The Toys for Tots ride rolls out of Brunswick Harley-Davidson on Sunday, October 18, and it comes through Melrose.

Update, October 18. The ride is today. Our traffic advisory has the timing for Route 40 and the village.

If you hear a long rumble of motorcycles coming up through Melrose on the Sunday after next, that is the Toys for Tots ride. The Brunswick HOG Chapter, the Harley Owners Group sponsored by Brunswick Harley-Davidson, holds its 27th annual Toys for Tots event on Sunday, October 18, rain or shine.

The day

Registration runs 9 to 11:30 a.m. at the dealership, 1130 Hoosick Road (Route 7) in Troy, four miles east of the Hoosick Street bridge, and the chapter serves pre-ride refreshments while the bikes gather. The parade departs after registration closes and rides through Troy, Melrose, Mechanicville, Clifton Park and Round Lake to The Mill restaurant on Route 9 at Round Lake, where the toys are delivered to kick off the Marine Corps Reserve’s annual Toys for Tots campaign. The Mill serves a fixed-price buffet for attendees, with a cash bar.

Admission per attendee is a new, unwrapped toy for a needy area child or a $20 cash donation. Checks go to Capital District Toys for Tots, and donations are taken before and after the run. Holiday decorations on the bikes are encouraged. The ride is open to anyone on two wheels, not just chapter members. Questions: 518-279-1145 or 518-369-7104, and the chapter’s Facebook page carries day-of updates.

The likely route, and where to expect delays

The flyer names the towns but not the roads. The map below draws the most direct state roads between them, which is our reading, not the chapter’s published route. It comes to about 29 miles, and the roads it uses match the ones news coverage described in earlier years, when the parade ran Route 7 and Route 142 out of Brunswick.

If that reading is right, here is what it means on our end of the county. The parade leaves the dealership sometime after registration closes at 11:30, so figure late morning into early afternoon for the stretch below.

• Route 7 and Route 142 (Grange Road and Livingston Street) through Brunswick and Lansingburgh are where the parade forms up and gets moving.
• Route 40 from Leversee Road north, through Speigletown and past the Rustic Barn, the firehouse and Melrose, is the long straight run. Side roads onto Route 40 will wait while the column passes, and the column can take a while: coverage of the 2023 ride counted hundreds of bikes, with the Patriot Guard Riders invited along as a lead group in the escort.
• Route 67 through the village of Schaghticoke and over the Hudson into Mechanicville is the next leg. Expect the village four corners and the bridge to be slow for a few minutes.
• From Mechanicville the parade heads to Clifton Park on Route 4 and Route 146 and finishes at The Mill on Route 9 at Round Lake.

If you plan to watch, the Route 40 shoulder through Speigletown and the village of Schaghticoke are the natural spots. If you need to be somewhere on time, give yourself a few extra minutes or use Route 4 along the river instead. And if the chapter posts a different route on its Facebook page, that one wins; we will update this story if we learn of a change.

If you cannot ride

The Speigletown Fire Company is collecting for the same campaign: Santa’s tour of the district on Sunday, December 6 takes new, unopened toys at the door, and the company’s November and December breakfasts take donations too. Details are in our calendar-drive story. The ride is on our events page and in the calendar feed.

Sources: the Brunswick NY HOG Chapter’s 2026 Toys for Tots event flyer, reproduced above; WNYT and CBS6 coverage of earlier rides for turnout and roads; the Patriot Guard Riders New York mission page for the 2025 ride. The route map is ours: the most direct state-road route between the towns the flyer names, computed from OpenStreetMap road data, not a route the chapter has published.