Best of 2013: Cycling Marathon's "Ride to the Post" Heritage Bike Route

  

One of our Texas Mountain Trail Heritage Bike Routes is featured in the current issue of the Texas Historical Commission's magazine, The Medallion!   Click HERE to read the entire issue online--a travel article covering our region including Marathon, the Gage Hotel, and Big Bend Ranch State Park starts on page 6!

Is the route easy?  YES!  A family could easily handle the five miles there, five miles back route.  There's virtually no vehicular traffic, is incredibly scenic and the average slope is only 1.2%!  The elevation gain is only 121 feet! 

Why is this called a "heritage" bike route?  The ride starts out at the historic (and cycle-friendly!) Gage Hotel, continues across the highway and railroad (easy crossings!) to the Gage Hotel's formal Gardens.  From there, you follow signs to the Cemetery and County Park. 

Water Lily from Gage Gardens

The Cemetery is a short detour and has the graves of early Marathon residents, with interesting markings and monuments.

Head further south to Post Park, through country that once held a tent hospital during the 1918 influenza epidemic, a buffalo soldier encampment called Post Pena Colorado, and to Post Park. Be sure to read the interpretive panels on the Buffalo Soldier encampment and the geology of the area, produced by our friends at the Brewster County Tourism Council...and have a GREAT ride! 

Post Park!

The park itself is a great place to watch birds and enjoy wildlife, and was a stopping off point for the Comanche and Apache.  It also was a project of the 1930s Works Progress Administration!

Ride to the Post!