Field Notes Ohio

Ohio's parks, forests and wildlife areas with camping, the ancient mounds beside them, and the Buckeye Trail that links them. Stories, trails, wildlife, and where to eat and fuel up nearby. Book campsites on ReserveOhio.
Try:
The Buckeye TrailA 1,444-mile blue-blazed loop around Ohio, with all 26 sections.
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Mounds & Earthworks43 ancient sites, including the Great Serpent Mound and the Newark Earthworks.
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Historic Sites39 places, from Fort Steuben and Zoar to Camp Chase and the Rankin House, from the frontier to the Civil War.
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Road Trips33 drives, from the Lincoln Highway to the Morgan Heritage Trail.
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Lake Erie Beaches20 public beaches from Conneaut to Toledo and the islands, with a map.
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Oddities & Roadside Attractions19 giants, ghosts and folk-art stops, plus a Mothman just over the line.
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Caves & Caverns12 show caverns, recess caves and rock shelters, with a map.
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Waterfalls34 falls from the Cuyahoga Valley to the Hocking Hills, with trail notes and a map.
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Explore Ohio

One map for every park, mound, historic site, beach, cave, waterfall and oddity in the app.

Lake ErieWest Virginia27 places277 places77 places73 places35 places519 places1913 places1319 places1916 places168 places810 places1010 places109 places98 places820 places204 places43 places3Barkcamp State Park4 places47 places77 places76 places69 places917 places173 places3Harrison Lake State Park2 places2Forked Run State Park3 places32 places26 places610 places103 places32 places2

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117 parks in 7 regions

Ohio & Erie Canalway Scenic Byway

Northeast Ohio
Scenic byway · Dover to Cleveland
110miles
1 to 2 daysto drive
8stops

A 110-mile byway along the old Ohio & Erie Canal, past the Cuyahoga Valley, Zoar and the Tuscarawas valley.

Length
110 miles by the state list; the byway follows the former canalway from Dover to Cleveland
Designated
June 2005
Follows
The Ohio & Erie Canal, built in the 1820s and 1830s
Also on the route
The Ohio & Erie Canal Towpath Trail, which the Buckeye Trail uses
Best for
Canal towns, valley overlooks and a day out of the car
Designation
An America's Byway
In the park
Twenty miles of the route drive through the heart of Cuyahoga Valley National Park, on the nation's first inland waterway link between the Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico

The story

Ohio began its canal age in 1825, and its canals, built between 1825 and 1845, came to nearly 1,000 miles. The Ohio & Erie Canal connected Lake Erie at Cleveland to the Ohio River at Portsmouth, and the communities along it grew rich shipping grain and coal. Zoar's German separatists helped pay off their land by digging their section of the canal. Steam railroads made the canals uneconomical and most fell out of use by the end of the 19th century.

Today the canal corridor is a scenic byway, with much of the towpath open to walkers and cyclists. It runs through the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, the canal towns of Summit, Stark and Tuscarawas counties and the historic villages of Zoar and Bolivar, and the Buckeye Trail follows its towpath through the Akron and Massillon sections.

Stops along the way

1 Brecksville and Bedford Reservations
Cleveland Metroparks at the north end. Brecksville Reservation has the Ottawa Overlook backcountry sites.
Open
2 Cuyahoga Valley National Park
The towpath and the Scenic Railroad run through it. The national park is on the route.
Open
3 Akron and Canal Fulton
Canal towns where the towpath is still used.
4 Massillon
A canal-era city on the Buckeye Trail's Massillon Section.
5 Fort Laurens
Ohio's only Revolutionary War fort, on the towpath at Bolivar. See the Fort Laurens entry.
Open
6 Zoar Village
A communal village on the canal, where members dug the canal for pay. See the Zoar Village entry.
Open
7 Schoenbrunn Village
Ohio's first Christian settlement, near New Philadelphia. See the Schoenbrunn entry.
Open
8 Dover
The byway's southern end, home of the Warther Museum. See the Warther Museum entry.
Open

Take the stops with you

Load the 8 stops into your maps app to drive between them.

Google Maps: stops 1 to 8

The file holds 8 waypoints and a stop-by-stop route line. Locations are approximate, often a town center, so use the stop notes to find the exact spot. Your maps app chooses the roads between stops, usually the fastest, so follow the byway signs where they differ. The GPX arrives in a zip file; unzip it and open the .gpx in a GPS or hiking app. The CSV imports into Google My Maps.

Where to camp nearby

Cuyahoga Valley National Park
The national park at the heart of the byway.
Open
Brecksville Reservation
A Metroparks reservation with backcountry camping.
Open
Bedford Reservation
Tinkers Creek gorge and waterfalls.
Open

Tips

  • Combine driving with a walk on the towpath; parking is at trailheads along the way.
  • Zoar and Fort Laurens share a combination ticket.
  • Fall foliage and spring are the best seasons.

Distances are the route lengths given by the sources. Confirm road conditions, closures and seasonal hours before you go.

Ohio scenic byways list →

Details last checked 2026-09-22. Confirm hours and prices before you go.