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  • Ride the Catskills: A Motorcycle Rider's Guide to the Catskills

Ride the Catskills: A Motorcycle Rider's Guide to the Catskills

The Rides

  1. Port Jervis Overnight

  2. Breakfast, Lunch, & Pepacton

  3. Bear Mountain Tour

  4. Kanawauke Road Time Trial

  5. Route 23A Waterfall Tour

BONUS: Our Favorite Breweries

1. Port Jervis Overnight

  • 282 Miles

  • Around 6 hours

  • Start & Finish: Port Jervis

The Route

The route starts in Port Jervis so depending on where you're coming from, you'll probably want to spend the night and start out early AM after grabbing breakfast in town.

You'll hit Hawks Nest pretty quickly coming out of Port Jervis and will continue heading north on 97. You'll do a loop around until you hit Pepacton Reservoir (supplies 25% of NYC's drinking water!) which is a fantastic ride on its own.

That road is mostly empty of traffic so go ahead and roll on the throttle. Once done with Pepacton, you'll head back down to Port Jervis via 17 & 42. Or stick around the area and hit up some of the curves Southwest of the reservoir.

Bail Out Option

The route is quite long for a day ride so if you're not up for the full 6 hours - or just want to break it up across 2 days, cut out the Northwest and Pepacton Reservoir portions. That should bring the trip down to just under 3 hours.

Map Links

2. Breakfast, Lunch, & Pepacton

  • 131 miles

  • 3 hours

  • Start: Phoenicia Diner

  • Finish: Outpost BBQ

The Route

You'll start out at the Phoenicia Diner and for a damn good reason: order anything with their local caught trout and thank me. Just make sure to start the day early to make time for the whole route (especially if you’re coming from the city) and check to make sure the diner is open. Don’t ask me how I know.

Finish breakfast and head West to Pepacton. You'll stay on Route 28 and then hang a left as that turns into 30 around the reservoir.

Pepacton is a fantastic 50 mile loop and if the traffic is light enough, do a few rounds and maybe get that knee down. It can be a FAST loop so take a breather and burn it. Then do it again.

After the reservoir, head Southeast via 151/55/44 to finish the day off at Outpost BBQ or continue on a bit to Mountain Brauhaus. Both are great options for lunch.Bail Out Option

The route is quite long for a day ride so if you're not up for the full 6 hours - or just want to break it up across 2 days, cut out the Northwest and Pepacton Reservoir portions. That should bring the trip down to just under 3 hours.

Bail Out Option

It's not a short route and you might not have 3 hours to crush, especially if you're doing multiple loops at the reservoir.

And easy bail out is to ignore the reservoir entirely. That will cut your ride time down by about 45 minutes while still touching the tip of route 30. I like this option as it's easy to make a decision once you get there.

Map Links

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