Missouri Bicycle & Touring Routes

Missouri Bicycle & Touring Routes (including GPS downloads)

This page has cross-state, touring, regional, connector, and local bicycle routes  for all types of cycling--day rides, weekend or multi-day touring, on-road, gravel, mountain bike, and bikepacking--created by MoBikeFed and our partners across Missouri.

Related pages

This is one of a series of pages on MoBikeFed.org designed to help find routes, roads, trails, and places to bicycle in Missouri:

On this page:

About the Missouri Bicycle & Touring Routes & GPS downloads

All routes can be downloaded immediately as GPS files, or simply used as reference maps for planning your own routes and trips.

Routes are typically great rides that also follow historic, cultural, and scenic corridors in Missouri. They include historical, cultural, and practical information about the places you visit, such points of interest, historical background on places & communities, historical maps and photos, and lodging, food, and camping along the route.

Note that most of the routes below are created and maintained by MoBikeFed, its members, and partners.  However a few routes (as noted) are similar style routes created by local or regional groups.

We currently have Released Routes, Beta Quality routes, Draft Quality routes, and Other route candidates. If you would like to help turn out Beta Quality, Draft Quality, and Other route candidates into released routes, please contact us.

Bicycle & Touring Routes

Links will take you directly to the route pages with more info & route links, or in some cases directly to the RideWithGPS page for that route.

  • Released routes
    These routes are ready to ride:

    • Birthplace of the Santa Fe Trail bicycle tour - selected sections totaling over 270 miles released in commemoration of the Santa Fe Trail Centennial in 2021

      • Note that the remaining segments of the Birthplace of the Santa Fe Trail Bicycle Route--over 370 miles--remain in draft stage - they are all excellent first draft ideas for fascinating historic and cultural bicycle tours, but have not yet been thoroughly vetted, checked, and ridden. (If you'd like to volunteer to check out a route or segment, let us know!)
         

    • Butterfield Stage Experience (Jefferson City-Springfield, gravel, 250 miles)

      • Experience an 1850s stagecoach ride through the wilds of rural Missouri - the first segment of a 2500 mile transcontinental ride on the longest stagecoach route ever attempted anywhere in the world, any time in history.

  • Rock Island Trail Connectors, Side Trips,  Loops, and Route Options.  Check out these route options that connect you from airports, Amtrak stations, major cities, and more to the Rock Island Trail, and that explore areas around the trail:

  • Katy Trail Connectors, Side Trips,  Loops, and Route Options. The Katy Trail is great, but it's only ten feet wide--but Missouri's scenery, history, and culture isn't! Check out these route options that take you to great places near, but not on, Missouri's Katy Trail - and that connect you from airports, Amtrak stations, major cities, and more TO the Katy:

    • St Louis to Katy Trail connectors - How do you connect from the Kirkwood Amtrak Station, the Amtrak Station Union Station in downtown St Louis, the St Louis Airport, or major trails in the St Louis are to the Katy Trail? Here is how . . .

    • Lewis & Clark - St Louis Confluence Tour - connect with the eastern end of the Katy Trail and explore the confluence of the Missouri and the Mississippi River from all three sides - while taking a deep dive into Lewis & Clark history, local culture, and some of the best trail routes available.

    • KGTG Loop - a 555 mile loop route combining the eastern end of the Katy Trail State Park, the Great Rivers South Adventure Cycling Association route through southern Missouri and Illinois, Tunnel Hill Trail State Park (Illinois), and the Goshen and Confluence Trails in Madison County IL.

    • Boonville-Rocheport - Katy Trail Side Trip & Route Options - including a beautiful, scenic, low-traffic bypass route for the Katy Trail bridge outage between Rocheport and Boonville

    • Sedalia-Boonville-Jefferson City - Katy Trail Side Trip & Route Options

    • Warrensburg-Rock Island-Katy Connections - Warrensburg is right in the crook of the corner where the Rock Island and Katy Trails meet.  That makes a number of touring routes and loops involving the Katy & Rock Island Trails very attractive.  Warrensburg has an Amtrak station and tons of local history and culture to offer. 

    • Bike MOPAC - Katy's counterpart just south of the Missouri River, BikeMOPAC makes many loop routes and alternate routes with the Katy Trail possible.

    • Katy-Rock Island-Flint Hills Connectors - connect from the west end of the Katy or Rock Island Trail via low traffic/low stress routes to the Flint Hills Nature Trail in Kansas.

  • Local area routes - routes and rides centered on a particular area or city

    • St Louis Katy Trail Connectors & Confluence Tour

    • Ava: Best road rides - Best gravel rides

    • Raytown & western Rock Island Trail terminus: Best area loop routes - Best area connecting routes

    • Jackson County: History & culture tours - Follow the Santa Fe, Oregon, & California Trails, see Civil War battles, Quantrill's Raiders, the James-Younger Gang, Mormon history, Jazz, Harry Truman, Tom Pendergast and more.  Kansas City & Independence area.

    • Boonville area loops and routes - some nice side trips and loops to add to your Katy Trail trip. Or spend a day or a week in the Boonville area, exploring the surrounding countryside - Arrow Rock, Boons Lick, Glasgow in the north, or Tipton and California down Old Boonville Road to the south.

    • Columbia - Best Road & Gravel Rides - Walt's Bike Shop in Columbia has collected some of the best rides and loops in Columbia area, from the Big Tree Loop and Centralia-Moberly Century (paved) to the Long & Short Southern Routes & BOCOMO Fondo route (gravel).

    • Warrensburg Area Rides - Some of the very best bicycle rides, loops, and connecting routes (for example, to the Katy Trail and Rock Island Trail) in the Warrensburg, Missouri, area.

    • Warsaw Area Rides & Routes - The Truman Lake Adventure Club has assembled some of the best road, gravel, and trail cycling routes in the region: Epic 60 on the Butterfield, Lincoln 104, Iconium 20, Pomme de Tour 66, Butterfield Stage Expierence, Truman Lake Mountain Bike Park routes, water trails, & more.

    • Mark Twain National Forest Exploration Tours - explore some of the most scenic, historic, and little-known areas of Missouri's Ozarks and Mark Twain National Forest in this series of regional bicycle touring routes and loops that can be explored in a day or two or up to a week or two. These are all paved, low traffic road routes exploring the areas around Ava, Marshfield, Willow Springs, West Plains, Van Buren, Fredericktown, Farmington, Salem,  Rolla, and Licking

    • Stockton Lake Bicycle Tour Connecting Loops - A loop tour of the Stockton Lake area, connecting Stockton, Stockton Lake State Park, Walnut Grove, Dadeville, Bolivar, and Springfield - and providing connections between the Stockton Lake area and the Frisco Highline Trail, the Butterfield Stage Experience route, the TransAmerica Trail (USBR 76),  Bicycle Route 66 (USBR 66), and forthcoming U.S. Bicycle Route 51.

    • Stockton Lake Local Bicycle Route System - Stockton Lake bicycle touring loops, connecting all major lake-area destinations, campgrounds, and recreational sites. Choose your trip! Anything from a couple of hours to a couple of days to more than a week is possible.

    • Way of American Genius Bicycle Route paralleling Hwy 36 across norther Missouri. This route was created by the Missouri Highway 36 Heritage Alliance and explores the history and culture of northern Missouri, including: Walt Disney, Mark Twain, newscaster Walter Cronkite, retailer JC Penney, WWI General John “Blackjack” Pershing, outlaw Jesse James, the Pony Express and more.

    • Springfield Bicycle Touring Loops - Ozark Greenways has collected some of the most scenic and historic bicycle touring routes in the Springfield area, from a tour of the Frisco Highline Trail & Nathan Boone Homestead, to the Bikes & Battlefields Loop and the SGF Brewery Loop.

  • Beta Quality Routes
    These routes are significantly developed and researched but not polished or ground-checked to the same level as released routes. Some segments may be more polished while others are more in draft state (check each segment for details)

    • Bike MOPAC (St Louis-Sedalia, paved, gravel segments)

      • Follow the adventures and travails of the historic Missouri Pacific railroad route as it tries - and fails - to become the first transcontinental railroad. Fascinating history, fascinating railroad towns, as you see the best of Missouri from the biggest cities to the smallest rural hamlet.

        This route parallels the Missouri River on the south side, making it an excellent complement to the Katy Trail, which is just on the north side of the river.  Many Katy-MOPAC loop routes and side trips from the Katy Trail are possible.
         

    • Katy Trail-Flint Hills Nature Trail connector

      • Let's connect Missouri's biggest trail system with the longest trail in Kansas via trails, gravel roads, and low-traffic paved roads.
         

    • Ozark Trail Mountain Bike/BikePacking Route Network (South-Central & Southeast Missouri, gravel/singletrack)

      • Missouri's great bikepacking adventure!  You can take anything from a day trip to a month-long adventure, in this route system that links mountain-bikeable segments of Missouri's Ozark Trail together via the area's amazing forest roads to make one seamless high-adventure bikepacking route over 280 miles in length - or gives you the option of several amazing, scenic, and historical paved and gravel routes and loops exploring Missouri's remote and beautiful Ozarks.

  • Draft Quality Routes
    These routes have had a degree of development and research, but as a whole need more research and ground-truthing before release:

    • Lewis & Clark Missouri River Adventure (St Louis Arch-Kansas City-Omaha-Sioux City Sgt Floyd Monument, gravel, remote, north/south of river options, over 1000 miles)

      • You have driven the Lewis and Clark auto tour route, and ridden the Lewis and Clark Bicycle Route. But have you really experienced the Missouri River and the Missouri River valley the way Lewis and Clark did?  Have you seen everything they saw and visited every place they visited?

        That is the goal of this ambitious high-adventure cycling route, which as the goal of visiting every Lewis & Clark camp site and historical site, seeing every Missouri River and Missouri River Valley view there is, and experiencing the Missouri River and Lewis & Clark history in a way you have never experienced it before.

        The route plan includes many segments and loop routes, so you experience the river and its history as one mega-trip or many shorter trips.

    • Lewis & Clark St Louis Confluence Tour

      • Explore the rich history of the confluence region--the confluence of America's two biggest rivers, the Mississippi and the Missouri. See the confluence from all three sides!

    • Birthplace of the Santa Fe Trail Bicycle Tour (Boonville-Independence-Lawrence)

      • 270+ miles of this route exploring the history and culture along the old Santa Fe Trail was released in commemoration of the Santa Fe Trail bicentennial in 2021. Another 370+ miles still remain to be carefully vetted and developed.
         

    • Rock Island/Katy/Central Missouri Connectors (gravel)

      • Missouri's 200+ mile Rock Island railroad corridor is being developed into a statewide trail piece by piece over time. Do you want to make the bicycle connection between every Rock Island city and town now, before the trail is complete? Would you like to use a network of Missouri's beautiful, scenic, low-traffic (mostly) gravel roads to make those connections? You can do all that today, using these routes

        Or, would you like to connect from the Katy Trail to the Rock Island Trail or Rock Island communities? Would you like to connect any community in central Missouri to the Katy Trail?  Here is your network of low-traffic, mostly gravel connecting routes that do all of those things.
         

    • Missouri Rock Island Trail Gravel Route

      • Missouri's Rock Island Trail is currently in the planning and development stage.  But did you know you can ride the entire Rock Island route, visit every Rock Island community, and experience the history of the Rock Island Railroad in America's heartland right now?  The Gravel Route is a mostly-gravel, mostly very-low-traffic, amazing scenic and historic route that takes you to every Rock Island community in Missouri. 

        When the Rock Island Trail is complete, these routes will parallel and complement it.

        Check it out.
         

  • Other route candidates
    This are Missouri routes with excellent bicycle touring or bikepacking potential, but which need support from communities or cyclists along the routes to further develop them:

    • Boonslick Trail - this route follows the historic Boonslick Trail from the St Louis area to Boonslick State Historic Site. The trail was used for centuries as a native American trail, then followed and developed into a wagon road by sons of Daniel Boone, who discovered salt springs at Boonslick. This could be developed and promoted as a fascinating historic route--and directly connect from St Louis to the Santa Fe Trail route--if communities along the route have an interest.

    • Missouri Trail of Tears Bicycle Route - this route could follow the National Park Service Trail of Tears National Historic Trail Routes through Missouri and adjoining states, if tribes and organizations with an interest in the historic trail and communities along the routes have an interest in doing so.
       

    • In general, we would like to see every National Historic Trail, every National Heritage Area, and other similarly prominent routes and historical areas be developed into usable bicycle routes.

  • Information about the Routes & How to Use Them

    • What are the routes--what are they like--who are they for--who creates and maintains them

    • Released vs Beta vs Draft Quality routes

    • Do I need RideWithGPS to use these routes?

      • Short answer: It goes best and easiest with the RideWithGPS app - and with MoBikeFed's RideWithGPS Tourism account anyone can use any of our routes with full RideWithGPS app features, including turn-by-turn voice directions, saving routes for offline use, downloading routes for use with various devices, etc.

        • Just download the RideWithGPS app, sign up for a free account, and access the routes via the event pages & route collections linked from our web page.

        • Whether you access the routes online using a web browser or via the RideWithGPS app, you can access advanced features on these routes - just as though you had a paid RideWithGPS account - including:

          • Easy download for any GPS unit in the format of your choice

          • Download/print maps and cue sheets (PDF format)

          • Use the routes with the RideWithGPS app and use all advanced/pay features in the app (on these routes only) including:

            • Voice navigation

            • Download route to use offline/with no connection

      • If you are a MoBikeFed member, access to our RideWithGPS routes is even easier. Just sign up as a "MoBikeFed Club Member" on RideWithGPS (instructions with your membership receipt) and then access any route, event, collection, etc via the RideWithGPS "Organization" tab.

        • MoBikeFed members (who can join MoBikeFed's RideWithGPS club) have full access to all RideWithGPS app features for all of these routes, including turn-by-turn voice navigation, saving routes for offline use, saving routes in various formats for GPS units, and more.
           

        • Saving routes for later use: If you click on the routes above and then (while logged in) "Pin" any routes you are interested in, you will be able to easily find them later.

        • Finding and using our routes in the RideWithGPS app: Once you have joined MoBikeFed's RideWithGPS Club, access our routes, events, and route collections in the RideWithGPS app:

          • Start the app and log in

          • On the bottom menu of the app, tap "MORE"

          • The tap "ORGANIZATIONS"

          • Then tap "MISSOURI BICYCLE & PEDESTRIAN FEDERATION"

          • There you will see our events, routes, and collections

      • If you don't want to deal with either of those options, there are other (free) alternatives as well--outlined in detail on this page

 

 

What are the routes--what are they like--who are they for--who creates and maintains them

The Missouri Bicycle & Pedestrian Federation works with partners all across Missouri to collect and create some of the best bicycle routes in the state.

The routes are available for free download  and can be used with a variety of mobile phone software (including free software options) and GPS bicycle devices.

The routes can be used for:

  • Finding some of the best local rides of any length, particularly if you are unfamiliar with bicycle routes in a certain area
     
  • Making major statewide bicycle route connections, such as from various cities, airports, train stations, etc, to the Katy Trail and Rock Island Trail
     
  • Connecting to major existing bicycle touring routes in and near Missouri, such as U.S. Bicycle Route 76, 66, the American Discovery Trail, the Mississippi River Trail, local and regional trails systems around Missouri, the Great American Rail-Trail
     
  • Planning bicycle touring routes in, around, and through Missouri--whether paved, gravel, trails, bikepacking, or some combination of all, and whether short, medium, or long

Routes are designed to be similar in many ways to Adventure Cycling Association routes--including information about historical, cultural, and scenic points of interest along the way and information needed by touring cyclists, such as where food, lodging, and camping is available.

Many of the routes follow historical trails, routes, rivers, or other routes that are historically, culturally, or scenically important and interesting.
 

 

Creating a world-class bicycle, pedestrian, and trails transportation network across Missouri is one of the four major goals of MoBikeFed's Vision for Bicycling and Walking in Missouri. Creating, promoting, and encouraging the implementation of the statewide trails vision along with major trails like the Katy Trail and Rock Island Trail along with developing and maintaining statewide bicycle touring routes like the Birthplace of the Santa Fe Trail Bicycle Route, Butterfield Stage Experience, and many others--which often create connections between our major trail and existing bicycle route systems--are vitally important parts of that plan.

Your ongoing membership and generous financial support help turn our Vision into reality!

Join MoBikeFed's Advocacy Network

MoBikeFed is a statewide group of people like you, working together for better bicycling, walking, and trails in Missouri. When you join our advocacy network you receive occasional important advocacy alerts and bicycle, pedestrian, and trails news from around Missouri.

Working together we make a real difference! Join our advocacy network: