Day 1: Monday 10/5
So, as I was packing for my Great Allegheny Passage trip with Gail and Chris I was faced with a conundrum in determining how much stuff to bring. I don't have the sort of mutual filthiness understanding with Gail and Chris that I have with my kayaking friends and so I felt compelled to bring enough clothing to stay relatively presentable over five days. Plus, as we were staying in civilization (or what passes for it in small town Pennsylvania), I also didn't want to be stinking up the B&Bs. Last, I absolutely, absolutely didn't want to be one of those people who walks around in Spandex cycling clothing when off the bike like some MAMIL* superhero wannabe. This all militated against my being able to pack super light. I knew both G&C were going to be towing trailers, and while I had hoped to stick to just panniers, the amount of clothing and other stuff dictated by five days of travel pushed me to also break out the trailer. I wound up filling three large dry bags (always good to pack in, as they seal out rain, dust, etc.) with clothing, food and supplies - and I must say, at the end of the trip I really didn't feel I had brought too much extra stuff (well, maybe I could have lived without the iPad). Certainly, while I thought I was brining way too much food, I wound up eating almost all of it!
The idea for this trip came about this past summer. In one of our few forays outside of home we went to visit Gail and Chris at their (semi-retirement) home in Lewes, DE, and while there, I mentioned that a GAP trail trip was on my bucket list. Gail is a really avid traveler. Usually, at any given time she's got a number of trips both near and far in the works. She's been really frustrated by the travel difficulties associated with the COVID pandemic and she took what started as idle "let's ride the GAP sometime" talk in their backyard as a call to action and before I knew it, she was texting me with a date and travel plans for a trip!
Day 1: Monday, 10/65 (1 mi)
On Day 1 (Monday) we all showed up right on time at Cumberland Trail Connection in Cumberland, MD, where we were going to catch a shuttle to Pittsburgh. I felt like the three of us with our bikes and trailers full of gear were carrying enough stuff for a month-long trip, but what the heck - it all fit so we brought it. Our shuttle driver was a young guy named Robbie. In deference to COVID precautions we all kept our masks on for the whole ride. Chris made some joke along the lines of, Don't worry, we haven't been to any Trump events recently" (this being right after the president had come down with COVID), which made Robbie crack a big smile and say, "Ohhh - this is going to be a fun ride!" Houses in this part of Pennsylvania is heavily festooned with Trump signs, and I guess he was a Democrat happy to come across some fellow travelers.
Robbie dropped us off at Point State Park in downtown Pittsburgh, which sits at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers and is also the starting point of the GAP trail. It was about 4 in the afternoon and we weren't starting our ride until the next day and so the three of us biked the short distance to our hotels, which were both near the baseball stadium. Gail and Chris may have had an easier time navigating their hotel since they were two people, but I had quite a time wheeling my bike and trailer through the hotel, getting the whole rig (bike detached from the trailer) into the elevator, and then getting the rig from the elevator to my room, which of course sat at the far end of the hallway. My hotel (a Residence Inn) was quite nice and I didn't see another guest the whole time I was there, which made me feel a little safer COVID-wise. Still, upon entering my room I whipped out my pack of sanitizing wipes and went over all the high touch surfaces, then spread out the pillowcase I had brought over their pillow for an added layer of safety. These precautions may have been unnecessary, but they gave me a feeling of control in an era where just leaving the house - let alone going to a hotel - seems risky.
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| My bike in my room |
We met up again to go out for dinner. We headed across the Roberto Clemente bridge into downtown and wound up at a Greek restaurant called Christos Mediterranean Grille, where we sat at a streetside table and were waited on by an older Greek guy, complete with Greek fisherman's cap and very shaky hands. I immediately liked the guy because he could have been straight out of the ethnic mish-mash of my childhood in Brooklyn, and fellow Brooklynite Gail was taken with him too - so much so that every time he tried to upsell us something (Would you like some hummus? Potatoes with your salad? ...) she said yes. It turns out we were being waited on by Christos himself, and that his claim to fame was that he had cooked for Jackie and Aristotle Onassis (according to this review he was their personal chef aboard their yacht). Every upsell came with a story about how Jackie O had loved that dish. The salad, otherwise a typical Greek salad, included slices of banana - a combination that seemed strange, but Christos explained that was how Jackie liked it. And of course, we had to try Jackie's favorite dessert, a vanilla cake with Greek honey, custard and whipped cream. The three of us split one serving and it was delicious. So now I can say I've had dinner prepared for me by a billionaire's personal chef (and a real billionaire at that, not someone who plays one on television). Ευχαριστώ, Christos!
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| Gail and Chris with Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis' favorite dessert |
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| Here I am, preparing to photograph the Jackie O cake |
Day 2: Tuesday, 10/6 (41 mi)
In pandemic times hotels have done away with breakfast buffets in favor of grab and go meals. This helps prevent the spread of the virus and I assume also saves the hotels money - I'm pretty sure the cup of yogurt and granola bar that composed my takeaway breakfast was cheaper than the buffet would have been. Being an early riser and expecting, as I was, a skimpy breakfast at the hotel, I rose early and made my way over to the nearest Starbucks (which I had spotted the previous evening - just up the block from Christos) where I got a decaf and an order of oatmeal. Back at my hotel I ate breakfast and then repacked everything (one disadvantage of dry bags is you wind up pulling a lot of stuff out to find anything, vs. a regular suitcase or duffel with a bigger opening). The three of us met up in front of the baseball stadium. We could have shaved a little bit off of the trip by catching the trail closer to the bridge but we decided to return to Point State Park so we could take pictures and officially start our trip at the trail's terminus. After photo duties, we were off!
The beginning of the trail snakes its way through Pittsburgh (we got only mildly lost) before crossing the distinctive Hot Metal Bridge (really! - Pittsburgh place names include a lot of steel references) and heading into the suburbs. We agreed that if you weren't focused on doing the whole thing end to end, it could make sense to start about 7 miles in at Homestead. The scenery stayed suburban through McKeesport and then the countryside started to open up. Still, most of the day's scenery was pretty unspectacular, but we didn't care - we were just excited to be on our adventure.
Our goal for the first day was the town of West Newton. The day was really consumed by the novelty of riding. We stayed together the whole time and no one had their ear buds in - we just rode along, marveling at being on the trail at long last, and of course (in COVID times) traveling anywhere at all.
After about 40 miles of riding we rumbled into West Newton, and easily found our lodging, which sits adjacent to the trail. The Bright Morning B&B actually occupies four adjacent houses (plus a "bike barn") alongside the trail. We were met by Rob, the innkeeper - properly masked - but unfortunately, the pandemic makes interactions distant and weird and so we didn't talk with him very much other than to get instructions and dinner recommendations. The inn was more old timey than fancy - one could easily imagine you had gone back in time there. Actually, it reminded me very much of an inn in the Canaan Valley area of West Virginia, coincidentally also called the Bright Morning. My room was on the first floor, directly off the kitchen (which in that building is there just for the guests - no one is cooking meals there, so it wasn't noisy), while G&C were upstairs in the same building. The owners live in a separate part of the building (I met Mary Lou, the wife, not masked, as she transited through the house into the owners' quarters), but I don't think anyone else was there in that building, so not too much COVID risk, though of course I did my little sanitizing routine with the wipes.
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| One of several times we crossed the Youghiogheny River - lots of cool bridges! |
Many of the towns along the trail are pretty dead. Since this was our first night we didn't realize how relatively thriving West Newton was, with a number of restaurants and even a drug store within easy walking distance of the inn. Chris and I walked over to the Trailside Inn and got some beer, which the three of us brought back and drank outside the inn, then we went back to the Trailside for dinner (outside). The menu wasn't particularly heart healthy, but I figured that riding 40 miles probably balanced out whatever I was going to eat. I wound up getting the fired fish sandwich, which was quite good, with vinegary cole slaw. Then it was back to the room, where I worked on the blog writeup for my recent kayaking excursion (my adventures have been coming right on the heels of one another - which is good!), watched part of a movie and then went to bed.
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| One of the buildings of the Bright Morning Inn |
Day 3: Wednesday, 10/7 (43 mi)
On Monday we were just excited to ride and we did our day's riding with pretty much no breaks. We had broken the trip up into four days (people often do it in three) in order to be more leisurely about it and so we made it a conscious focus to relax a little in our riding. After a nice breakfast on the inn's patio (most guests ate inside, but we were a little creeped out at the notion of being in the dining room with all those unmasked people) we packed up our stuff and got rolling about 9 AM, which actually made us the last ones out (at least judging by the emptiness of the bike barn). In the course of packing up I also discovered luggage services - I saw two different vans roll up to pick up people's luggage. Apparently there's a whole industry of shuttle drivers, not just of people, but of luggage - transporting people's bags from one inn to the next so they can ride unencumbered. I could dig that!
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| Snack break |
It was another lovely autumn day. We started every day somewhat bundled up - long pants, full fingered gloves, hats under our helmets, shedding layers and accessories over the course of the morning as it got warmer. Actually, I didn't wear long pants - rather, I wore cycling leg warmers, which are great (easy to take on and off to convert shorts to long pants) but are always sized for people with big cyclist legs. On a skinny guy like me they tend to fall down after a while unless the legs of my cycling shorts are really tight. I think I need garters. 😮
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| Pretty scenery! |
The ride got prettier as we got further into rural areas, and we began to see some nice fall colors. True to form, we stopped plenty of times, including quick snack breaks and a long lunch break at a park pavilion in Connellsville. We had paid for the Bright Morning Inn to provide us with bag lunches and so we were well fed with sandwiches, vegetables, apples, and chips. We also spread out, sometimes riding together, sometimes apart. Gail and I are both moderate in speed, though I am a tortoise (just ride steadily along) while she is a hare (rides fast, then stops). Chris is the monster cyclist of the bunch, able to chase us down with ease no matter how far ahead we get. I hate natural athletes.
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| Photos of the shabby cabin |
Our destination for the day was Ohiopyle, PA, a town that's a hub of outdoors activity in the area. We expected it to be a little more thriving than the the other towns we passed, but in fact it was pretty dead. Our lodging was a "rustic cabin" at the "Ohiopyle Lodge", which Gail had booked expecting it to be a quaint log cabin in the national park. It actually turned out to be a pre-fab building with all the charm of a storage shed. Outside our front door was an old pop-up camper which had been turned into a storage shed - redneck recycling. Inside, it was decorated in a style I'll call out-of-date rustic, with wood paneling and hunting/fishing decor. All three of us were staying together - the place had two bedrooms, though mine was windowless. Still, while it was shabby it was clean - my compulsive sanitizing wipe-down didn't turn up any dirt, and the beds were cheap but seemingly new mattresses, comfortable enough for a night.
Our dinner choices were limited to the Falls Market (greasy spoon - order at the window and eat outside), the Ohiopyle Bakery and Sandwich Shop (ditto), and pizza. We opted for the first, figuring we'd save pizza for some time when we rolled into a town and found nothing else to eat (it seems every town, no matter how desolate, has a pizza place). I got a black bean burger, which turned out to be pretty tasty. That evening was the Vice Presidential debate. Our shabby cabin didn't have Wifi, but we noted that the Falls Market had Wifi that reached outside - we figured if worst came to worst we could walk back over and stream the debate using their Wifi. Gail went into the market itself and got some breakfast food; Chris and I made plans to get breakfast at the Bakery (Chris also envisioned getting a fancy coffee at a coffee place in town called the Bittersweet Cafe, but it turned out to have closed for the season).
After dinner we went back to the shabby cabin. Chris and I went out in search of beer, which we found a short walk away across the Yough at a place called the Falls Cafe. When we walked in we both got the feeling that everyone turned and looked at us, like in the barroom scene in a Western - was it that we were strangers? Old men suspected of having wandered away from the home? Had they never seen Jews before? Anyway, we managed to buy beer. Unlike the Trailside Inn in West Newton, which sold single beers to take out, this place sold only six-packs, but you could mix and match. We bought two IPAs (for me), two ales (for Chris), and two sours (for Gail, who had repeatedly said that she wasn't interested in a beer, but we had to fill out the six-pack).
Back at the cabin I popped an IPA and Chris, in a moment of ADD, opened the other IPA when he meant to be opening a sour for Gail (who had acquiesced to having one). Chris and I did manage to watch the debate by sitting outside at a picnic table (there was no cell reception in the cabin) and hooking my iPad to his phone as an Xfinity hotspot - but because the screen was small we completely missed the appearance of the now-famous fly!
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| Watching the debate |
I slept well in my windowless room. To avoid tomb-like darkness, I slept with the closet light on (which required harvesting a bulb from the bedside lamp to put into the fixture in the closet, which had a blown bulb - an old-fashioned incandescent, to give you an idea of how long it had been since the bulb blew.
Day 4: Thursday, 10/8 (43 mi again)
By the third day of riding I woke up with a little feeling of, "not another day of riding!" but it turned out to be probably the best day of the trip. Chris and I walked over and got breakfast from the other walk-up window at the Bakery (the very same place Valerie and I had eaten at several years ago on our trip to Fallingwater, which is just outside of Ohiopyle - Ted ate there too on his trip) which Gail had breakfast at home. Good egg sandwich. The guy was nice enough to brew decaf for us, even though I doubt he sold any of the rest of the pot.
As usual we got rolling 9-ish, saying goodbye to the shabby cabin. The GAP continues to follow the Youghiogheny River in this section, and the scenery is really pretty - small rapids in the river, some decent views, more high trestle bridges, enhanced by more intense fall foliage. The first day of riding we made almost no stops; the second day we made a lot of stops so that somehow it took us seven hours to ride 40 miles. On day three we pledged to plot a middle course, not being hesitant to stop but trying to make a little better time.
One problem we had was that we had no planned lunch. We still had sufficient snack foods and some tuna packs if we had to be self-sufficient, but we really preferred to get lunch. Gail and Chris had different recollections from their previous trip - Chris remembered there having been restaurants in the town of Rockwood, which we'd hit around lunchtime, while Gail did not. We decided to stop in the town of Confluence along the way to see if they had any provisions but there was nothing - nothing - open in that town. Looking at the map now, it appears that a little further from the trail there's a grocery store, but we didn't venture that far.
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| A little lost in Confluence |
The trail takes a funny bend through Confluence and we wound up having to hunt around a little to find the continuation of the trail. Once we did, it was smooth sailing - as I mentioned, through some really nice terrain. I knew Ted had commando camped at least one time along the GAP during his DC to Pittsburgh hike and so I made a little game of looking for place where someone could make covertly camp without it being too obvious from the trail.
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| Some really pretty scenery along the trail |
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| More scenery |
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| Navigating an obstacle |
We pulled into Rockwood at lunchtime to find it too was pretty devoid of commerce. The promising-sounding Rock City Cafe wasn't open, so we rode downhill (knowing we'd have to schlep back up), past the "For God and Country - Vote Trump!" signs complete with red, white and blue Jesus, and came upon the Hometown pizza shop, which also seems to serve as the town's laundromat, car was and junk shop. At this point Gail was anxious for lunch and so I said, "let's just order a pizza and we'll eat it in the parking lot if we have to" - which is exactly what we did. They made a decent veggie pizza (or maybe we were just hungry) and we indeed parked our butts in the middle of the lot (there were no other pizza, laundry, car wash or junk shop customers using the lot) and had a wonderful lunch of pizza and soda. After lunch we trekked back up the hill to the trail and continued on.
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| Parking lot pizza |
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| Pretty colors in Rockwood |
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| Inside the pizza place/laundromat/junk shop |
Near the end of the day my left hand really started to hurt. My hands always go numb on long rides (a common problem), but this was different - real pain. I think i must have been compressing a nerve or something. As the ride went on I had to constantly shift hand positions and did a lot of one-handed riding, which slowed me down. Riding in weird positions also made my right trapezius start to seize up and so I had pain on both the left and right sides. I had anticipated other aches that never really came - legs, saddle, but not this! Fortunately, we had only a few miles to go and I was able to limp the rest of the way to Meyersdale.
When we grouped up Meyersdale I told Gail and Chris what about the pain I had been going through at which point Chris said that Gail get same thing and that he knows how to give a shoulder massage to relieve it, at which point he started to approach me as if he was going to rub my shoulders. A combination of body defensiveness, COVID defensiveness and a little concern that Chris might not be thinking straight because of some non-prescription medication he had taken earlier kicked in and I told him "no". He kept approaching and I told him no a few more times, finally shouting at him to stop, which startled and actually stopped him. This was our one awkward, contentious moment on the whole trip - as I mentioned earlier, Gail and Chris may nag each other a little to mutually manage each other's ADD tendencies, but they are overall very mellow traveling companions.
Our B&B in Meyersdale, Yoder's Guest House, was the most luxurious of our accommodations on the trip. Their bike shed is like a fully equipped repair shop, and the rooms and common spaces were lovely. The owner said that they've been doing good business but (fortunately for us, unfortunately for him) the place was fairly empty - I think only 2 or three other rooms were occupied. My room was on the top floor, so I schlepped my stuff up two flights and immediately headed for a hot shower, after which I felt much better.
Meyersdale is yet another town that shows evidence of past affluence but which has clearly fallen on somewhat bad times. Our B&B, originally the home and office of a prosperous local doctor, was quite fancy and large. Up the hill, sat the yet larger and fancier Levi Deal mansion, also run as a B&B. To give you an idea of property values in the area, Levi Deal, which deserves the "mansion" name, sold a few years ago - fully furnished as a turnkey B&B operation, for $570K.
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| More scenery |
Our dinner choices in Meyersdale were very limited. What was said to be the best restaurant in town was closed due to a family wedding, which left us with the "diner", another walk-up window offering an array of fired foods (the "fried trio" of shrimp, chicken and potatoes seemed to be popular), the pizza/sub shop - we went in, saw that no one was wearing masks, and walked right out again, Subway, and Sheetz. We would up getting sandwiches from Sheetz, which we ate on the inn's front porch. Gail and Chris also indulged their passion for Sheetz hard-boiled eggs. The only place in town to get alcohol was the pizza/sub/COVID shop we had fled, but fortunately we we carrying leftovers from the six-pack we had bought in Ohiopyle, which we pulled out to have with dinner.
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| Peafowl along the trail |
Day 45: Friday, 10/9 (43 mi again)
Breakfast at Yoder's was our one indoor meal of the trip - but it seemed pretty low risk, given that we were the only ones in the dining room. I think all of these places normally would have a more extensive breakfast buffet, but like the Residence Inn's yogurt, they've switched to more limited table service breakfasts due to COVID. Still, it was good and after eating we eagerly got under way for our final - and mostly downhill - day.
The elevation profile of the GAP trail looks like this:
We had just spent three days riding up the long uphill from the righthand side of the figure and were looking forward to cresting the eastern continental divide and zooming downhill. I have to say, the scale of the map distorts the severity of the elevation profile since you've got 150 miles on the X axis and maybe 1,500 feet on the Y, but still, after constant pedaling with no chance to coast for three days the feeling of rolling downhill was great! I think that you could probable coast the 20-ish miles from the divide to Cumberland, but with the gravel surface you'd be going pretty slowly, so we still pedaled. I put on some upbeat music (Turkuaz) and really took off. We kept passing each other over as the miles went on, smiling all the way. I was also being careful not to lean too heavily on the bars, wanting to avoid the pain I had felt the previous day - which I mostly managed to keep at bay.
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| At the Eastern Continental Divide |
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| Crossing the Mason-Dixon line |
About 12 miles from the end I stopped to pee. Chris caught up with me and stopped too. I took off and shortly thereafter noticed the disheartening feeling of a tire going flat. Yup, my rear tire had gone flat. I was so ticked off that I didn't even notice Chris as he went by - I might have flagged him down. Fortunately, I had what I needed to do the repair. Unfortunately, it was a narrow section of the trail so I was kind of half on / half off the trail as I worked on my bike.
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| Uh, oh! |
I texted Gail and Chris to let them know what had happened. They waited for me at about Mile 2 and we rolled into Cumberland together, triumphant at having completed our ride. The Cumberland terminus of the trail is a little confusing and we once again got mildly fahrblunget but eventually found our way back to the start. Chris and I went back into Cumberland Trail Connection to look at the GAP swag - jerseys, stickers, etc. (didn't buy anything). Meanwhile, Gail went around the corner where she found a winery tasting room - she texted us to come over and join her for wine tasting! I didn't have any wine, but I did try some cheese and we sat (outdoors) and reveled in our successful trip. Maryland wine must have improved over the years, as Gail bought a bunch of bottles!
After a while we loaded up our stuff and got underway. They had a long drive back to coastal Delaware. Gail had eaten cheese and cracker and Chris had gotten ice cream, but other than a few little pieces of cheese I hadn't eaten anything so I sought out a restaurant in town where I order (window service, again) a veggie wrap and what I really craved - a milkshake - which I downed at a park table nearby. After days of chilly fall weather it was surprisingly warm in Cumberland; I was glad to have my cold drink as I sat in the sun. Then it was off to home - arriving as usual from my trips with bags of dirty, smelly clothes, but being atypically clean (my trips usually involve camping - though I could get used to this B&B thing!).
Would I do this trip again? Absolutely! Though we did say that we would consider the opposite direction - maybe it would be worth toughing it out up 20 miles of 1.5% grade (in contrast, my house sits on about a 7% grade and just past the mailbox at the corner the street hits 14% ... values courtesy of Strava) to get the slight downhill push of 0.75% for 130 miles.
*MAMIL = Middle Aged Man in Lycra
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| One of many bridges along the trail |
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| One of many tunnels along the trail |
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