Happy Creek Loop |
Exploring Southern Appalachia on two wheels
A fun route that leaves from the heart of Knoxville's Urban Wilderness. This loop has numerous short climbs and rollers, and takes you on Happy Creek Road...a tight and twisting road that could be described as singletrack, but for road bikes.
This route starts only a couple miles from downtown Knoxville. The ride leaves from Ijams Nature Center located at 2915 Island Home Ave, one of the most popular trailheads of Knoxville's Urban Wilderness. You have two choices of where to park: either you can park at the nature center itself, a paved lot with a indoor bathroom and water available, or you can go a little further down the road and park at Meads Quarry. The quarry current facilities are port-o-lets, but they plan on building real bathrooms in 2016. The Quarry is also one of the favorite trailheads for mountain bikers, and on Tuesday evenings during the summer, there will usually be food trucks and beer venders for all to enjoy post ride. It's a really good scene.
This road riding route consists of rolling terrain, with a few short climbs and in turn, some nice downhills. The highlight of this route is Happy Creek Rd. Happy Creek is best described as singletrack for road cyclists. It is paved, but is narrow, extremely twisty and has many ups and downs. It is a real gem of a road.