Tammany Trace in Mandeville Louisiana

One of the things we wanted to do while camping at Fontainebleau State Park in Mandeville, LA was to bike part of the Tammany Trace.  Tammany Trace is a rails to trails conversion that runs around 30 miles from Covington to Slidell.









We had previously biked the Tanglefoot Trail in Mississippi so were familiar with the rails to trails concept.  We didn't bike as much of this trail as we did the Tanglefoot, but I really liked the part of the trail we did use.  The Tammany

Trace goes through Fontainebleau State Park, so we started there and biked to the Farmer's Market trailhead in Mandeville. 

One of the things I really liked about this section was that it was mostly shaded. I also liked seeing the colorful and eclectic housing in Mandeville that borders the Trace.  I was surprised to see how many bike trails there are in Mandeville.  I would have to say that Mandeville, LA is the most bike-friendly city I have ever visited.  There were trails all thoughout the older residential section that leads to the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain.



One of the things I noticed on the section that we rode is the 4-way stops at almost all of the intersections with vehicle traffic.  I felt like this made for a safer ride across city streets.  The other thing was that in sections were there is not a cross street, there are markers painted on the asphalt of the tail to let you know what to tell 911 dispatch if you need help so that they can find you.

I noticed, once we were on the trail with Sally Mae, that dogs are not supposed to be on the trail.  We made sure that she stayed in her "chariot" and nobody said anything to us about having a dog on the trail.

It appears that the Tammany Trace gets plenty of use and biking the part that I did makes me wish we had a bike trail closer to where we live.