Heading to Zanesville OH next week to ride... recommendations???

[IndyRob]

Weather is looking decent so I'm off from Indy on my trusty 93 ST to the Zanesville OH area for a few days of riding. I received the "Scenic Motorcycle Routes" brochure from the Ohio Dept. of Tourism and plan to do the Triple Nickle, Hocking Hills Tour, and Amish Country Tour rides (at minimum). Any recommendations for good roads, places to eat, etc. from you folks who live there? Cheers!

 

[sirbike]

The Bear’s Den Steakhouse just east of Cambridge.
Farm to table.
Beef tastes better that way.
Sweet potato fries done in lard.

 

[mello dude]

Check out

Ohio's Windy 9

Ohio's Windy 9 is a motorcycle tourism destination. Visit the official website here to learn more.

www.windy9.com

Also head east to area around Marietta, if you can get in 800, 26south and 78east, its worth it.

A big heads up on 555.... you need a focus of 11 out of 10. Any less than that it can bite you.

 

[larryg]

Check out

Ohio's Windy 9

Ohio's Windy 9 is a motorcycle tourism destination. Visit the official website here to learn more.

www.windy9.com

Also head east to area around Marietta, if you can get in 800, 26south and 78east, its worth it.

A big heads up on 555.... you need a focus of 11 out of 10. Any less than that it can bite you.

Just returned from a trip to Marietta, the roads around there are excellent.
Our group made earlier trips to Athens, to ride the 555, Windy 9, etc . All great rides.
One of our favorites was 56, going west from Athens - we went up and back several times on it.
If you PM me, I can send you GPS files of the routes we rode.

 

[Andrew Shadow]

If you PM me, I can send you GPS files of the routes we rode.

Post them for the benefit of everyone.
There is a section for that- Route Sharing

 

[scootac]

........
A big heads up on 555.... you need a focus of 11 out of 10. Any less than that it can bite you.

THIS!!!!!!
Blind curves and blind hill crests abound!!!!!
DO NOT get near the yellow line because there will be others coming towards you that know the road and are hauling ass!!!

 

[Buckeyechris]

Weather is looking decent so I'm off from Indy on my trusty 93 ST to the Zanesville OH area for a few days of riding. I received the "Scenic Motorcycle Routes" brochure from the Ohio Dept. of Tourism and plan to do the Triple Nickle, Hocking Hills Tour, and Amish Country Tour rides (at minimum). Any recommendations for good roads, places to eat, etc. from you folks who live there? Cheers!

@IndyRob,

I highly recommend the Demons Triangle East of Zanesville. A link to the roads can be found here. There's a nice little diner in Bealsville, OH.

Chris

 

[ST Gui]

Sweet potato fries done in lard.

I never had the pleasure of farm to table beef but do remember when McDonald's fried fries in lard. Those were the days even if they weren't sweet potato based.

 

[mello dude]

THIS!!!!!!
Blind curves and blind hill crests abound!!!!!
DO NOT get near the yellow line because there will be others coming towards you that know the road and are hauling ass!!!

YES! On the blind hill crests, the road can suddenly veir to the left or right.

 

[the Ferret]

Here are some loops we ride over in SE Ohio, but we base out of Marietta, with one loop extending into West Va (a very good loop btw)

 

[Larry Fine]

YES! On the blind hill crests, the road can suddenly veir to the left or right.

That's why I like having my Garmin on and zoomed in, even with no set destination.

 

[scootac]

That's why I like having my Garmin on and zoomed in, even with no set destination.

I prefer to trust my own eyes over a bunch of electronics going back and forth. Garmin won't show field lanes where a tractor drug mud out on the road or Ma Kettle toodling along at 20 mph or somebody stopped at their mailbox still halfway on the road.
Eyes on the ROAD..not on a GPS!!!!

 

[Larry Fine]

I prefer to trust my own eyes over a bunch of electronics going back and forth.

Eyes on the ROAD..not on a GPS!!!!

I don't consider the two to be mutually exclusive. I can glance down and back very quickly.

But I do agree with you. If the going gets challenging, I do give looking ahead top priority.

 

[IndyRob]

Thank you all for your replies!

 

[IndyRob]

Just returned from a trip to Marietta, the roads around there are excellent.
Our group made earlier trips to Athens, to ride the 555, Windy 9, etc . All great rides.
One of our favorites was 56, going west from Athens - we went up and back several times on it.
If you PM me, I can send you GPS files of the routes we rode.

Thanks for the info, but with really only 2 days of ride time I want to try to get in at least 3 of the "main rides" advertised by the State.

 

[IndyRob]

UPDATE: Thanks for all of the hints/ suggestions.

WHAT GREAT ROADS! I would definitely put them up with those around Robbinsville/Dragon and Fontana Dam area. We road 4 of the 5 routes provided by the Zanesville Dept of Tourism: Hocking Hills Tour, Triple Nickel, Wayne Tour, and Amish Country Tour. The Hocking Hills was our "warm up ride" after riding over from Indy mostly via OH22. The next morning was chilly but sunny so we started out and did the Triple Nickel. Appropriately named "Ohio's Dragon" since there are some tricky sections with many blind hills and descending turns. Very light traffic on a Thursday morning. We then got on the Wayne Tour route and headed (back) to Marietta for lunch. Neat historic town! OH26 through the Wayne Forest was a blast! Again, almost zero traffic and not many leaves down. When we got closer back up to Zanesville we jumped on 77 and headed up to Cambridge then east out of town on 40 to Guernsey TapHouse for a cold beverage. Out in the middle of nowhere, but honestly the best Pumpkin beer I have ever had (not much of a fan, but hey it IS October, so...). Short easy 20 miles west back to ZVille. The next morning we were met with cold rainy skies so I threw on pretty much all of my riding clothes as we headed up north on the Amish Tour run (OH93, 39 etc). Good choice for a wet morning since these roads were not as gnarly and 26 or 555 but I still found my rear tire sliding quite a bit on the wet rubber snakes. As usual, we faced rain and a nasty crosswind on the way home (I have a 100% record of having bad weather on my return ride!).

Would highly recommend this area if you can get over there. People were very nice, traffic was light, and roads were AWESOME. You can definitely do all 5 rides in 2-3 decent days of around 300 miles each.

 

[mello dude]

Glad you had a great time, I am way overdue to get out that way, even into WV too.