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Choice Ridge: Houston to Spring Grove

Choice Ridge: Houston to Spring Grove is 48.6 miles of point-to-point riding through Houston County in Minnesota — Bluff Country, the Root River valley, the Mississippi bluffs and the ridge roads above them. Moving time is about 61 minutes; allow 90 with stops — a half day. It is scored CS-2, Easy: 63 corners, 105° of turning per mile, 2,806 feet of climbing. The roads it uses, in the order you ride them, are in the app.

Curviness
CS-2Easy · 1.3/mi
Distance
48.6 mi61 min riding
Corners
6348% sharp · Tight
Climbing
2,806 ft58 ft/mi · Relentless
Shape
Point-to-pointHalf day
Roads
Backroads100% county & local
Traffic
287vehicles a day, median
Speed limit
60 mphtypically 60
Open this route in the app

About this road

Choice Ridge is a prominent upland between Houston and Spring Grove; early settlers preferred the high ground and the name stuck. Long grades and sweeping views characterize the point-to-point. Spring Grove carries strong Norwegian heritage, including a historic church and cultural markers that still shape the town. The ridge is capped by the more resistant rock that defines the local skyline. Elevation here provides layered views across the Root River system—the reward for every sustained climb. The route’s strength is the clarity of its story: leave the valley, climb Choice Ridge, traverse the upland, descend toward Spring Grove or Houston. It pairs naturally with other Root River routes for a multi-day exploration, or stands alone as a satisfying half-day of honest elevation and cultural texture. High ground, long views, and Spring Grove worth arriving in.

How it rides

63 corners over 48.6 miles — 1.3 a mile, and 105° of turning for every mile ridden. That scores CS-2, Easy on the five-point curviness scale. 48% of those corners are sharp ones, and the road reads as tight.

What it climbs

The road climbs 2,806 feet in total, 58 feet per mile, between 678 and 1,335 feet — 657 feet of relief. The longest single climb is 531 feet over 2.1 miles, and the steepest grade on it is 10.4%. By Driftless standards that is relentless.

Surface, speed and traffic

Paved end to end. 100% of it is back road rather than highway. Posted speeds run to 60 mph, typically 60, measured across 22% of the route. Where traffic counts exist — 20% of the miles — the median is 287 vehicles a day, busiest at mile 48.5 with 4,604.

Where to stop

2 of the towns on this road have somewhere to stop — 1 fuel, 6 food, 1 bars.

Longest stretch without fuel: 48.3 miles. Worth knowing before you set off if your tank is small.

Listed alphabetically, and chosen by us rather than rated by anybody. The order you reach them, and the mile each one sits at, are in the app.

Turn-by-turn directions and the spoken guidance are in the app. Every figure on this page is measured from the route itself — corner counts and gradients from the road geometry, elevation from the national elevation dataset, traffic from the state transport departments where counts exist.

Nearby roads