We pedal one-way out to Montauk, NY. That means that no matter which route you choose, at the end of the ride you are going to be in Montauk, and you have several delicious choices: Move to Montauk for the rest of your life. (Not a bad idea...) Get picked up by a friend. Sign up for our transportation home for your bike and you. This costs extra. The price of the OPTIONAL return transportation includes transportation for your bike AND for you. WARNING! ACCORDING TO THE LONG ISLAND RAIL ROAD, NO BIKES ARE ALLOWED ON THE MANHATTAN/BABYLON/MONTAUK TRAIN LINE ON RIDE WEEKEND -- SATURDAY OR SUNDAY. This is why we offer optional return transport for our bike and you. This ride could not exist without our friends from the LIRR -- we are gratful for what we can do and understand what we can’t do. If You Are Getting Home on Your Own Thanks for coming along! Enjoy a free hot shower, free massage, free Blue Point Brewery beer, and free all-you-can-eat post-ride meal, then leave whenever you are ready. (Of course, if you drink a LOT of delicious Blue Point Brewery beer you’re an idiot to drive, right? Right!) If you are getting picked up by a friend, click here for driving and parking information. The rest of this page is only for those who are taking our optional transportation home from Montauk. If You Are Taking Our Optional Transportation Home If you are staying overnight in Montauk Saturday night and want transportation home on Sunday, skip all of this stuff and go straight to the bottom of this page for information. Everyone else, read on! New for 2010! You can pick up your bike in Babylon or Manhattan immediately after the ride on Saturday per usual OR Pick-up your bike on Sunday (the day after the ride) in Babylon or Manhattan any time between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. -- your choice. What’s the difference between Saturday bike pick-up and Sunday bike pick-up?  Do I need to sign up for return transportation in advance? YES. Return transportation does sell out. If you don’t sign up for it in advance, you might be stuck in Montauk overnight. You can sign up for return transportation during on-line registration for the ride. I already registered and said that I did NOT want return transportation, but now I want it after all. No problem-o! If you already registered for the ride with no return transportation, and decide later that you want it after all, not to worry! Just drop us an email by clicking here. If I can’t bring my bike on the train going home, how is my bike traveling? I don’t get it. We have our own private trucks. Your bike goes in the truck; you take the train, charter bus, or van. You meet up with your bike in Manhattan or Babylon -- your choice. You can decide right at the finish line which destination is best for you. What time are the trips headed home from Montauk? 12:30 p.m. 1:30 p.m. 2:30 p.m. 3:30 p.m. 5:30 p.m. 7:30 p.m. These are estimated times -- actual times will be posted on ride day. ALL cyclists will be at the finish line no later than 6:00 p.m. (either by pedaling or by being driven there by our S.A.G. bike rescue team) so you’ll have plenty of time to catch the last trip home. Which trip home will I be on? 1:30 p.m.? 5:30 p.m.? Who knows which trip home you’ll be on? It depends on when you get to Montauk, and that depends on how fast you can pedal a bicycle! As soon as you arrive at the finish line, check in at our transportation desk and make a reservation -- we’ll do our best to get you on the trip of your choice. Please understand that even if you have pre-paid for return transportation, each scheduled trip home can sell out! Huh? What’s that mean? Here’s the dirt. Read carefully: Just as an example, let’s pretend that for the 2:30 p.m. run home we have two charter buses available. Those two buses hold about 108 people total. If 108 people or fewer want to leave at 2:30 p.m., no problem -- you’re on your way! Hey, even if only one person wants to leave at 2:30 p.m., we’ll depart on schedule. (We’ll probably put that one person in one of our lovely vans instead of all alone in a 54-passenger bus, but we WILL leave on time!) HOWEVER... suppose that 109 people want to leave at 2:30 p.m. -- one more person than we have room for on those buses. That 109th person will have to wait for the next trip. We just can’t afford to send out a THIRD vehicle with only one person on it. (Remember those old ads for the NYC to DC shuttle flights where they promised to add another jet if the flight was full, even for just one additional passenger? Yeah... we can’t afford that). If you miss a trip home, there’s another one right behind it! Relax, have a free Blue Point Brewery beer, and enjoy a beautiful day in Montauk. Where Does the Return Transportation Leave From? Right from our Montauk finish line. Our finish line at the Old Harbor House restaurant is just 150 feet from the train station. You can relax right until departure time. After I Get to the Montauk Finish Line, What Should I Do? Before you do ANYTHING else, give your bike to one of our staff members, who will carefully put it in one of our bike trucks. It doesn’t matter what time you decide to go home -- get your bike on the truck ASAP! The sooner we have your bike, the less time you’ll have to wait to pick it up in Manhattan or Babylon. Where Do the Trains, Vans, and Charter Buses Go? Whether you head home on a train, charter bus, or van, we offer return transportation to two locations ONLY -- Penn Station in Manhattan and the Babylon LIRR station. This means that you can NOT park in the middle of the route and get a lift back there after the ride. Where do I pick up my bike when I get home? Babylon -- The Babylon train station. Manhattan -- 10th Avenue between W. 31st Street and W. 32nd Street. NOTE: This is NOT where the Manhattan start line was located -- it’s two blocks away. Why? Well, first because it’s fun to fool everyone when they’re tired, but more to the point, our Manhattan start line at Penn Station is deserted when we’re there at 5 a.m., but by the time we get home from Montauk that corner is a traffic nightmare. Better to move just two blocks away so we can unload the bikes swiftly and safely. WHEN can I pick up my bike? If You Are Picking Up Your Bike on SATURDAY Your bike will be available in Manhattan or Babylon right after the ride. If your gave us your bike at the Montauk finish line early, your bike will be waiting for you when you arrive, guarded by our staff. If you weren’t able to give us your bike until later that’s OK, but you may have to wait a few minutes for your bike. NOTE: we can NOT hold your bike for you later than 9:45 p.m. in Babylon or 10:30 p.m. in Manhattan -- you must pick it up right away after the ride. (These are the times that our last transportation home from Montauk arrives. If you are on that last run, not to worry -- we know that you’re on the way, and we’ll wait for you.) If You Are Picking Up Your Bike on SUNDAY Your bike will be available in Manhattan or Babylon any time between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m What if I miss the bike pick up Saturday? If you miss the Saturday pick up, you can get your bike on Sunday (the next day) in the same locations between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. What if I miss the Sunday pick up too? You are totally screwed. This presents some interesting challenges! If you miss the Sunday pick up too, your bike will be taken back to our headquarters, located a convenient 10,000 miles from where you live, and it will be up to you to retrieve it -- we can not deliver it. Contact us after the ride for painful details. Will My Bike Be Safe in Your Truck? Yes. We are cyclists too and we all own expensive bikes. We do our absolute best to handle every single bike VERY carefully. I spent $40,000 on custom-made racks to carry the bikes safely -- no one else does this. I’ll never recoup that investment, but I think it was the right thing to do. READ THIS! We are gentle with all of the bikes, but even under the best circumstances, nicks, dents, and scratches can and do happen. In other words, if you see one of our staff jumping up and down on your bike, we promise to kill them, and we will pay for damage to your bike. But if your bike gets scratched, nicked, or dented accidently during shipping, we are not responsible, and we can not reimburse you. This may be the wrong day to bring your one-of-a-kind, Dura Ace 25th Anniversary Edition, custom-painted-by-Ernesto Colnago-himself-bicycle. We are loving and caring, but you have been warned. (Hey, reminds me of my old girlfriend from college! One time she... never mind.) I have a monthly LIRR pass. Can I use it to get home from Montauk on ride day? On Saturday you can NOT use your LIRR monthly pass, and you can NOT buy a ticket at the train station ticket window in Montauk on ride day. This is LIRR policy, and we support that policy. If you are headed home on Sunday your bike will travel in our truck, and you can use your LIRR pass if you have one, or you can buy a regular return ticket when you depart Montauk. I Want to Stay in Montauk Saturday night. How do I get my bike home? During on-line registration it will ask you if you want transportation home on Saturday or Sunday. Be sure to pick Sunday. On Sunday meet at the Montauk LIRR station at 2:30 p.m. At that time we will load your bike in our truck and you will buy your own ticket and hop on the train. Vital! Urgent! Read this carefully! -- If on Sunday afternoon you load your bike in our truck, you get to take a relaxing train trip home while the bike truck will be wrassling with the usual insane traffic jam that occurs every Sunday in the summer as people head home from the Hamptons. That means that for those of you taking the train to Babylon, we will probably arrive there with the bikes close to the same time that you do. We could arrive up to 45 minutes after you do, due to the traffic. But if you are taking the train to Manhattan, we will be late. Figure AT LEAST an extra one to two hours after you arrive at Penn Station before we show up. (This is exactly the reason we are hesitant to offer this Sunday service, but what the hell...) That means that you should plan on arriving at Penn Station via train and then going to get dinner and MANY drinks while you wait for us to show up. We’ll give you a cell phone number you can call to check on our stuck-in-traffic progress, but the first person who calls to complain about how long this is taking while they are sipping a margarita and we are stuck in a smelly truck in bumper-to-bumper traffic is in way big trouble. You MUST be at Penn Station when we arrive. If you are not there, we will have no choice but to take your bike back to our world headquarters, located a convenient 10,000 miles from where you are now, and it will be up to you to arrange pick up -- we can not deliver it for you. • • • Click here to go to the next page, or use the navigation menu at the top of your screen. Glen Your tour director and humble servant glen @ ridetomontauk.com Not ready to sign up yet, but want to be added to our bike ride mailing list? Just click here. 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Getting Home

Photo By Catherine Van Dyke

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