Ausable Valley & Whiteface

The Whiteface mountain ride: it leaves Keeseville on NY-9N along the AuSable River, passes Au Sable Forks and Jay, and in Wilmington climbs the Veterans Memorial Highway to the castle on the summit. You come down the same road and return through Upper Jay to Keene. It's 50 miles of river valley and one mountain climb. NY-431 is a toll road and seasonal: it opens mid-May to mid-October, so it's closed now until May 2027.

The Whiteface Mountain Veterans Memorial Highway was first proposed in the late 1800s by Marcellus Leonard, a Saranac Lake merchant, and the land was given to the state on the condition that the road honor the veterans of World War I. Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the dedication as governor in 1929 and, as President, cut the ribbon on September 14, 1935. The road climbs about 8 miles, gaining roughly 450 feet per mile, and ends at the Castle, built from granite dug out during the construction. From the summit lot a 426-foot tunnel and an elevator of about 27 stories reach the top of the 4,867-foot peak.

NY-431 is a toll road and runs only in season, from mid-May to mid-October, and the summit is a dead end, so you ride up and down the same road. Lower on the route, in Jay, the Jay Covered Bridge sits just off NY-9N: rebuilt in 1857 with a Howe truss over the East Branch of the AuSable, it has carried only walkers and bikes since a steel bridge took the traffic in 1997, and there's parking on both banks. Wilmington and Keene have food for the start and end of the climb.