All Aboard! Rail Explorers Opens for Fifth Season of Excursions

By BILL BELLEN
MILFORD

During the warmer months of the year, the sight of red pedaling bikes traversing the rails between Milford and Cooperstown has become a familiar sight for locals. Since 2021, Rail Explorers Cooperstown has operated out of the Cooperstown and Charlotte Valley Railroad’s depot on East Street in Milford. Bruce Hodges—president of the Leatherstocking Historical Society, which manages the railway—had invited Rail Explorers to open a division on the line. Rail Explorers has been offering locals and tourists rail excursions each season ever since.

“We [go] in two directions,” Michelle Weigel, division manager at Rail Explorers Cooperstown, said. “We go toward Cooperstown, and we also go toward Portlandville … That’s our southbound tour. That is [an] eight mile round trip. You go four down, four back, whereas our north tour, which goes toward Cooperstown, is 12 miles round trip, so six down, six back.”