Tour De Patapsco Day 7 - Old Ellicott City to Hollofield and Back

So, the last ride showed how to connect middle patapsco to Avalon. This one shows how to connect Old Ellicott City to Hollofield. Hollofield is an awesome part of the park where we will get some good rocky trails and some of the best flow in the park all in one ride. But with this also comes some big road climbs right out of the gate. Of the 10 miles this day around 4 of it was professionally built goodness. This one seems short, but we will have 1,400’ of climbing and when we are not climbing we will have a good bit of rock, so you’ll be working the entire time! This is probably my favorite part of the park due to the varied terrain.

Waiver: Mountain biking is a risky sport, By signing up for this meetup you are agreeing to our MVD Mountain Bikers waiver located here: Link to MVD Waiver.

What’s the schedule? I will give a brief overview of the ride around 9:00 / 9:15, with the plan to roll at 9:15. We will meet at the back of the lot by the dumpsters.

What’s the Terrain? Expect a little low volume roads, some big hill climbs, rocks, and flow on this one. So yes, a little bit of everything. Some stuff is newer machine built awesomeness. Some is slow technical old school rock gardens so be prepared for anything.

Also, keep in mind, I will be stopping a lot, as there are multiple turns and hills on this route and want to keep everyone together. Just be forewarned.

Mileage / Speed? This one is only 10 miles but over 1,400’ of climbing! Between the climbing, and power needed for the rock gardens you will be working most of this day, but in the fun way! Pace will be around 7.5 mph.

So, what’s the route? The first 2.2 miles of this is road and stone road, but don’t be fooled, as there are some solid climbs on these roads right out of the gate. We’ll be hitting the Old Ellicott City connector, but split in two. After the road climbs we’ll hit the camp ground loop to the OEC to under the route 40 bridge. We’ll then repay that awesomeness with a big climb up better than 40 all the way up to park headquarters and then bomb the flowy awesomeness of the peaceful pond trail. We will not make it to frederick road today, as we will stop and climb the new ranger trails back to the park. We’ll take a short trail from the parking area to some road / dirt roads, and then hit the campground loop again, but only for a short stint, as we will be hanging a right to take the new awesomeness of the OEC basically back to old ellicott city and our cars.

Here is the Strava Route. There is a button under the title to “Export GPX” for those who want to pull this down for their mapping devices: https://www.strava.com/routes/3309662055018266870

Tour De Patapsco Overview
What is the Tour De Patapsco?
It is 8 days worth of rides throughout just about every part of the Patapsco Valley State Park trail system, where we have minimized trail overlap in an effort to showcase the entire park. We have made the routes available for you to do on your own, or if a group setting is what you are looking for, Craig will be leading a ride just about every Saturday from 4/19/25 to 6/28/25. The only saturdays we will not ride will be trail days and the 6 hours at Woodstock weekend. If you do all 8 days you will get around 116 miles and 13,485’ of climbing.

Could this all be done in one day? Sure, but we wanted this to be more accessible to everyone, so each day will be between 10.5 and 18 miles and will have between 1350’ and 2150’ feet of climbing, but for the crazies, we even have a 93 mile route posted.

It’s just Patapsco. Won’t it all be the same? That’s a big nope! Some may be familiar, some new to you, but each ride will definitely have it’s own feel, as the different parts of the park have different terrain, and trails are definitely built differently in each part of the park. Most people don’t realize that we have a little of everything here, from fast and flowing, to some decent hills, and definitely some more technical stuff.

Okay. What parts of the park are we hitting and when? Well, we will be hitting Avalon, Orange Grove, Glen Artney, HIlton, Rockhaven, Pickall, Hollofield, Alberton, Daniels, Woodstock, and McKeldin, so just about every area where we have rideable terrain. Also throwing in Banneker Park into the mix.

Are the start / finish in the same spot? Each ride will loop us back to our start spot, but we will be starting in many different locations throughout the 8 days. For the most part the routes take us in big loops, where I tried to minimize hitting the same trail twice. In some areas this is harder to do then others, but in most cases when we do double up it will be in opposite directions giving you a different feel of the trail

Will the courses be marked? That’s a no. Again, the logistics of marking 116 miles of trails, and making sure they stay in place over the duration of the tour would be impossible. Instead we have posted these as strava routes and group rides. There will be a lead, a sweep, and probably some people in the middle that will know the route, and help guide / take care of any on trail issues. Not sure how big each ride will be, but if we get too big, we may need to split into groups, and the rides could be extremely slow, so stay patient.

Can we go ride by ourselves? Absolutely. This event is all about exploring the park.

Are the routes available for download (i.e. GPX files)? Yup. I’ve created them all in Strava as routes, and the GPX file can be pulled down from there. I have created separate rides for each day to describe the mileages / terrain, and will have a link to the strava route for that day there.

What happens if it rains? Well, we don’t ride if it’s muddy, so stay tuned to our MVD Facebook, and Meetup events, which is where I will post if I need to cancel a day or two.