Originally Posted by
sd5782
Another thought occurred to me. While you are in the island area, take one of the ferrys to either Put in bay(party island) or Kellys(more relaxed). I haven’t been to either for years. Check the schedules, but I seem to recall that the ferry also goes to Sandusky, so you will be East of Sandusky bay and back on route after seeing some VERY scenic Ohio.
I don't think this will work, or it might require chartering a boat. My memory is that you can ferry from Sandusky to Kelleys Island, and from Port Clinton to Put-In-Bay (South Bass Island), but there's no combination that gets you from Port Clinton to Sandusky, at least not with a bicycle. I think there's a ferry between South Bass and Kelleys, but I don't think it took bicycles when I was there. I don't know if the ferry between Sandusky and Kelleys takes bikes.
From living on South Bass for three summers several years ago, I have some experience getting me and my bike from South Bass to the mainland, but my info may be out of date, since it was almost 20 years ago. At the time, there werre two ferries from Port Clinton to South Bass. One, the Jet Express, goes from downtown Port Clinton to downtown Put-In-Bay, but I feel like there are bike restrictions and that some, maybe all, trips are foot-traffic only. The other ferry is the Miller Boat Line that leaves from a few miles east of Port Clinton and goes to a point on South Bass a few miles from Put-In-Bay (but closer to the state park if you are camping, plus the whole island is not very long, maybe five miles). Miller takes cars, bikes, and pedestrians with every trip. I don't remember a way to take your bike from South Bass to Kelleys Island. I faced this problem when going a little stir-crazy on the island and deciding to spend a day off in Sandusky. The only way I could figure to make it work was to take my bike over that bridge over Sandusky Bay. To go around would have eaten up my whole day. So I did it, legality be damned, and it was pretty intimidating. There was enough of a shoulder that I didn't block faster traffic, and there was bit of a curb on the actual bridge where I was able to walk the bike. On the return trip, I decided to try to get a passing pickup to carry me over, but I got no takers and ended up going back over on my bike. Doable, but not legal and not fun. However, while I think the Lake Erie islands are well worth a visit, I don't know how to work the ferries to get you around Sandusky Bay.