Basket Bike Tours – Upper Shirley Vineyards

Tours are offered Thursday through Sunday from March to December with two options. A 6-mile Petite Signature Ride and a 14-mile Signature Ride, both include a guided history, nature and wine tour.

The ride begins at Upper Shirley Vineyards, just outside Richmond, VA, with a tour devoted to the history of the Charles City County area and the beautiful James River, aka Yeokanta, that has rightly been called The River Where America Began. Three nations came together to form this country we know as America—from early English settlers, who created a new nation of freedom on the shores of this river, to the Africans who arrived in chains to bear the brunt of the work in building the industries of cotton and tobacco, to the Native American Algonquins who already called this home some 15,000 years before.

This tour pedals through cotton fields and past plantation lands of Westover and Berkeley, where will face the inspiring and often uncomfortable truths of our history. The tour will bring in America’s future, introducing you to VCU’s Rice Rivers Center and their work on water quality and preserving the health of all rivers. Then you’ll bike on to a quest at historic Westover Parish and grounds, established in 1613 and still in use today. Then pedal back to the vineyard on what was once the original grounds of Shirley Plantation, American’s oldest working farm, to be reminded, this history is our story, and the truthful telling of it, our legacy.

Dine after your ride at Upper Shirley Vineyards Winery Restaurant. Prepay with us or purchase onsite. Veranda, patio, and indoor seating are available but fill up quickly on weekends.