The pavement around the lake was in good condition. A section was thru city streets but marked. In the south east is Mable Wood Park, on a huge wooded hill for hiking.

The trail is very nice - lots of variety of scenery. In town, neighborhoods, but also parks, prairie, river, ponds, and woods. There’s also lots of little fun detours. Makes for a nice leisurely ride. The trail is not marked particularly well, but it is t as bad as the other reviewer indicates. We used this app to stay on course (or get back on course if we Took a detour).

The path wasn’t always super well marked, but it’s not as bad as the other reviewer said. This app was VERY helpful in guiding us. Some in town, neighborhoods, prairie, woods, ponds, river - and lots of little detours to take advantage of. A very nice leisurely ride.

I fairly level ride along the river. Can be a bit on the busy side, especially on the northern end, but still worthwhile. Some stops along the way for water and for scenic overlooks.

I am not sure what they are doing with everyone's $5 as both trail heads were a very rough ride. The trail is mostly flat and straight which gets quite boring. Our ride was less than 700ft of elevation for a 50+ mile ride if you go down the Hayward trail as well (which was smoother than the CVT).
The trail was very busy to the point of being a nuisance.

Pros would be a view of the river, few road crossing and the trail is sheltered/shaded for 95% of the ride.

I will not do this ride again, there are too many better rides out there.

Rode from Hay Creek Campground along riverbank and horse trail. In good condition and a fun pig tail under Pioneer Road.

The whole thing is a circle, so getting back is easy

I rode this trail as it branched off of the Cannon Valley Trail going into Cannon Falls. The first segment looks like an ancient city trail that is very narrow with rough pavement. After a mile or so it sends you into a little park on dirt, down a hill then back up on gravel. I bypass this by going through the parking lot and then the road where the new segment starts which has smooth pavement and a few hills with an underpass under Hwy 52 and a view of the Cannon River.

This leads to a nice park/campground--Lake Byllesby. It has recently been re-modeled. There are a few old sites along the lake that have shade & grass. The rest of the new sites (over 60 of them) have no shade or grass, just an asphalt pad, some gravel, electricity and a grill or fire pit. It has very nice bathroom facilities. The swimming beach was closed when I was here in late July, although you can swim on the Goodhue side of the park.

As far as the rest of the trail goes there are some huge gaps once you're done with Northfield and Cannon Falls. Some day when it's all connected it will be worth the extra effort.

This is a nice, pleasant trail but is in need of TLC. Lots of ruts & broken cracked pavement. There are several very nice new bridges west of Welch into Cannon Falls which also have new pavement nearby. It's mostly uphill towards Cannon, so if the wind isn't opposing you it will be almost a coast back to Welch.

The trail fee at least keeps up basic maintenance such as mowing, blowing, cutting fallen branches, etc. The trail head at Welch could definatly use some upgrades such as the rest rooms which probably go back 30-40 years. The water is awful but there probably isn't much that can be done about that. The cell coverage is very poor at Welch but improves at both ends.

As far as any amenities along the way, there isn't much--bring your own water & snacks. Much better choices are available if you ride into Red Wing which also has some scenic trails along the Mississippi River.