Along the Genesee Riverway Trail (Comments: 3)

Today I took my first ride with my new Power Grips. They’re great, although they also exposed an issue in my seat positioning. My right knee is killing me, partly from being used in a different way because of the Power Grips, but also because I need to reposition my seat. The instructions that came with the Power Grips clearly tell you to try them out and get used to them. So I put them on the bike and rode 30 miles. Probably not the single smartest move of my short cycling career.

It was worth it, though. I rode to Lake Ontario on the Genesee Riverway Trail. It was breathtaking. Two big waterfalls. The river gorge. A boardwalk about a foot above the river. Then the pier out onto the lake. Amazing.

I started out on the Ford Street Bridge, which is just about my favorite piece of architecture in Rochester. From there you can hop right on the trail and ride along the river to Court St., home of the Dinosaur BBQ, a local landmark.

Then it was down State St. to the High Falls historic district, across the Pont du Rennes bridge over the Upper Falls, and up St. Paul to the main trail.

The Pont du Rennes Bridge over the Genesee River

The Upper Falls of the Genesee River

After a few miles, you come to the Lower Falls. You can break off the trail onto a little spur that runs down for a lovely view of the waterfall. This was my first time seeing the Lower Falls. In fact, I don’t think I knew the Lower Falls existed.

The Lower Falls of the Genesee River

The Genesee Riverway Trail is a multi-faceted thing. It was a fairly normal paved bike trail when I started at the Ford Street Bridge. Then it disappears and you have to travel on surface streets until you come to the regular trail again on St. Paul. At various times, it’s a gravel path, a sidewalk (!) and a wooden boardwalk. Near Rte. 104, it narrows into a cement trail with a head-high stone wall on one side.

The trail is bordered by this stone wall as it passes under the Veterans Memorial Bridge

Shortly after the Vets Bridge, you come to King’s Landing, site of the first European settlement on the west side of the Genesee. In addition to a marker at the site of the landing itself, there’s also a cemetery — the oldest in Rochester.

A stone marker memorializes those buries at the King’s Landing Cemetery

Just beyond the cemetery is the site of a Native American village, the ruins of which were discovered in 1880. There’s nothing there now but a hill and a water treatment plant.

The site of a Native America village on the banks of the Genesee River

After a while, I was back on a paved bike trail that started to descend toward the river. Then came something I wasn’t expecting — a long boardwalk. Here’s some video footage I shot while crossing it:

From the boardwalk, it’s just a short distance to the southern shore of Lake Ontario. As you approach the lake, you come to the harbor and the O’Rourke Bridge:

And then you reach the beach, with its long cement pier jutting out into the water:

• All the photos I took today are here. (Note: There are three pages of photos.)

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