Downtown via Dexter & back via the Cheshiahud Trail

I had to go downtown for a meeting today & decided to take the bike rather than the bus or the car. Odd as it sounds, I've never ridden the bike to downtown Seattle. I had a couple of routes planned, but checked Google's cycle directions to see what they had to say. They confirmed one of my choices—BG Trail to Fremont, across the Fremont bridge & then along Westlake.

I set off on the familiar route to the U-District, then the less familiar but still travelled portion of the BG Trail towards Fremont. Fremont confused me. I knew the trail was going to duck under the bridge, but there were no signs telling me where to veer off the trail to get to the bridge approach. I ended up going underneath the bridge & making my way through office parks & then back to the bridge.

Safely across the bridge I lined up at the light with all the other cyclists, but they took off up the hill on Dexter, not along Westlake. So I followed them till I decided they were going too slowly up the hill—guess they weren't on singlespeeds—and I passed them. After a while I realised where I was again. Dexter's actually a really nice road to ride on.

Once I hit Denny I turned west & made my way down towards the PI building where I was meeting someone. Denny was fun with all the traffic.

Not a bad way to get downtown: about 40 minutes from Wedgwood. I just wish the signage was better.

I decided to take Eastlake on the way home so I made my way up to Dexter and saw a sign for the U-District. Great! Except there were no more signs & I ended up "lost" in South Lake Union.

No problem, I got over towards Fairview & then started up the fairly new Cheshiahud trail. It has these nice signs everywhere.

 Some of them even have a cute little subscript that say "Wheels" or "Heels". Perfect. Until one of the un-annotated signs pointed me down a set of stairs!

The trail is a nice quiet oasis compared to the busy arterial that's Eastlake.

It has nice views of the lake:

Nice smooth mostly flat roads:

 Some hilly bumpy alley cut-throughs (nicely signposted though):

 And some nice pocket parks to rest & enjoy the views:

The trail is a nice place to have a relaxing ride on a cruiser, or take the kids on the trail-a-bike to feed the ducks, but having ridden it I understand why the commuter cyclists go up Eastlake (and Dexter evidently). It's just a little too roundabout and scenic if you just want to get home!

I recommend checking out though. it's just the sort of place that is made for exploring on a bike.