best college campuses to run around and about?

lol.

The University of Wisconsin- Stevens Point! It has the green circle (33 miles of nature trails) that are perfect for running. There are also many other trails that branch off of it. Drivers are also very aware of the amount of runners, bikers, walkers, etc. and are very courteous. Beautiful city with beautiful places to run!

Rome GA

Berry College.. it has a HUGE campus with lots of dirt roads.

I like wisconsin, but too much snow. trails are covered 3-5 months a year.

I was going to say UC Santa Cruz. Tons of runs in the redwoods from there. However, you said you wanted something a little more open. You could actually go about 30 miles down the highway from there and check out CSU Monterey Bay. It is on the old Fort Ord army base. The vegetation is much more open and the landscape is drier. Since it is an old army base, there are tons of dirt roads criss crossing the entire area.

You could probably still purchase or rent a home in Seaside or Marina for not too much money.

The weather is conducive to year round training at both places, but would be more sloppy up by santa cruz. The soil is much sandier down by Monterey

The University of Virginia has a beautiful campus and Charlottesville has a nice downtown area. I have also seen deer quite frequently on the Rivanna trail that is about 300 yards from my apartment and circles the town.

Sac State- right across a pedestrian bridge from a 30 mile running/bike path. there is an adjacent single track horse trail.

on yesterdays run we saw 4 deer, dozens of turkeys, and river otters not to mention the squirrels, ducks, and geese.

you can also drive east and get trails out of auburn.

austin, TX was what I originally had in mind, despite not knowing too much about the place. what is that place like?

Austin is wonderful place to run ... the main running place is around Town Lake (not far from campus) with miles and miles of running loop - this such a great place to meet members of opposite sex ... also from same place you have immediate access to great hill training

The only downside - I remember running in summer around Town Lake in early afternoon when temp was 103 and little shade on north side of lake. Brutal but you learn to deal with it.

Try Amherst, take a looky...

http://www3.amherst.edu/~xcountry/traininglocations.html

ya man wrote:

austin, TX was what I originally had in mind, despite not knowing too much about the place. what is that place like?

Not a lot of deer near campus, but Austin is great for running. Sure it gets hot, but the Town Lake trail is well shaded.

anybody know anything about fayetteville, arkansas or asheville, NC?

Loved running around the lakes while at LSU

Don't know about Ashville, NC but Fayetteville, AR is a great city with a terrific trail system with very challenging terrain for us flat landers from Texas.

After a long deer chase, aint nothin' betta than drinking some tea and bumpin' this jaunt. Know what I'm sayin ya man?

hmmm, I know a good place to run around, but not about

you don't have to go to a big college. you could just run from one ocean all the way to the other ocean, across all of america. then you will see a bit of everything!

anyone run near Florida st.?

SUNY Albany - not sure about the deer, but the campus loop is AWESOME!