Trip report- Bikepacking C&O and Gap trail

oromis

New member
In 2020 I was planning to take three weeks and hike the John Muir Trail. However, the pandemic caused too much uncertainty for me to commit to an endeavor of that scale. As a consolation prize my wife agreed to do a bikepacking trip with me on the C&O/GAP trails. We had tried to do the C&O before but a broken derailleur hanger cut the trip in half. This would be our redemption.

I am a teacher so this trip is VERY budget minded. I used UL backpacking I already owned. I slapped some 36c gravel tires on her Diamondback Insight along a rack and panniers we already owned. My bike is a Motobecane Cross Uno disc with 36c gravel tires and Amazon bikepacking bags. We started in DC and went uphill to Pittsburg. Our mileage was 340 miles which is a little longer than the trail itself but we did some exploring in towns along the way. Plus we parked my truck in DC and had to cross town to start the trail. In Pittsburgh we rolled our bikes onto a train and rode back to DC. This was during the protests in DC so it nearly was abandoned as we rode across the National Mall to get back to Reagan International where my truck was parked.

I am no cinematographer and am just learning to edit but I am in the process of putting together a YT video for each day of our 8 day trip. If you haven’t checked out these trails then it is an excellent way to ease your way into bikepacking.

I like to think my editing skills improved after this video but I don’t want to spam the post with all them. Here is a link to the first video.
 
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oromis

New member
Having finished editing all the videos I wanted to at least post the ending as well. In the end it was 354 miles that we biked with 99% of it being off pavement. We camped 5 out of the 8 days of the route. Here are days 6-8.
 

calicamper

Expedition Leader
Oh yeah! Will check this out! Bike packing no doubt has large potential. BTW Tahoe / truckee region is working on a cross Sierras route for horse, bike and hikers. Most of it already exists from old wagon routes. I would expect more old routes to be mapped out and set up for this type of no passenger vehicle adventuring ?
 

oromis

New member
Oh yeah! Will check this out! Bike packing no doubt has large potential. BTW Tahoe / truckee region is working on a cross Sierras route for horse, bike and hikers. Most of it already exists from old wagon routes. I would expect more old routes to be mapped out and set up for this type of no passenger vehicle adventuring ?
That would be great! I’ll have to look into it. We really enjoyed this trip and have talked about traveling to do another route. This was an easy way to start because free hiker/biker campsites are already mapped out along the route. I would be down for more of a challenge now.
 

calicamper

Expedition Leader
That would be great! I’ll have to look into it. We really enjoyed this trip and have talked about traveling to do another route. This was an easy way to start because free hiker/biker campsites are already mapped out along the route. I would be down for more of a challenge now.
Oregon and Washington states have some routes also?
 

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