This Ohio county has 19 covered bridges and America’s longest one, all off the highway

Bridges built by hand, not luck

You can spend a whole day in Ashtabula County and never run out of covered bridges to find. Ohio’s northeast corner, right along Lake Erie, holds 19 of them, more than any county in the state.

They sit scattered across rolling hills, river valleys, and farm country, and you can string them together on a self-guided drive whenever you want. Some date back to the 1860s.

One set a national record in 2008. The roads connecting them barely see traffic, so nobody rushes you through.

New England roots run deep here

Settlers from Connecticut’s Western Reserve moved into this part of Ohio in the early 1800s and brought their bridge building knowledge with them.

They knew that a roof and walls kept rain and snow off a wooden frame, which meant the bridge lasted decades longer than an open span ever could. That knowledge stuck.

The county kept building and rebuilding covered bridges long after most of the country moved on to steel and concrete, and that habit is why you can still drive through working wooden bridges today instead of just reading about them in a museum.

The longest covered bridge in the country

The Smolen-Gulf Bridge stretches 613 feet across the Ashtabula River, and nothing else in America comes close. You’ll cross it 93 feet above the water, with full highway traffic moving alongside you.

Dedicated in 2008, the bridge carries the name of John Smolen, the county engineer who pushed to keep building these structures when most places had given up on them.

Standing at one end and looking down the length of it, you get a sense of just how long 613 feet actually is when it’s made of wood.

Then there’s the shortest, just down the road

A short drive from the record holder sits its opposite.

The West Liberty Covered Bridge in Geneva runs only 18 feet across a branch of Cowles Creek near downtown, and people call it the shortest covered bridge in the country.

It opened in 2011 using a simple single-kingpost frame, a much plainer build than its giant cousin. John Smolen designed this one too, and also helped design Smolen-Gulf alongside architect Timothy Martin.

You can walk the whole span in about four steps.

See both extremes in one afternoon

What makes Ashtabula County stand apart is that you don’t have to choose between the two record holders. Both sit in the same county, only miles apart, so you can visit both and walk through each before dinner.

At Smolen-Gulf, the walkways open up wide views down the river gorge below you.

Further down, the Riverview pedestrian bridge crosses the valley at a lower point, giving you a different angle on the same water. Neither one rewards a quick photo.

Both ask you to slow down and look.

Indian Trails Park sits right under the giant

The Smolen-Gulf Bridge anchors Indian Trails Park, where paved and dirt trails trace the Ashtabula River beneath the span.

A visitor pavilion near the bridge hands out maps covering trails and bridge history, so you don’t need to guess where to go next. Bring binoculars if you can.

Birders here spot kingfishers, woodpeckers, bluebirds, and bald eagles along the river corridor. Picnic spots and parking make this an easy place to start your day before you head out to the rest of the county.

Walk through bridges older than your grandparents

Some of these bridges have survived more than 150 years of Ohio winters.

The Mechanicsville and Windsor Mills bridges date to 1867, with Root, Middle, and Harpersfield following close behind in 1868. Floods have come and gone.

Decades of snow have piled up and melted off their roofs.

Most have been strengthened over the years so they can still carry cars, but the wood frames underneath are the same ones built generations ago.

Walking through one puts you closer to that era than almost anything else in the county can.

Harpersfield’s bridge is half wood, half steel

The Harpersfield Covered Bridge crosses the Grand River, and at 228 feet, it ranks among the longest covered bridges in Ohio.

A flood in 1913 washed out one end and shifted the river’s course, so engineers bolted on a steel span to fix it.

That repair left the bridge part wood, part steel, a patchwork you can see clearly if you look at where the materials meet.

It sits inside a riverside park with picnic areas and easy walkways, making it a good stop to stretch your legs between bridges.

A red bridge with copper topped towers

Near Jefferson, the Netcher Road Bridge crosses Mill Creek with a look that breaks from the older spans around it.

It runs about 110 feet and carries a neo-Victorian design, with cupolas topped in copper sitting at each end. The bridge opened in 1999, making it one of the newer additions to the county’s collection.

Painted red with cream trim, it draws photographers more than most stops on the route, especially when the light catches the copper roofs just right in the late afternoon.

Five truss styles, one back road tour

Part of what keeps this drive interesting is variety.

The county’s bridges span five main truss styles, including Howe, Pratt, Town lattice, Burr Arch, and Inverted Haupt, along with smaller design touches like West Liberty’s single-kingpost trusses.

Some bridges date to the 1860s, others were built as recently as the 1980s and after, so no two stops look quite the same.

Out of 19 bridges total, 17 are open for you to drive straight through, while the rest are set up for walking only.

Quiet roads carry you past vineyards

The drive itself winds past creeks, river valleys, and wooded hills, with vineyard covered slopes adding color between bridge stops.

Several bridges sit close to parks, so you have room to pull over, stretch, and take a longer look before moving on.

Traffic stays light along most of the route, which means you can slow down without anyone behind you getting impatient.

Maps mark out the whole trail, so you can plan a route that links as many bridges as you want to see in a day.

Fall turns every bridge into a postcard

October changes everything here. The hardwood forests around the county turn red, orange, and gold, and that color frames every bridge against the rivers and farm fields behind it.

The county holds a covered bridge festival each October across the sites, and in 2026 it runs October 10 and 11, free and open to families.

Photographers come in from across Ohio chasing the crisp light that falls on wood and water during those weeks. If you only have one season to see this place, this is the one people keep coming back for.

Drive the Ashtabula County Covered Bridges, Ohio

You’ll find the trail in Ashtabula County, off Interstate 90 in Ohio’s northeast corner, and it’s free to drive year-round since the bridges sit on public back roads.

Of the 19 bridges, 17 let you drive straight through, while the rest are walk-only stops.

Before you head out, grab a route map from the county visitors bureau or the pavilion at Smolen-Gulf so you can plan which bridges to hit first.

Most stops have parking right at the bridge, so you can pull over whenever one catches your eye.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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