road of the ride. The biking here involves climbing up and coasting down, on and off, with an overall elevation gain of about 800 feet in 5 miles. Beautiful riding!

This area is completely different from where we started.  There is an abundance of backwoods homesteads, with oversize pickup trucks and teen girls riding by on 4 wheelers. Log cabins are the primary residence here. Some of them are also apparently second “homes,” but of a completely different nature.  There are many tiny hunting cabins with just the essentials. Many of these are long abandoned, with 6 inches of grass and moss sprouting from the roof.  Soon we found that we were riding beyond the last electric pole and beyond any homes at all. Deep woods riding on good, wide gravel roads – such a delight!

Eventually the power lines start up again and we end up in Sandgate proper- a very pretty (but remote) little town near the NY border, where the town hall sports a sign that says, “You can’t get there from here.”  This felt true in a lot of ways. Getting into Sandgate, we came through a very forested woods road, and getting out we had to climb over a small mountain, on a rough boulder passageway. It really did feel like you couldn’t easily get there!

Turning left takes you through some winding turns to a left turn onto W Sandgate Rd.  The best (and worst) part of this ride involved a very steep, Class 4 Road, connecting Sandgate to Manchester – Bear Town Road.  A hairy and scary ride that involved a lot of hiking with our bikes and sometimes even carrying them over rocks.

This involved 1500 feet of elevation over a six mile stretch. Three miles felt like straight up, over loose stone and washed out ledge, and then three miles down the same stinking stuff – negative 21% grade at times. A sane person might rather skip this altogether, and turn around to backtrack the route. Not us! We carried and climbed up, then took a breath, then turned and scrambled down. Bear Road was a bear of a ride – if you could even call it riding!

After coming out of Bear Road, though, it was easy riding through beautiful rural country, then beautiful residential areas, then back to our car.

We ended up in the outside seating area at Sam’s Wood-fired Pizza where we got an excellent vegetarian pizza, before driving home.