ROUTE INFORMATION
You may be interested in some other week long bike tours in the same area. A fine ride is the "Bonton Roulet". You'll find their full route maps on their web site. This ride costs about twice as much as FaNY, but for that price you get camping facilities that are much more accommodating - reasonably spread out tenting facilities with real showers and bathrooms - and full breakfast and dinner, as well as drinks and snacks along the route. FaNY provides no food, or even water along the way - you're on your own. We liked that for dinners because there were nice restaurants to go to in the towns we stayed at. But breakfasts were really difficult. Some days we had to ride 20 to 30 miles before the first cup of coffee! With the large group of riders, the breakfast places were totally swamped. If we were to do this ride again we'd bring a whisperlite or jetboil to make breakfast at camp before rolling off. Bonton Roulet is an easier loop ride, but FaNY provides a much more interesting route and you ride through the Finger Lakes region plus through the scenic Adirondacks. However an outstanding destination on the 2008 FaNY was Lake George which is missing form the 2009 route. The 2008 route spent a full day riding in the spectacular Adirondacks. That's also missing in 2009 - you ride in one day and ride out the next.
Many other rides are listed on the National Bicycle Tour Director's Association. We've done the summer and fall "TRIRI" rides in Indiana which we were particularly happy with. [See photos.] A real bargain ride is GITAP - Grand Illinois Trails and Parks - a "full service" camping ride that's only about $400. It sells out early. Lately I can't recommend it for the comfort minded because the condition of the Illinois state park facilities is dilapidated (our impeached Gov. had cut park funding to virtually nothing). Maybe in a year or two the park facilities will get fixed up and GITAP will be a fabulous ride. [ 2012 update: no improvement in the state park camping conditions. ] [See photos from 2004] [and 2003.]