Newport Ocean Drive

Scenic road chapters

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Narragansett

   Narragansett is where Rhode Island's south coast stops being a drive and starts being a habit. The town sits on a knuckle of land between Narragansett Bay and the open Atlantic, and the ocean here is the real thing: long gray rollers that arrive from Spain with nothing in between. Ocean Road, Route 1A, hugs the shoreline past the seawall, Scarborough Beach and a string of big shingled summer houses, and on a calm morning it is as pleasant a start to a coast ride as New England offers.

   Read the complete Narragansett write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Narragansett is where the day begins. Next is Point Judith.

2. 2. Point Judith

   Point Judith is where Rhode Island sticks its chin into the Atlantic, and the sea knows it. The point marks the western entrance to Narragansett Bay, and a stretch of coast where the swell comes in unbroken from the open ocean and the fog banks arrive without warning. A lighthouse, a stout octagonal tower of brownstone built in the 1850s, stands on the headland, and the ships heading in and out of the bay have steered by it for generations. In the hurricane of 1938, the sea came over the point and destroyed a good deal of the nearby shore.

   Read the complete Point Judith write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Point Judith comes up about 10 km into the recorded legs. Next is Jamestown.

3. 3. Jamestown

   Jamestown is a town on an island in the middle of Narragansett Bay, and the sea defines it. Conanicut Island, nine miles long and a couple wide, lies between Newport and the mainland, and until the 1940s you could only get here by ferry. Today two big bridges carry the traffic across, the Jamestown Bridge to the west and the Claiborne Pell Bridge, a graceful suspension span with a toll, to the east, and the views from them are some of the best in New England, with the bay opening in a field of white sails.

   Read the complete Jamestown write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   At least about 40 km into the recorded legs you reach Jamestown. Next is Ocean Drive.

4. 4. Ocean Drive

   Ocean Drive is ten miles of road along the southern edge of Newport, and the whole way is a performance. It leaves the old town, runs past Fort Adams, one of the largest coastal forts in America, and then loops around Brenton Point and out to the open Atlantic, with the surf breaking on black ledges and the houses of the old rich set well back behind hedges and walls. At Castle Hill, a lighthouse stands above a rocky cove, and on the far side of the neck, the road swings north past the shoreline of Rhode Island Sound.

   Read the complete Ocean Drive write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Ocean Drive, late in the day. Next is Newport.

5. 5. Newport

   Newport lies at the southern tip of Aquidneck Island, in Narragansett Bay, and it is a town built on a double identity. For a century and a half it was a rich colonial port, with a synagogue dating to 1763, the oldest in the country, and a harbour full of ships. Then, in the late nineteenth century, America's richest families chose it for their summer cottages, which were mansions in everything but name. The Breakers, built for the Vanderbilts in the 1890s, has seventy rooms of marble, gilt and carved stone, and several other great houses along Bellevue Avenue are open to the public. It was, by any measure, an extraordinary display of money.

   Read the complete Newport write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Finish at Newport. That is the ride.