WILMINGTON, MA — On Sunday, April 3, 2016, the Middlesex Canal Association will lead a bicycle tour of the Middlesex Canal. Completed in 1803 after 10 years of digging a ditch 3½’ deep, 30′ wide and 27 miles long, the canal connected the Merrimack River at Lowell with the Charles River at Boston. It was the greatest work of its kind in the US until the Erie Canal. The canal operated for 50 years, but the one horsepower canal boat quickly lost to its competitor, the 30 horsepower steam locomotive.
The ride will start at the the Lowell train station after 10:43am when the 10:00am train from Boston arrives. This year an early group will take the 8:00am train from North Station to allow more time in Lowell and breakfast at the Owl Diner, a US Historic Place, http://www.owldiner.com. Train fare is $9.25. Tour visits Lowell canals, River Walk, Francis Gate, canal plaque at Hadley Field, then south on the route of the canal. Lunch at mini-mall in Billerica, Route 3A at Lowell St, around 1:00pm. Quick visit to the canal visitor center/museum, then on to Boston.
Long day, but sunset is late. Cyclists wanting a shorter tour can plan their own start and stop using the Lowell Line schedule available at http://www.mbta.com. Anderson/Woburn station off 128/I-95 and I-93 is popular. Also N. Billerica because the Visitor Center is only two blocks from the station and is open noon-4:00pm.
The route is pretty flat – the summit pond is only 24′ above the Merrimack – and we will average 5 miles per hour, so the ride will be an easy one for most cyclists. Along the way we will stop at remnants of the canal including two aqueducts, the one lock remaining of twenty, and the northern end of the floating towpath, as well as the house of Loammi Baldwin, the engineer of the canal (and propagator of the Baldwin apple). The ride will be led by Bill Kuttner of the Shirley Eustis House (617-241-9383, bkuttner@ctps.org) and Dick Bauer of the Middlesex Canal Commission (857-540- 6293, dick.bauer@alum.mit.edu). Helmets required. Steady rain cancels. The map for the bike tour is in two parts, tinyurl.com/lowellsouth and tinyurl.com/wedgemere.
(NOTE: The above information is from the Middlesex Canal Association’s website.)
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