If you’re looking for a great run that’s not too far from the city, but feels removed from all the hustle and bustle, here are some trails to try. We picked pathways with unpaved surfaces to be gentler on runners’ knees and legs and routes with few or no road crossings, so you don’t have to break your stride.
Tucked away in the Bronx, the Old Putnam Trail is an unexpected outdoor oasis. The 1.25-mile natural-surface trail traverses heavily wooded Van Cortlandt Park, New York City’s fourth largest park, for a cool, shady run. If you want to go longer, you can pick up numerous other trails within the park, or take the South County Trailway, which begins at the park’s north end and continues on a paved, 14.7-mile
Located south of the Los Angeles International Airport, the Hermosa Valley Greenbelt, which connects two beaches (Manhattan Beach and Redondo Beach), feels like a big-city get-away. The soft-surface trail is surrounded by lush vegetation and flowers and only a quarter-mile inland from the ocean, so it’s easy to cool off after your run.
In the Chicago suburb of Darien, the 9.5-mile loop trail in the Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve features glacier-carved rock ridges, ravines, and forest interspersed with prairie and grassland.
Within reach of two major cities—Philadelphia and Trenton—the Delaware Canal Towpath offers a great escape from urban life. Spanning 60 miles, the trail is flat and picturesque with views of the canal itself, quiet woodlands, and historical structures.
Beginning south of Bellevue, across Lake Washington from Seattle, you’ll never feel that the city is so close at hand. At just under 4 miles, the soft-mulch route is enveloped in trees. Along the way, you’ll have interesting visual finds, like a locomotive turntable, coal car axles, and lots of wildflowers.
The Sand Creek Regional Greenway connects Denver’s northwestern neighborhoods and Aurora with a crushed-stone pathway. A paved portion of the trail continues into Commerce City, but if you stick to the unpaved portion, you’ll still have plenty to see. The route even has two nature centers to learn more about the local wildlife: Bluff Lake Nature Center in Stapleton and the Morrison Nature Center in Aurora.
C&O Canal Towpath is an incredible asset, beginning in the nation’s capital and expending northwest into Maryland along the Potomac River for a whopping 184.5 miles. This is one run on which you won’t be bored: Hundreds of original features, including locks, lock houses, aqueducts and other canal structures can be seen all along the way.
Barton Creek Greenbelt is one of Austin’s most popular trails, which runs for nearly 8 miles through Barton Creek Wilderness Park southwest of the city. The trail, flanked in places with rock walls, follows the course of its namesake creek through lush greenery. At the east end, Zilker Park features dinosaurs hiding among the botanical gardens!
Located on the eastern outskirts of Savannah, the McQueen’s Island Trail offers a salt-air excursion of nearly 6 miles. Paralleling the South Channel of the Savannah River, you’ll see saltwater marshes and coastal cedars, and have a good chance at spotting native wildlife, including the eastern box turtle, American alligator,
Beginning in Cleveland’s Scranton Flats this 81-mile trail continues along a historic canal all the way to Bolivar. A highlight of the journey is
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