Trails: Fox River, Baird Creek, East River and George Kress Trails in Wisconsin
Start: Fox Point Boat Launch in Green Bay
Route: Ride north to Green Bay cutting across to the Baird Creek trail. Then riding the East River trail and cutting back across to the Fox River trail. Ride south to Wrightstown before turning around. On the way back, in De Pere cut across the Fox River and ride over to Lambeau Field and then return back.
Distance 61 miles round trip.
Weather: Sunny. Temp: 50-70 degrees.
Low Elev 570, Hi Elev 700. Feet Ascended: 1180
Trail Material: Asphalt.
Rating: TWO Thumbs Up.
Had only planned on riding the Fox River Trail but the ability to ride on bike lanes across Green Bay to other trails had me exploring the City of Green Bay and outlying communities like De Pere. Even rode bicycle lanes over to Lambeau Field which is home of the Green Bay Packers. The trails were asphalt with the exception of some bricks at the north end of the trail in Green Bay and smooth Crushed Limestone on the south end of the Fox River Trail.
The interesting thing was Green Bay reminded me a lot of Mobile. City along a big river that drains into a big bay that connects to a big waterbody. Big ships in their river and big industry along their river front including massive oil tank storage and shipping docks. Green Bay, with only half the population of Mobile has done so much to connect their people to their Fox River waterfront. No trash was seen along Green Bay's Fox River but if you go to Mobile, the first thing you see along the downtown Mobile River waterfront is trash along the shoreline of their Convention Center and Riverside Park.
Green Bay, half the size of Mobile has a big NFL team and is noted for filling the stands of their stadium regardless of the weather. Mobile, twice the population of Green Bay has no Football but it does have a Triple A baseball stadium. Amazingly, the bleachers are almost empty during games. Is the vast difference between the two communities due to race? Green Bay has about 4% blacks whereas blacks make up the majority of population in Mobile with 51%.
The only bad parts of this ride was the green slime in the Fox River said by a local resident to be allegedly a result of upstream farming nitrate runoff and the noxious ammonia smell coming from one of those farms that caused me to promptly turn around on the Fox Trail because I couldn't bear riding in the smell anymore. That resulted in not riding about 10 miles of the Fox River Trail.
Highlights of this trip: The scenery along Fox River and East River and Baird Creek. Wildflowers. Seeing Lambeau Field and the Cities of Green Bay and De Pere. Loved the ability to get all over the area by bicycle lanes and bike trails. Well done Green Bay!