This year a friend who knows me all too well apparently put me in touch with a friend of theirs who had an idea. They wanted to ride around all 11 of the Finger Lakes in New York. And the goal was to do it all in the spring and summer of 2025. Up to this point I have been riding my bike pretty regularly but I have never undertaken a serious commitment of this level before. But I am easily persuadable and jumped in for the adventure.

Keuka Lake would be the first of our Finger Lakes rides where we would cover a distance significantly farther than anything I had done before. I was excited but nervous about how this ride would go. But I had no familiarity with the route or the terrain aside from my experiences driving through the areas, which to say the least is very different and misleading compared to being on a bike.

Keuka Lake is a lake that is shaped like the letter Y. There are two options for the route you can take to ride around the lake. There is the most straight forwards and significantly shorter route or there is the longer route. We rode the shorter route which would have us ride across the tops of the highest points of the Y shape from one tip to the other instead of riding the exact shape of the Y and dipping down into the V section of the Y from one end down the lakeshore to the center where they meet and then back up the other shoreline. Our route would take us 45 miles as opposed to 60 miles on the longer route.

I intended to write these articles shortly after finishing the ride, but I simply failed to accomplish that. So now that I am writing several months after the ride these will be more of a vibes and feeling post than a details oriented story.

We started our ride at the southern tip of the lake near Hammondsport, NY. We rode north up the western shoreline towards Branchport. A fitting name for the town that sits atop the western branch of the Y shaped lake. From there we stayed on the major roads and rode from the western branch across to the western shoreline of the eastern branch of the Y shaped lake. (Are you confused yet? I think I am.) We rode up the eastern shoreline to Pen Yan, NY.

We stopped briefly in Penn Yan to do the things that one needs to do on a really long bike ride. I think you know what that means. Yes, we ate some food. As well as taking care of other bodily necessities. From Pen Yan we rode south down the eastern shoreline of the lake. All the way down the eastern branch to where the two joints reconnect and then to our starting point.

This was one of the most waterfront friendly rides out of all the Finger Lake we rode. For most of the ride you are able to regularly see the lake. And there are many areas where you are right down near the water. A very beautiful and scenic ride. There is even a section near the end where you can get off the main road and tour down near the shore where you can see all the lake houses and you are very close to the water. It is a beautiful part of the ride.

Speaking of this beautiful part of the ride. By the time I reached this section of the ride where you literally dip down off the main road periodically to get closer to the lake I had ridden farther than I ever had before. My legs were clearly getting tired and I was slowing down.

This was clear as my biking partner slowly began to pull away from me. And every time we dipped down off the main road for those scenic views it meant we would have to go back up some incline. Now, these were not particularly long or steep hills. But, my legs were so tired that they felt like it. I really was struggling to just make it up these little bits of elevation that on fresh legs would have been no problem. But despite my fatigue I kept choosing to dip down off the main road to take in the scenery, because that was really what this was all about. Seeing the sights and exploring new areas. I would never have reason to drive down these roads in a car. Here I am putting in the effort to make this exploration, let’s do it right and see everything we can see and experience everything we can experience. Who knows if I will ever do this again.

I really enjoyed the ride around Keuka Lake. It was beautiful and scenic. And aside from it simply being a long ride it was not a particularly challenging route. It was mostly flat. Maybe, some time I would go back and ride the longer version of this ride.

We completed this ride on 6/7/25. You can check it out on Strava: Ride around Keuka Lake:

https://strava.app.link/c8TyWTmilYb

If you enjoyed this article you can click the link below to support the work I do here or subscribe to my email so you don’t miss out in anything I share.