For the 1,800 bicyclists who used to travel to southern Minnesota every October to ride the Mankato River Ramble, memories of the picturesque ride endure:
- Stunning fall colors along the off-road wooded trails.
- A 40-foot waterfall and energy-boosting homemade snacks (peanut butter-oat balls, bumps on a log) at the Minneopa State Park rest stop.
- A warm small-town spirit, whatever the fall temps might bring.
- Best of all, flaky-crust pie from the Rapidan Dam Store (which has reopened in downtown Mankato after a flood demolished the rural location in 2024).
Sadly, hundreds of bicyclists rode their last Mankato River Ramble on October 8, 2023.
Owned by Saint Paul Classic Bike Tour founder Richard Arey, the Ramble was an annual fundraiser for the Bicycle Alliance of Minnesota (BikeMN) and managed in partnership with Greater Mankato Bike and Walk Advocates (GMBWA), one of 13 BikeMN chapters. Late in 2023, Arey parted ways with the Bicycle Alliance, leaving the cycling advocates in Mankato to construct a new event.
“We were really bummed out,” says GMBWA President Ben Scheidel. “We didn’t want it to go away.”
Two years later, the previous ride will be replaced by a weekend-long two-wheel celebration on September 27 and 28 featuring all manner of cycling: road, gravel, bike polo, cyclo-cross, BMX, mountain bike and e-bike. The hope is to inspire visitors to spend the weekend — and discover the small city’s cycling amenities.
“We wanted more of a festival atmosphere,” says Chris Corley, a board member and past president of GMBWA. “Wouldn’t it be nice if people decided to come a day early? Or had something to do when they got back from their ride?”
Weekend activities are anchored at Mount Kato south of town, a year-round hub for skiing, snowboarding, tubing and mountain biking.
Two Ride Types, Four Routes
Although the sunset mountain bike ride and evening bonfire on Saturday night — among the many activities that GMBWA is planning — sound enticing, the crucial part of the weekend for BikeMN is the four rides. With adult ride registration priced at $43 ($5 more on the day of the ride) and a “student ride” fee of $22 for ages 18 to 22, BikeMN is looking to recoup some of what it lost with the demise of the River Ramble.
Operations & Supporter Relations Manager Ted Duepner provides enticing details of the four Sunday rides, which include two gravel routes (new since the River Ramble) and two road routes.
Those include:
- The 12.4-mile (paved) Minneopa Loop is a mostly traffic-free trail ride to Minneopa State Park, a wooded step back in time with a WPA–era (Works Progress Administration) historic stone-and-timber shelter. Rest Stops include Sibley Park hosted by Key City Bike at mile 4 and Minneopa State Park at mile 8.5.
- The 37.2-mile (paved) Mankato Loop takes you on the scenic route through this Minnesota River Valley town (where the Blue Earth and Minnesota rivers converge), covering many area trails. Rest stops include the two listed for the 12.4-mile route, plus Kato BMX Park at mile 20.5 and Javens Family Vineyard & Winery at mile 28.9. Organizers will even transport bottles of wine that riders purchase back to Mount Kato!
- The 11.4-mile (gravel) Red Jacket Gravel Loop is a great way to dip into gravel riding. Expect a mixture of trails and gravel roads with a fun, challenging climb midway through the ride. No official rest stops other than the start/finish at Mount Kato.
- The 38.7-mile (gravel) Good Thunder Loop takes riders south to, you guessed it, the town of Good Thunder for some great gravel grinding, climbs and descents. The one rest stop at the Red Iron Mercantile and the minimal route marking make this an option for more adventurous riders.
The former Rapidan Dam rest stop — featuring a bluegrass band and the popular pie — is unavailable due to the catastrophic June 2024 flood. “We can’t use the same route. The bridge is out,” GMBWA’s Corley explains. “So, we’re bringing the pie to Mount Kato instead of riders going to the pie.
“Mount Kato will be selling beverages,” he says. “You can get something to eat and watch a sporting event you might never have seen before [the Kato Cross cyclocross race]. We want to create that sense of community.”
Bike-Friendly Communities
The seat of Blue Earth County, Mankato has a population of 46,500 (a 14% increase since 2010) and boasts a thriving campus of the Minnesota State University system. Greater Mankato encompasses the adjoining North Mankato in Nicollet County (population 14,100), as well as small surrounding communities such as St. Peter and Madison Lake — which the Sakatah Singing Hills State Trail passes through en route from Faribault to Mankato.
The area’s growth and robust economy (“people come from northern Iowa to shop,” Corley says) means that bike infrastructure — from on-street lanes to off-road trails — is gaining more support for both recreational and utility cyclists.
A coming upgrade of Highway 22, the scenic alternative to U.S. 169 from St. Peter to Mankato, will include a protected bike trail that connects to the Sakatah Trail. As with the Summit and Cleveland Avenue projects in the Twin Cities, loss of trees has become a point of contention, says Scheidel, the Greater Mankato Bike and Walk Advocates president.
“People are blaming it on the bike trail. I feel like they roll their eyes when they see us coming,” he says. “But regardless, widening the road or improvements would be needed. They would have taken the trees down anyway.”
Other advocacy projects on GMBWA’s website include a neighborhood safety proposal and a request for traffic lights with leading pedestrian interval (LPI), which gives walkers a head start of 3 to 7 seconds before vehicular traffic gets a green light.
Those initiatives will benefit the Kato Bike Fall Fest in years to come, as Greater Mankato — already recognized as a Bicycle-Friendly Community by the League of American Bicyclists — enhances its reputation as a hub for bicycling. “We have all these communities within the Mankato biking community,” explains GMBWA secretary Becky (Davis) Brooks, a novelist and retired English professor. “We want to showcase the variety of biking options in the area.”
The September timeframe will make for more predictable weather than the October River Ramble could promise, Brooks says, and she hopes the Saturday activities — including a 5K “wellness walk,” mountain biking demonstrations courtesy of Mankato Area Mountain Bikers and an evening bonfire at Mount Kato — will inspire hundreds of riders and former River Ramblers to discover Mankato anew.
Learn more and register at bikemn.org/kbff.
River Ramble photos, route map and logo courtesy of the Bicycle Alliance of Minnesota.