Mar 28 2014

Trailsnet Website & Social Media Statistics

Trailsnet Website Information

Trail website information

Trailsnet Analytics

2013 was a great year for Trailsnet.com with July 2013 being the busiest month since our 2009 introduction. Our subscriber numbers are looking great, website visits remained steady and our social media is on a slow but steady path. This past month has been a great one for blog subscribers, and we just went over the 200 mark with 204 blog subscribers as of today. According to Google Analytics, since our inception we’ve had:

  • 143,090 page visits
  • 123,857 unique visitors
  • 224,822 page views

Trailsnet Social Media

Trailsnet on Twitter is doing just fine with 3,841 Followers and lots of retweets. For our needs, Twitter is by far the best social media outlet and seems to generate pretty decent traffic to the Trailsnet.com website. It’s also a great way to announce new trail-listings and blog posts. Trailsnet will start using Hootsuite in 2014 to increase our social media presence in general and our Twitter activity specifically.

Trailsnet is also doing fine on Facebook even though it is not one of our areas of focus. Trailsnet has 353 likes on Facebook and is often mentioned as a “Page to Watch” by other Facebook users. One of the Trailsnet goals for 2014 is to expand our Facebook presence by making posts on a more regular basis.

Trailsnet is also represented on Pinterest and Google+, but these are not major outlets for us. Hopefully that will gradually change starting in 2014.

Permanent link to this article: https://trailsnet.com/2014/03/28/trailsnet-website-social-media-statistics/

Mar 27 2014

C & O Canal Trail Bike Trips

C & O Canal Trust

The C & O Canal Trust is an official non-profit partner of the C & O Canal Historic Park in Maryland. A group of nine towns located along the C & O Canal Towpath Trail have collaborated to offer bike tours and fund-raisers to promote biking along the famous Cumberland and Ohio Canal. They have also teamed up with Wilderness Voyageurs, an active travel tour company, to promote the trail, encourage bicycle tourism for the towns along the trail and to raise funds to promote the trail and the communities along the trail.

Bike Trail Tourism

This effort by the C & O Canal Trust is a great example of communities uniting to promote trail tourism in their area. The benefits of active travel tourism are great and include:

  • improved tourism
  • economic benefits to local communities
  • environmentally friendly travel
  • historical awareness
  • healthy travel options
  • greater connections between locals and tourists
  • affordable tourism for people of all incomes

Permanent link to this article: https://trailsnet.com/2014/03/27/bike-trail-tourism/

Mar 21 2014

Arthur Frommer Would Love Trailsnet

Arthur Frommer Promotes Inexpensive Travel

Since the mid-1950s, Arthur Frommer has been the champion of inexpensive travel and, for that, he’s my hero. His original travel guides touted Europe on $5 per day. He had to raise the daily rate over the years, but he has always introduced us to inexpensive vacations and affordable travel. Mr. Frommer gives four sage bits of travel wisdom that are shared below. Each of these travel tips would work easily well with the Trailsnet trail travel philosophy:

bike tours

bike trail travel

Don’t Be a Stupid Traveler

Arthur Frommer believes in traveling inexpensively but also safely. He would love trail travel. By avoiding dangerous highways and roads, trail travel is much safer than touring on road bikes. No traffic, no dangerous vehicles, no highway fatalities. It’s as simple as that. Trail travel is safe travel!!

See More Than the Sights

Frommer recommends seeing more than just the hyped tourist attractions like the Roman Coliseum, the Eiffel Tower & Big Ben. He advises travelers to take the path less traveled, stay at bed & breakfasts & interact with locals. Trail travel allows you the opportunity to travel off the beaten path and see sites that so many others miss. It’s less expensive & way more fun.

Travel in Small Groups

Avoid the busloads of tourists. Instead, join a small-group bike tour along the Danube River, the C & O Canal or the Silver Comet Trail. Travel in groups of under a dozen. Better yet, travel with a partner. Trail travel even allows you to comfortably travel solo. And don’t forget that in many places throughout the world, electric bikes are allowed on trails, so you don’t have to be a bike racer to enjoy bike trail travel.

Look for Bargains

Arthur Frommer recommends destinations such as Bali, Bulgaria and El Salvador for cheap destinations. When it comes to trail travel, you’re not limited to just a few inexpensive places. All trail travel, no matter what country you’re in, is an inexpensive way to get around and see the countryside. Even during peak seasons such as autumn leaf viewing, international festivals and summer hot spots are much less expensive when viewed via a bike trail or foot path.

Permanent link to this article: https://trailsnet.com/2014/03/21/inexpensive-travel-on-trails/

Mar 19 2014

Trails Promote Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness

Trails Embody the Spirit of the Declaration of Independence

No other institution better promotes life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness like trails. They promote life because of the great exercise they provide. Trails are the ultimate gymnasium providing safe and healthy exercise as well as fresh air and sunshine. And this is just one aspect of the importance of trails.

Trails Provide Liberty

forest trail

trail tranquility

According to an online dictionary, liberty is “the state of being free within society from oppressive restrictions imposed by authority on one’s way of life, behavior…” This is a pretty good definition of trails, too. Oh sure, trails have certain restrictions, but they are neither oppressive nor omnipresent as they are elsewhere. One can enjoy the freedom of trails without constant interruptions of stoplights, stop signs, congestion and societal restraints. Trail users are truly free in spirit and soul. More than anywhere else on this planet, trails provide peace, tranquility and…

Happiness on Trails

As any great philosopher knows, true happiness comes from within. And to have this true happiness and tranquility, one must be able to escape the rigors of daily life and commune with nature. If you don’t believe me, ask any of the great philosophers, poets and scholars. And where do you find nature and tranquility? Wilderness areas, open spaces and parks. And how do you get to and through these great bastions of freedom and relaxation? On trails, of course. Trails link us, unite us and free us. For years, mankind has built roads to escape the wilderness. Now we must build trails to find the wilderness… and to find peace and harmony both within ourselves and in the greater world.

Permanent link to this article: https://trailsnet.com/2014/03/19/the-importance-of-trails/

Feb 08 2014

Trail Tours and Trail Travel

What are Trail Tours?

trail tours & bike tours

trail travelers

You’re probably familiar with the typical adventure travel model that involves riding bikes on roads, streets & byways. It is a very popular travel option for travelers who are bicycle enthusiasts but is quite different than trail tours. It offers exercise and camaraderie as well as a unique way to explore different regions or countries. But traditional adventure bike tours also has their disadvantages:

  • It’s not very safe. As newspaper headlines often prove, automobiles & bicycles do no work well together.
  • It often involves a frantic pace. Although riders are free to stop wherever they want, many roadsides aren’t conducive to site-seeing due to narrow shoulders and/or speeding traffic.
  • Road biking presents numerous less-than-pleasant distractions including pollution, noise & unattractive views.

Advantages of Trail Biking

The next section of this blog-post will provide you with information about the types of trails most often used in trail touring. But first, let’s look at the advantages of trail bike touring:

  • safety –  Because you aren’t sharing the road with hulking, speeding vehicles, you are much safer riding on trails.
  • serenity – Without the noisy background sounds of traffic, trails are much more peaceful than roads.
  • scenery – Trails often provide a much more scenic backdrop than roads.
  • less crowded – Since the majority of people have not yet discovered the joys of trail-travel, you are much more likely to enjoy a more peaceful and less crowded biking experience.
  • history – Most long-distance trails are built on former railroad grades, canal towpaths, historic footpaths or converted roadways. As a result, they are often dotted with historical gems along the way, including scenic villages, converted rail stations, historical waysides & unique museums.
  • family friendly – Because of all the reasons listed above, trail tours are much better for families, couples, retirees and most other demographic groups.

Types of Trails Conducive to Trail Tours & Trail Travel

Most people are unfamiliar with “destination trails.” Destination trails are those that are worthwhile for planning a vacation around and are most often the type used in trail travel and trail tours. Here are some examples of destination trails with brief explanations or definitions:

Trail Tour Companies

At present, only one bicycle tour company specializes in trail tours. Active Travel Tours offers trail tours as part of their hosted tour program. Most bike tour companies offer guided tours that are mainly limited to road biking. That will probably change soon as trail biking becomes more and more popular. Both trail tours and hosted tours are recent innovations in the travel industry, but it is likely that they will gain momentum and become a rising trend.

Permanent link to this article: https://trailsnet.com/2014/02/08/trail-tours-trail-travel/

Jan 09 2014

Top Trail Articles for Trailsnet.com

Ammonoosuc Rail Trail Rates in Top 3 on Internet

New Hampshire's Ammonoosuc Rail Trail

Covered Bridge Near Ammonoosuc Rail Trail

Ranking high in the search engines is difficult; and, believe it or not, trails are one of the more competitive search terms when it comes to SEO ranking. (Search Engine Optimization) Let’s face it, there are a lot of great trail websites out there: Traillink, Everytrail, Trails.com… Don’t forget all the trail websites run by government entities such as the Forest Service, BLM, various National Parks, state trails, county trails, community trails and so on. So I’m quite pleased to have one of Trailsnet’s major destination trail descriptions, the Ammonoosuc Rail Trail in New Hampshire, ranked in the top five in the search results on Google and many other search engines.

Colorado's Glenwood Canyon Trail

Glenwood Canyon Trailhead

Colorado’s Glenwood Canyon Trail Ranks in Top Ten

Trailsnet’s Glenwood Canyon Trail near Glenwood Springs, Colorado ranks among the top 8 in search engine returns. This is especially significant considering how popular the Glenwood Canyon Trail is among bikers in Colorado and throughout the nation. Since Glenwood Springs is such a famous recreation destination, its premier bike trail is a big deal.

Permanent link to this article: https://trailsnet.com/2014/01/09/top-trail-articles-trailsnet-com/