Continuing on ... Saturday, 6/11/16

When the shuttle dude picked us up in Jim Thorpe following our Lehigh Gorge Trail bike ride, he gave us just enough of a town tour to entice us.  But first, one of Hickory Run State Park's recommendations was a short hike to Hawk Falls, a mile-and-a-half round trip, half down/half up.  As far as hikes go, this one was ok, but nothing to write home about, with lots of kids and grown-up kids whooping and hollering by the waterfall and its pool.  We looked and left.  And then we drove to Jim Thorpe.  Jim Thorpe, you say?

It was a pretty cascade.

The day figured to be warm and humid, so we dressed in shorts.  Parking was easy near the trail/train station, and once we put Smartie in the shade, we set off on a town explore.  

Okay, thumbs up!

Stylish Dimmick Memorial Library (1889), constructed with local brick, is built in the Jacobean style.  We walked about inside, admiring its beauty.  But we didn't get any books!

We peeked in every open building we found, including an old Presbyterian church, circa 1837, now turned into an art gallery.  The giant wheeled wooden structure in the center was very interesting! 

It isn't too often you see a tree growing out of a chimney!

The town of Mauch Chunk is located in the Pocono Mountains.  Loosely translated, Mauch Chunk means, "Sleeping Bear Mountain" in the native Delaware language.  The name change to Jim Thorpe is a fascinating story.  In part:  After the Olympic athlete, Jim Thorpe, passed away in 1953, his third wife, Patricia, contacted the town of Mauch Chunk (they were desperately seeking to attract business), and made a deal with city officials to bury him there as a memorial to him, in return for renaming the town to Jim Thorpe.  There's more to it than just these bare facts (as you can imagine). All of this was news to us.  Google it if you want more info.  

This line of houses with colorful embellishments on Race Street is called "Stone Row," and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (1977).  Most of the buildings have become tourist shops.

The Episcopal church of St Mark and St John offers free tours.  Jimmy and I simply inserted ourselves into one, and enjoyed it very much.  The tour highlights the room’s marble altar, stained glass windows (including priceless Tiffany windows), and its original tile floor (1869 and still shiny!) above.  It's truly an incredible sacred structure.

As we circled around the town, wishing the temperature was a few degrees lower, or the humidity level had dropped into the basement, we came upon the scenic railway cars.  If we'd had more time, we could have and would have ridden the train on basically the same route we bicycled the day before.  But ... you've heard it before ... you just can't do it all. I'm sure we would have enjoyed the ride.

On our way out of town and back to our campsite, we stopped at Jim Thorpe's monument. He was "the world's greatest athlete."  Apparently he could do anything  Born in 1887, he participated in the 1912 Stockholm, Sweden Olympics and overall, Jim Thorpe won eight of the 15 individual events comprising the pentathlon and decathlon ,.,, and so much more.  I knew he was an Olympian and I'd heard his ancestry was part Native American, but I learned a great deal about a humble champion by visiting the small town named in his honor.

A great find for us! Friday, 6/10/16

Across the wild and scenic Lehigh River from Hickory Run St Pk where we're camped, is Lehigh Gorge State Park.  And it just so happens that a 26-mile Rails-to-Trails bike path runs parallel to the river.  Woot-woot!!  Because there's so much history associated with the area, we elected to ride the entire 26 miles, one way, from White Haven south to Jim Thorpe.  We hired a shuttle for our return to our car, and that way we could take our sweet time exploring.  Pocono Biking would pick us up in Jim Thorpe at 5 pm.  This was a most enjoyable ride, since we were off our bikes as much as we were on -- there was that much to see.  The trail, like most rails-to-trails is open to walkers, hikers, bikers, and is accessible.

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, Eastern Pennsylvania is steeped in history.  The discovery of anthracite (hard) coal in 1791 played a major role in it's development.  Large quantities of coal had to be transported down river to fuel the young nation's need ... fuel to fire the burgeoning steel mills that would make the country's railroads.

Between 1835 and 1838, 20 dams and 29 locks were built over the 26 miles between White Haven and Mauch Chunk (Jim Thorpe). We saw remains the of those locks, dams and towpath.  

By the 1800’s, clear-cut logging, sawmills, and the second largest tannery in the US ushered in a boom time. Above is a photo of the ruins of Lehigh Tannery. The header on a nearby signboard screamed -- The River Ran Black. Yikes!

Hemlock bark from the valley’s giant Hemlocks provided the tannic acid used to cure as many as 50,000 hides a year, making this the 2nd largest tannery in the US.  The river and the forest paid an enormous price … wastes dumped into the river turned it black. Logging created a landscape littered with the debris of abandoned trees cut only for their bark. In 1875 an uncontrollable fire ignited and swept across the forest floor, engulfing and forever destroying the Tannery, the remaining standing timber, many sawmills, and stockpiles of lumber. The sawmills closed and the loggers departed.

John James Audubon noted in his journal years before: “Trees, one after another were … constantly heard falling. In a century, the noble forests around should exist no more.” How very prophetic.

This must have been one of the locks.  We're guessed it to be 35-50 ft high.

A train continues to run on the other side of the river.

A swift intake of breath is how I'd describe my reaction to ALMOST RUNNING OVER this big ol' Timber Rattlesnake with my bike.  Yes, a signboard further down the trail reported this area is home to these "docile" creatures.  I was pedaling along, minding my own business, and saw the snake at the last minute.  It didn't move, but I certainly did!  We stopped to take the photos, giving it a good three feet clearance, maybe five.  It still didn't move, so we got back on our bikes and continued on.  Many times we see snakes on our hikes or while biking, but this one gave me a start.  Below you can clearly see it's rattles.

We stopped at most of the picturesque waterfalls, and we saw many! 

For those of you who can't stand to see snakes, here's a pic of white Mountain Laurel.

Much prettier, I'd say!

For most of our ride, as on our previous ride, the trail is sandwiched between the river and a cliff, hence the trail name:  Lehigh Gorge.  Rhodies, two or three stories tall, graced the rock face, sending down roots wherever they could find a purchase.  They weren't in bloom yet, but when they do, wowee, the trail will be amazing.  And then there's the tree above, happily growing in the rock.

There are plenty of outfitters in the area, catering to the whitewater rafting crowd.  On weekends, water is released from the dam, making the rapids a Class 2 and 3+.  We saw some spots that looked impossible to navigate!  It's a beautiful river today, no matter what happened to it in the past.

The train crosses the river here, as we near Jim Thorpe. 

We found this a fascinating trail to ride.  Here, tracks run above the wall. 

Obviously an old train tunnel.

The opposite open end can be accessed by a dirt road on the other side of the mountain.

Finally, at the large trestle near Jim Thorpe, a couple took our pic.

We are two happy people.

A shout-out to Tom at Pocono Bike Rental for his good humor and timely pick up.  We were tuckered out by the time we saw him at Jim Thorpe, and were ready to get off the saddles and into his vehicle. I promise you:  We had a great time!

A Boulder Field? Thursday, 6/9/16

The first thing I want to note is we awoke to a cloudless sky!!  That hasn't happened in a while, and it was very nice to see.  We left Rohrbach's, continuing east.  We don't always go far from camp place to camp place, and this was one time when we skipped lightly, maybe 50 miles, to Hickory Run State Park, in Eastern Pennsylvania.  Neither of us knew a thing about it, but it looked good on the atlas!  With a weekend coming on, we wanted to secure a site for Thurs/Fri/Sat, and when we pulled into the park, it was a surprise to find it so empty. Settled in, we looked over the park guide to see what this beautiful park had to offer!  Boulder Field?  OK, we'd check into it.   

Parked in the shade, good.  Look at that greenery!

Straight away we learned that Boulder Field is a fossil, a relic, a leftover.

I'd call it an anomaly!  Smack out in the middle of a Pennsylvania woods is a 400 ft wide, 1,800 ft long, about ten feet deep, and surprising flat field.  It isn't glacial moraine, but it is glacially related.  If you'd like to know more about it, I suggest clicking on the link above ... it's fascinating.  A process called gelifluction was at work in its creation (also a good learning link).  The field is a jumbled assortment of loosely packed boulders, which are predominantly red sandstone, with some quartz conglomerate mixed in.  I suppose other parts of the world might claim a boulder field like this one in the middle of a forest, but we're here seeing this one, and it is simply extraordinary!

While Jimmy and I gingerly stepped from one boulder to another, a van pulled into the parking lot and disgorged several school-age boys in red shirts.  Those boys whooped and hollered when they saw the boulders and took off, hopping lightly over the boulders like they were gliding on a dance floor!  In only a few minutes they were out in the middle, happy to scramble from one end of the field to the other.  I didn't like seeing black spiders on the boulders, but they fled from approaching feet, for which I was grateful.

Meanwhile, Jimmy, who is celebrating his one-year new-left-knee anniversary tomorrow, decided to park himself on a boulder and just take it all in.  Smart man.

The field is shrinking as trees encroach,

and eventually the forest might cover all of Boulder Field.

I knew it was big, but this signboard photo blew me away (obviously taken in autumn).

After leaving Boulder Field, we ended up walking around Sand Spring Lake, through a rhododendron "forest," not in bloom yet, but they'll be stunning in about a month.  The lake has a beach, which, as you can see below, wasn't popular today.

This is one of the runs that feeds the lake.  Run is a colloquial name for a stream ... Pennsylvania talk, I presume.

There is so much history in/at this park that I can't begin to relate it all.  It covers nearly 16,000 acres in the foothills of the Pocono Mountains.

Many of the park trails were created by the CCC.  We didn't hike the above Shades of Death trail; the name alone was enough to deter me!  Actually, the gruesome name is attributed to the thick forests and rough terrain experienced by the early settlers.

After dinner I strolled through the campground, admiring mountain laurel in full bloom ... some are pink, some white, and some shrubs are mixed in with berry blossoms.  This is a gorgeous park and I'd recommend it to everyone.

More good stuff tomorrow?

At the farm market! Wednesday, 6/8/16

I'm sure most people who read this blog know that Jimmy and I don't "plan" our trips down to dotting i's and crossing t's.  Half the time we don't know where we'll be the next night, and that works well for us.  Weekends can sometimes be tricky, but so far, so good.  After leaving Monessen Elks, we debated about where-to.  Turns out we found the perfect Harvest Host spot in (ready?) Catawissa, Pennsylvania! I called from the road and got a "sure, c'mon over."  A brisk wind was blowing and, hallelujah, it was a tail wind!  Dodging occasional rainy periods (like I said, no wonder it's all-over green in these parts, it rains all the time), we made it to Rohrbach's Farm Market in early afternoon.  Rohrbach's is located in a lovely hilly part of PA, just a couple of miles from the Susquehanna River.

Thinking maybe we'd find a park to stroll through on the Susquehanna, we hopped in Smartie aiming for the river, and ... no park.  We turned on a road paralleling the river, hoping to find a bridge or a beautiful park and we drove and drove and came up with ... nothing.  When I turned around to return, lo and behold, here comes the North Shore pulling a few cars on the line that ran between the road and the river.  We waved, he waved, we continued on.

Never did find a park or anything resembling a place to walk, but Jimmy found this path below the Catawissa Bridge that led to the wide, shallow and swift river.  We met a young man with a fishing pole who was looking to catch some catfish.  Wishing him good luck, we left. 

Back in Tergel, we admired our pastoral surroundings -- prosperous farms with healthy-appearing crops.  A cold wind was blowing, so we bundled up for a short hike up a hill.

We briefly spotted a doe with a faun before they disappeared into the woods.

My oh my, we had fun in the farm market.  The biggest decision was whether to buy apple dumplings, a small apple pie or a BIG apple pie, all homemade.  No contest, the big pie won!  We also bought sweet corn and fresh local asparagus.  All delicious.  Thursday morning we had apple pie for breakfast.  It tasted so good that we had two slices each.  My sister called us "piggies." 

The ladies at the farm market were very kind to us, asking if we needed anything.  Jimmy mentioned that we were a little low on water and she showed him the hose bib to use.  

After dinner, I walked across the street to see for myself which grain was growing.  The whipping wind kept the field in motion, like the crowd at a ballpark doing the wave. Kind of mesmerizing.  A loose stalk of wheat lay on the ground, so I brought it back to show Jimmy.  It's now a part of Tergel.

What a fantastic sunset to end our hump day.  What a treat!