Biking Paths and bike rental options for OOS visitors (Minneapolis: rentals, university)

[jben]

We are coming to Minneapolis in a few weeks to visit our daughter who lives near the University East bank campus.

We would like to plan one or two outings to take advantage of the biking in the Metro area. So I'd like some recommendations on places to spend an hour or two of casual biking. Maybe 8 to 10 miles each outing would be enough. I know those three lakes looked pretty nice (Calhoun, Isle, Harriet). Which one is the must do?

How about another two or three other options for enjoyable bike rides in the Metro?

Also, tell me where I should go to rent a bike for this type of activity since we will not have room to bring our bikes with us as we are driving across country? We will probably need 2 or 3 womens bikes - like comfort or hybrid style (not road bikes).

[rzzz]

I would just use Nice Ride. There are stations all over the metro.

https://www.niceridemn.org

Then I would ride around all of Calhoun, Isles and Harriet. The total distance is about 8.5 miles.
If you were to skip one of the lakes, I'd skip Isles.

Another good ride would be the corner of West River Parkway and Marshall to Minnehaha Falls and back, or you could just rent at Minnehaha Falls and cruise around.

Another ride could be, rent at St. Anthony Main, ride across the Stone Arch Bridge, ride down the river path to Northern Pacific Bridge Number 9, ride across the river back to the U of MN campus, then ride back over to St. Anthony Main. The downside here is that it's a very steep climb to get to Bridge #9 as it's a river / bluff situation.

The Stone Arch Bridge area is nice to walk around, too, if it doesn't seem like the right place to cycle.

If you don't want to use Nice Ride (it's a bit pricey) there are bike rentals on Lake Street near Lake Calhoun as well as at Minnehaha Falls.

I ride from St. Anthony Main area all the way down the river to the greenway, then over to the lake paths and around them two or three times a week for exercise. If you wanted to do one big tour you could do something like that, too.

[Mdcastle]

Minnehaha Park to Lake Harriet and back is a nice ride too.

[mkwensky]

Does anyone know any bike shop near Lake Calhoun that rents bikes with toddler seats? It doesn't look like Wheel Fun Rentals have those. Thanks.

[katmu]

Originally Posted by mkwensky

Does anyone know any bike shop near Lake Calhoun that rents bikes with toddler seats? It doesn't look like Wheel Fun Rentals have those. Thanks.

Most places I'm finding that do rentals only seem to have the child trailers if those would work.

Both Freewheel Bike and MinneapolisByBike have child trailers available for rentals:

https://www.freewheelbike.com/about/...tals-pg647.htm

Minneapolis By Bike | Minneapolis Guided Bike Tours – Bicycle Rentals

[Izzie1213]

https://www.hennepin.us/bikeplan
Hennepin county regional bike trails