A form of routing used to allow connection to be established between pairs of nodes on different token rings. A node wishing to establish a connection issues a special explorer packet that is broadcast to all nodes on all rings until it is recognized by the specified destination node. The specified node then returns a specific reply packet that returns to the original node, acquiring routing information as it does so, and thus presenting the source node with a complete route between the two nodes. This technique presents a dynamic choice of route at the time of establishing the connection, but all subsequent traffic must follow the path determined at that time.