The Atlantic Coast Trail isn’t one trail at all — it’s two ways to ride the US East Coast from Maine to Florida. One is a fully mapped 2,615-mile cycling route; the other is a 3,000-mile car-free network that’s still being built. This guide covers which one fits your trip, what it costs, the best car-free segments, and the stretch to skip.
“Atlantic Coast Trail” usually means a long-distance bike or walk route along the US East Coast. Two dominate: Adventure Cycling’s Atlantic Coast Route (Bar Harbor, ME to Key West, FL — 2,615 miles, fully mapped) and the East Coast Greenway (Calais, ME to Key West — 3,000 miles, about 65% complete or in advanced development). Most cyclists finish in two to four months.
One quick clarification before you plan: the search term also pulls up the East Coast Trail in Newfoundland, Canada — a coastal hiking path that has nothing to do with the US routes below. If that’s what you’re after, you’re on the wrong page.
Which Atlantic Coast Trail Route Is Right for You?
Choose the East Coast Greenway if car-free riding matters most — it strings together more than 1,100 traffic-free miles, linked by an interim on-road route through the gaps. Choose Adventure Cycling’s Atlantic Coast Route if you want a fully mapped, road-tested tour with turn-by-turn cues and service notes for every mile. They cover the same coast with opposite trade-offs.
The Greenway runs through 15 states and roughly 450 communities, and its planning maps are free online at map.greenway.org. The downside is honesty about its state: the off-road trail still has real gaps you’ll ride on roads.
Adventure Cycling’s route is the opposite bargain — it’s finished and tested, but most of it follows low-traffic roads rather than dedicated path. You buy a seven-section waterproof map set (around $17 a section) and get cue sheets, elevation, and where to find water and a bike shop.
| Feature | East Coast Greenway | Atlantic Coast Route (ACA) |
|---|---|---|
| Distance | 3,000 miles (4,828 km) | 2,615 miles (4,208 km) |
| Termini | Calais, ME → Key West, FL | Bar Harbor, ME → Key West, FL |
| Surface | Car-free trail + interim roads | Mostly low-traffic roads |
| Car-free miles | 1,100+ off-road | Limited |
| Navigation | Free maps online | Print/digital map set (~$17/section) |
| Best for | Section riders, families, car-free miles | Self-supported road tourers |
On the Virginia Capital Trail, one of the Greenway’s finished segments, I rode the first 20 miles out of Richmond without passing a single car. That’s the case for the Greenway in a sentence — when it’s done, nothing else compares.
How Long Does It Take to Bike the Full Route?
Most cyclists ride the full route in two to four months, depending on daily mileage. Walkers of the entire East Coast Greenway have taken roughly six months. A comfortable touring pace is 40 to 65 miles (64 to 105 km) a day, with a rest day every five to seven days — enough to actually see the towns and beaches instead of just grinding through them.
Push harder and the numbers shrink fast. Regina Yan holds the fastest-known cycling time on the roughly 3,000-mile Greenway at 29 days, which works out to over 100 miles a day, every day, for a month. That’s a different sport than touring.
Pro Tip: Leave a buffer week. Hurricane remnants, a broken spoke in a town with no bike shop, or a stretch of trail closed for construction will eat days you didn’t plan for.
On my own trip I rode roughly 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. with a long lunch and still averaged about 50 miles a day — proof that a relaxed pace and real mileage aren’t mutually exclusive.
Where Are the Best Car-Free Segments and Trailheads?
The best finished segments are the 52-mile Virginia Capital Trail (Richmond to Williamsburg), the roughly 85-mile Down East Sunrise Trail in Maine, Manhattan’s roughly 13-mile Hudson River Greenway, Connecticut’s 47-mile Farmington Canal Heritage Trail, and Boston’s Charles River path. All are paved or firm-surface and beginner-friendly — except the sandy Down East Sunrise Trail.
Even if you never thru-ride, these are worth a weekend on their own.
Virginia Capital Trail — Richmond to Williamsburg
This is the segment that converts skeptics. It’s flat, fully paved, and runs parallel to historic Route 5, past Great Shiplock Park on the Richmond end and Shirley Plantation in the middle. The surface is smooth enough that families on hybrids and serious roadies share it without friction.
The one catch: shade is patchy in the open farm sections, and Virginia summer humidity is no joke. Ride early.
- Location: Richmond to Williamsburg, VA (parallels Route 5)
- Cost: Free to ride; bike rentals from about $45/day
- Best for: Families, first-time tourers, history stops
- Time needed: One full day one-way, or a relaxed weekend round trip
Pro Tip: Spoke & Art Provisions Co. rents full-day cruisers for around $45 with a helmet included — worth it if you’re flying in and don’t want to box a bike.
Down East Sunrise Trail — Maine’s Sandy Outlier
This one is the exception to the “beginner-friendly” rule. The Down East Sunrise Trail is a former rail bed running through remote Washington and Hancock counties, and its surface stays loose and sandy for long stretches. ATVs share it on summer and fall weekends, so don’t expect quiet solitude every mile.
The sand slows you down more than any hill on the whole coast. It’s beautiful and empty, but it earns the effort.
- Location: Washington and Hancock counties, Maine (east from the Ellsworth area)
- Cost: Free
- Best for: Riders on 2.0-inch-plus tires who want solitude
- Time needed: One to two days for the roughly 85 miles
Hudson River Greenway — Manhattan’s Car-Free Spine
For a car-free ride in the middle of a major city, nothing on the East Coast beats this. The Hudson River Greenway runs about 13 miles up Manhattan’s west side, separated from traffic almost the entire way, with the river on one side and the city on the other.
It’s flat, fast, and genuinely useful — locals commute on it. The friction point is weekend congestion near the southern tourist zone.
- Location: Battery Park to Dyckman Street, Manhattan (about 13 miles)
- Cost: Free
- Best for: Car-free city riding, beginners, commuters
- Time needed: One to two hours end to end
Pro Tip: Start at Pier 25 in Tribeca, not Battery Park, to skip the weekend rental-bike crush at the southern tip.
Two more finished segments are worth a detour if you’re nearby:
- Farmington Canal Heritage Trail (CT): 47 paved miles now, with about 81 miles planned when it’s finished.
- Charles River path (Boston): roughly 13 miles of paved, mostly car-free riding along both banks.
How Much Does an Atlantic Coast Trail Tour Cost?
A self-supported tour runs roughly $20 to $45 per person per day for food and camping. Budget riders who cook their own meals and use Warmshowers hosts can drop to $7 to $10 a day. Add fixed costs on top: Adventure Cycling maps from about $17 a section, a roughly $20 Amtrak bike fee per leg, and campsites from $10 to $40 a night.
Here’s where the money actually goes:
- Food and camping: $20–$45 per day; as low as $7–$10 cooking your own meals plus Warmshowers stays
- ACA map sections: from about $17 each (around $110 for the full seven-section set)
- Amtrak bike fee: about $20 per leg (roughly $40 if your trip connects through two trains)
- Campsites: $10–$40 per night; hiker-biker sites are the cheapest option
- Bahia Honda State Park tent site: around $36 a night plus a small (~$7) reservation fee
A word of warning from experience on that Bahia Honda site: the oceanfront views are magnificent, but there’s almost no shade, and the coral ground is hard enough that a thin sleeping pad won’t cut it. Bring a real air mattress.
When to Go and Is the Atlantic Coast Trail Safe?
Ride the northern half from late spring through fall and the southern half year-round; leaving Maine in late summer drops you into Florida as it cools. Hurricane season runs July through November. The route is safe on finished segments, but interim on-road links — especially US-17 between Charleston and Savannah — are high-stress and best skipped entirely.
Timing the season matters more than people expect. Florida summer highs sit near 90°F (32°C) with brutal humidity, so a north-to-south rider who starts in late summer lands in the Keys during the pleasant months instead of the swamp.
The safety picture is honest but manageable. On the completed off-road segments you’re separated from cars. On the interim links you’re on roads, and some are genuinely bad — the East Coast Greenway Alliance itself strongly advises against riding the high-stress US-17 stretch and recommends taking Amtrak to bypass it.
On US-17 in the South Carolina Lowcountry, the shoulder vanishes for miles with trucks moving fast beside you. After ten minutes of it I understood exactly why the “skip it” advice exists.
Pro Tip: Maryland’s Hatem Bridge allows bikes only on Sundays and state holidays, dawn to dusk. Plan your crossing around that window or you’ll be stuck.
Can You Walk or Run It?
Yes. The East Coast Greenway is a multi-use route open to walkers, runners, and wheelchair users — ultramarathoner Shan Riggs became the first person to run all 3,000 miles. On foot, the full route takes roughly six months, and most walkers stick to finished off-road segments like the Virginia Capital Trail rather than the on-road links.
This is the audience nearly every guide forgets. The completed segments are some of the best long walks in the country, and you don’t need a bike or a two-month leave to enjoy them.
On the Charles River path before 8 a.m., you rarely have to brake or dodge foot traffic — it’s the window when it feels like a runner’s trail rather than a city park.
How Much of the East Coast Greenway Is Finished?
The East Coast Greenway Alliance says about 65% of the route is complete or in advanced development, while roughly 1,100 of 3,000 miles — close to 40% — is actual finished off-road trail. New York leads, with about 62% off-road (around 90% in Manhattan); coastal Georgia trails at just 6%. The gap between “in development” and “ridable car-free” is the number that matters for planning.
This is the most misread statistic on the whole project. “65% complete or in development” sounds almost done. The car-free reality — closer to 40% — means you should plan for real road riding, not a continuous protected path.
For context, more than 120 people have logged the full route as through-travelers, so it is absolutely doable — just not yet as a pure car-free ribbon from Maine to Florida.
The signage gets thin south of DC, so I leaned on the downloaded GPX file rather than painted arrows or trail markers. Don’t count on the route signing itself.
What Bike and Gear Do You Need?
A road bike handles many paved sections, but 32-to-38 mm tires roll better across the Greenway’s stone-dust, gravel, and boardwalk stretches. Maine’s sandy Down East Sunrise Trail needs at least 2.0-inch (51 mm) tires. If you’re carrying full camping gear, a loaded touring bike is steadier and safer than a lightweight road frame.
The surfaces shift constantly — smooth asphalt, then boardwalk, then loose stone-dust within a single day. A tire that’s comfortable on all three beats a fast tire that’s miserable on two of them.
Pro Tip: If you’re buying one tire for the whole route, 38 mm is the sweet spot — fast enough on pavement, forgiving enough on stone-dust.
Gravel with loaded panniers is harder than it looks, especially on the sandy Maine sections. I wore a high-visibility orange vest the entire way, on-road and off — on the interim road links it’s not optional.
Before You Clip In
TL;DR: The Atlantic Coast Trail comes down to two routes — ride the East Coast Greenway for car-free miles you can do in pieces, or Adventure Cycling’s Atlantic Coast Route for a finished, fully mapped 2,615-mile tour. Budget two to four months, skip the US-17 stretch between Charleston and Savannah, and lean on Amtrak for the worst gaps.
Whether you’re planning a full Maine-to-Florida push or just want a car-free weekend on the Virginia Capital Trail, the honest version beats the brochure version every time. Pick the route that matches how much road riding you can stomach, and build in the buffer days.
Which one are you leaning toward — the finished-but-on-road ACA route, or the car-free-but-unfinished Greenway? Tell me your start city and I’ll point you to the best first segment.
