Keeping Nepaug Gnarly
03/8/2025
03/06/2025
How a local mountain bike crew changed Connecticut
by Sean McAlindin
It was a peak fall day in late October when I met Luke Furtney at the trailhead in New Hartford, Connecticut. Yellow leaves were floating silently around us as we prepared for a morning ride in Nepaug State Forest. Through golden trees, the Farmington River churned like a faded memory, drifting on its relentless course beyond the rocky edge of the Berkshire Mountains.
Change, as they say, was in the air.
Though a couple of years apart, Furtney and I both grew up not far from here in the small northwestern Connecticut town of Canton. As kids, we rode prototype mountain bikes on old logging roads and deer trails basically anywhere we could.
From the blue-blazed Tunxis Trail to the wild descents of Ski Sundown, most of the biking we did at the time was illegal trespassing on paper. But, anyone who grew up riding around here did the same. My non-suspension Iron AT 100 and I still have the scars to prove it.
"It wasn’t enforced, but it’s not technically for bikes," said Furtney of Connecticut’s historical mountain biking trails. "There was a huge demand and need for it—and not any official access."
One of our favorite backwoods routes to get from the top of Ratlum Mountain to school in Collinsville was to ride over Breezy Hill, across Satan’s Kingdom gorge, through the forests of Nepaug, along the Farmington River and over Town Bridge. When you start your morning like that, even junior high school seems tolerable.