From Coal to Goal

... remember me to Herald Square

Wed.  8/2:  Big Coal
The first 1/2 of the ride was pleasant enough... starting out along the Susquehanna river with fruit stands (peaches are in season!).  The 2nd half was punctuated by some of the ugliest scarred landscapes and depressed towns that you'd ever want to see.  Ashland, Gilberton, and Mahanoy City.
In addition to being flat and polluted (there's coal dust runoff in almost every stream) it's pretty hilly.

Who in his right mind wants to bring this back?

The best restaurant in Mahanoy City was a bar.  If I had to live in this town, I'd probably drink too. On the bright side, they had Funnel Cake fries on the menu.  Never saw that b4.  They were pretty good!  The wings, not so much.
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Thur.  8/3:  Family, Friends and sticky buns.

Alpacas on the way to Cousin Billy's

Hilly ride via PA309 over Blue Mountain to New Tripoli (1700 ft vertical for the 27-mile ride) where my cousin Billy and Paula live on their horse farm.  Billy's sister, Sally was visiting with her husband (Michael... who's taking the picture) and son from Israel... I got there just before they had to leave.

Paula, Sally, Sam, Yavin, yours truly, and Cousin Billy hanging out on the farm eating water melon and TastyCakes .

Then, on to the Allentown Fairgrounds farmer's market (Billy drove) for lunch and ice cream at the Ritz, and to pick up sticky buns from the Emmaus Bakery stand for the next day's breakfast.
From there, rode to my friend Susie's house for dinner.  Sue and Jim hosted me for the evening and we had a lovely grilled sticky breakfast.

Me, Bryan, Prenna (Susie's youngest), Jim and Susie.

Fri.  08/04:  NYC
Sue and Jim drove me about 20 miles to Clinton, NJ.  From there rode the last 22 miles to the train in Somerville to catch the NJT train to Newark Penn Station.  Shipped the bike home on Amtrak and caught the next train to NYC Penn Station.  Had an excellent slice of pizza... my end goal for this trip ... at NY Pizza Suprema, across from Madison Square Garden, then walked about a mile to the hotel.
Dinner was pretty OK.   Not up to Quebec standards.

A Chocolate Mousse thing with Hazelnut Ice Creme and Creme Fraisch at Ai Fiori on 5th Ave.

Flying home tomorrow afternoon.

Final Trip Stats:
Miles ridden:  3,502
Total Vertical Climbed:  88,643
 
   

The ups and downs of Pennsylvania

Sun. 7/30: Clearfield, PA
Left my credit card at a restaurant the night before, and didn't figure it out until I was about 5 miles down the road... this added a total of 10 miles to my trip by the time I rode back. Then about another 5 miles of detours from missing a turn around DuBois. The day's total was 78 miles with 3100 ft of vertical.

DuBois, PA... It's not Philadelphia

Mon. 7/31: State College, PA

Only miles from Clearfield to State College (home of my Alma Mater, Penn State), but 2500 ft. of climbing. Ended the ride with ice cream at Penn State's creamery. It took about 20 minutes standing in line. A lot of the people there were high school kids on college tours.

Penn State's creamery.

Tue. 8/01: Lewisburg
Started the day with breakfast at the Diner, where I spent a pretty significant amount of my time in college playing pinball in the back (not there anymore) and having the $0.65 special for breakfast: 2 eggs, potatoes and toast. Now it's about $5.75. Topped that with a grilled sticky. This has gotten very heavily promoted, so they're really mass produced now and not nearly as good as I remember. Of course, back in the '70's I usually had a grilled sticky in college after midnight, often while high.
On the way out of town, stopped in to Meyer's dairy, another top flight ice cream haunt.

Proceeded on roads I biked on when I was an undergrad. Amish country. PA192 is lovely. Gently rolling hills with the last 10 miles predominantly downhill. My hotel is next to a HUGE restaurant (Country Cupboard), seats 500, includes a bakery, creamery, gift shop. The dessert buffet is awesome.
Lewisburg is another college town: Bucknell Today's ride was not as hilly... only 1200 ft.