WayfarrowEastern Indiana Covered Bridge Road Trip: 11 Bridges, About 7 Hours of Driving
11 stops252 milesabout 7 hr 13 min of drivingEastern Indiana
This route strings together eleven covered bridges across eight Indiana counties. It starts in Decatur, finishes in Brown, and passes through Rush, Fayette, Franklin, Ripley, Jennings and Bartholomew along the way. Expect about 252 miles and a little over seven hours behind the wheel, before any time spent at the bridges themselves. Building dates run from 1838 to 1916, and you'll see three truss styles: Burr arch, Howe and Long. The Kennedy name turns up at each of the first three stops. Several bridges have moved over the years, to Connersville, to Columbus and to the north entrance of Brown County State Park. The waters crossed include the Flatrock River and Salt, Laughery, Graham and Beanblossom creeks. Start early, check access locally before you set out, and keep a paper map handy, since cell coverage can be patchy in rural stretches.
Route and drive times from OpenStreetMap routing (OSRM). Times are estimates without stops; roads to remote sites can be unpaved or seasonal.
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1. Westport Covered Bridge
Decatur County, Indiana · built 1880
Nyttend / Wikimedia Commons · Public domain Start in Sand Creek Township, Decatur County, with an 1880 Burr arch bridge by A.M. Kennedy and Sons. It runs 130 ft overall, with a clear span of 111.5 ft, and it's listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The bridge was rededicated in 2004. It's on public record at these coordinates, so check access locally before heading out.
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↓ 39.7 miles, about 1 hr 7 min
2. Norris Ford Covered Bridge
Rush County, Indiana · built 1916
Nyttend / Wikimedia Commons · Public domain Just over an hour on from Westport (39.7 miles, about 67 minutes), this 1916 bridge crosses the Flatrock River in Rush County. Emmett L. Kennedy and his sons built it as a single-span Burr arch. Sources disagree on length: the truss is 154 ft, the enclosure about 170 ft, and FHWA says 148 ft. It's on the National Register.
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↓ 23.4 miles, about 42 min
3. Longwood Covered Bridge
Fayette County, Indiana · built 1884
JERRYE & ROY KLOTZ M.D. / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0 About 42 minutes from Norris Ford is the Kennedy Brothers' 1884 bridge, which originally spanned Williams Creek. It was moved to Roberts Park in Connersville in 1984 (one source says 1983) and was removed from the National Register in 1989. Reported lengths are 92 ft, 97 ft, or 108 ft with overhangs, so there's no single agreed figure.
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↓ 21.3 miles, about 40 min
4. Duck Creek Aqueduct
Franklin County, Indiana · built 1846
Rosenthal, James W., creator / Wikimedia Commons · Public domain Here's an unusual one, about 40 minutes on in Franklin County. It's a covered wooden aqueduct that carried the Whitewater Canal, the only surviving one in the US. This Burr truss has been a National Historic Landmark since 2014. It replaced an original lost to a flood and was restored from 1946 to 1949. Its length is given as about 90 ft or 81 ft.
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↓ 23.7 miles, about 45 min
5. Snow Hill Covered Bridge
Franklin County, Indiana
Nyttend / Wikimedia Commons · Public domain Staying in Franklin County, about 45 minutes on in Whitewater Township, Snow Hill is a Howe truss also known as the Johnson Fork Covered Bridge. Sources date it to 1894 or 1895. Its roof and floor were replaced in 1987, and it's listed on the National Register. Length depends on who's counting: 75 ft, or 82 ft including overhangs.
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↓ 32 miles, about 53 min
6. Stockheughter Covered Bridge
Franklin County, Indiana
Nyttend / Wikimedia Commons · Public domain Roughly 53 minutes away in Ray Township, this Howe truss over Salt Creek is also called the Enochsburg Covered Bridge. Its date is unsettled: the NRHP-based figure is 1891, while other sources say 1887 or 1877. The NRHP length is 101 ft 10 in, rounded to 102 ft, though one source says 92 ft.
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↓ 24.9 miles, about 43 min
7. Busching Covered Bridge
Ripley County, Indiana · built 1885
Chris Light (talk) / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0 About 43 minutes further, in Ripley County, Thomas A. Hardman's 1885 modified Howe truss crosses Laughery Creek at the entrance to Versailles State Park. It was rehabilitated in 2005 and is on the National Register. Nobody quite agrees on its length, with reported figures of 170, 176, 182 and 184 ft.
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↓ 31.9 miles, about 51 min
8. James Covered Bridge
Jennings County, Indiana · built 1887
Chris Light / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0 Locals call this one the Kissing Bridge. Built in 1887, the Howe truss over Graham Creek in Jennings County joined the National Register in 2022. One news report gives 1877, which looks like a typo. It's listed at 140 ft, while lostbridges gives 139 ft at the roofline and a 124 ft floor. Allow about 51 minutes from Busching.
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↓ 31.5 miles, about 53 min
9. Brownsville Covered Bridge
Bartholomew County, Indiana · built 1840
Jack Boucher / Wikimedia Commons · Public domain This Long-truss bridge first went up in 1840 over the East Fork Whitewater River in Brownsville, Union County. It came down in 1974, the same year its NRHP listing was removed. Around 1985 or 1986 it was put up again in Mill Race Park in Columbus, shortened from 182 ft to 85 ft. It's about 53 minutes from the James bridge.
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↓ 17.2 miles, about 26 min
10. Ramp Creek Covered Bridge
Brown County, Indiana · built 1838
Chris Light / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0 Indiana's oldest standing covered bridge, and its only two-lane one, dates to 1838. It was built over Ramp Creek in Putnam County and moved in 1932 to the north entrance of Brown County State Park, about 26 minutes from Columbus. It's on the National Register. The span is 96 ft, but overhangs of 7 or 12 ft per end put the total at about 110 to 120 ft.
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↓ 6.4 miles, about 13 min
11. Bean Blossom Covered Bridge
Brown County, Indiana · built 1880
Chris Light (talk) / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0 Finish with a short hop of 6.4 miles, about 13 minutes, to Joseph Balsley's 1880 modified Howe truss over Beanblossom Creek. It's on the National Register, and the record lists metal as a material. Its length is reported as a 60 ft span, 69 ft with overhangs, or 101 ft total, which probably counts the ramp.
Every stop on this route links to its own page with coordinates, sourced facts and image licences. The text above was written from those records and checked against them before publishing. More covered bridges: all covered bridges in Indiana.