Trails in Philly, Brynn Mawr, Haverford, Villanova ?

Haverford College loop is 2.4 miles roughly. Also, lots of trails all throughout Villanova/Gladwynne. Check with the Gladwynne trail Society to see if you can get a map.You can look off of Ithan and Old Gulph. Also off of Lafayette Rd and down by the Phila Country Club. Good luck.

Thank you. As for the Phila Country Club approx how long are the trails there, can you get a good ten miles in without looping a bunch?

try going to Valley Forge Park. Some nice running routes there

Pennypack Park in the northeast is nice. It's a narrow stretch of woods that hugs Pennypack creek as it winds for ~8 miles across NE Philly. Paved bike path on one side plus a few trails on both sides. There are entrances at Frankford Ave., Rhawn St., Bustleton Ave., Veree Rd., and Pine Rd. among others. I recommend starting from the nicer Pine Rd. entrance, which I would also guess is closer to you considering you're looking in the Bryn Mawr area. The problem for you would be dealing with traffic to get there. It's also accessible from Rt. 1/Roosevelt Blvd.

If you're willing/able to drive a bit, there's Tyler State Park in Newtown, and Washington's Crossing State Park in PA/NJ. At Wash. X-ing, there are gravel towpaths on both sides of the river, and a bigger park on the NJ side with very nice trails. Worth the drive 2-3 times a month or so.

Also look into Valley Green, I think in the Conshohocken area. Mostly flat, but a long trail.

if you hit up the back woods of belmont plateau you can run for several miles on dirt...... easily worked into a loop with the east and west( i refuse to call them by their new names, east and west is so simple) river drives via strawberry mansion bridge.....

i'd say daylight only until you really get comfortable with the area ........ great way to break up a boaring river loop though......

floyd the dog wrote:

Also look into Valley Green, I think in the Conshohocken area. Mostly flat, but a long trail.

OP already mentioned Forbidden Dr. The drive itself is great (and flat) but I prefer to run on the hiking/biking trails. There are miles and miles of them, and they're very hilly and rocky in some spots, but I have a blast on them.

believe it or not wrote:

try going to Valley Forge Park. Some nice running routes there

Thank you. Any specific routes off the top of your head? I looked up Valley Forge on the internet and it looks like it's a fairly large area. Again thank you all for your help much appreciated.

needtrails wrote:

believe it or not wrote:

try going to Valley Forge Park. Some nice running routes there

Thank you. Any specific routes off the top of your head? I looked up Valley Forge on the internet and it looks like it's a fairly large area. Again thank you all for your help much appreciated.

As a former Philly resident who goes back to visit family in Wayne, I find VF Park a godsend. I don't remember exact details but if you take Route 252 towards the park from Paoli side you will come to an intersection where you have just entered the park. You can't go straight (one way the other way) and you can follow 252 to the left. Immediately after you turn, go into the parking lot there on your left.

You can then join up with some trails on the hill just above you, cross over 252 back from where you came and find trails over that way too. A lot of the trails are really deer trails but good running.

If you go here:

You'll see the parking lot I mean and if you look off to the left a bit, the dotted line goes towards horseshoe trail. That's all good running in there.

The trail system throughout Gladwynne and Nova is extensive, but not well marked. Mostly horse trails, and alot of them traverse through private property. However, I've never had any problems whatsoever. Certainly 10 miles is doable, as we would run for time mostly and be out anywhere from 1hr to 90 min.

I believe there are some trails within Tyler Arboretum in Lima/Media, off of Rte 352. Rte 1 out of the city(City Ave) will get you out there in about 25 minutes. As stated, there's always Valley Forge. The Haverford College loop is nice though if you don't mind 4 loops for 10 miles. Nova and Haverford teams on there constantly. You'll also run across Carmen Douma, Adrian Blincoe and other notables. Jen Rhines used to run that thing just about everyday when she was in Ardmore.

Get back in the Wissahickon Park but stay off of Forbidden Drive. There are about 30 miles of horsetrails and singletrack in that park and I can easily make a 15 mile loop that not only kicks my butt with hills but never repeats and barely touches Forbidden Drive.

Alos, I used to bike and run Pennypack Park as a kid and there are miles of trails in there as well.

Move to Boulder.