The Grange Encampment and Fair

Everyone here says we had to go to the Grange Encampment and Fair. So we did. What is it?

The Grange Fair is a city within a town, as campers "move into" the Grange Park in Centre Hall, PA to live for more than a week. Come for the concerts, the rides, the amazing food, the games, and the competitions. But you'll come on back for the experience of being in one of the most uniquely friendly "hometowns" in America.

They weren't kidding about the move in part: 800 tents, over 2,000 RVs. Awesome to see. A county fair on steroids with more monkey bread stands, blooming onion  vendors, slushy grinders, and things-on-a-stick fryers than you can ever imagine - or digest. We did our best, but our biggest regret is that we didn't skip the deep fried pickles and leave more room for another peach dumpling. My were they good.

The schedule said the tractor pulls started at 10 am. We got there around 11 and plopped down in the hot sun. After a few hours, I started to realize that this would not be resolved any time soon. There were stock classes, pro classes, classic classes, all in a welter of weights - 6000 lb, 7000 lb, 9,000 lb, 13000 lb, 15000 lb.... They planned to take a break at 4 pm, then resume at 6 pm and continue until closing! And there were tractor pulls each day. Pro points custom on Monday, garden tractor on Sunday, pedal tractor pulls too.

We had great fun. Ann bailed first, and went exploring. Ben bailed next. I stuck it out, broiling in the sun so I could watch the classic modified pull - old tractors gone wrong with straight exhaust chevy big blocks and front wheels that rarely touched the ground.

Just had to go back for the Monday Pro Mod. 

Allegrippis Trails

I was just getting my head around navigating State College by bike (which largely involves finding cool back routes to the Wegmans, the Walmart, the Giant food, and Faccia Luna pizza without riding the heavy traffic on College Avenue and Atherton Street) when my mountain bike staged a break from its basement prison. Of course I had to give chase....

I'd been to the Rothrock State Forest trails a few years back, so I decided to mix it up and explore some other trails shown on the excellent Purple Lizard Rothrock map. We (my bike and I) buzzed over the mountain to Greenwood Furnace State Park - Purple Lizard says they have lots of trails. It was a bust. Nice view from the Brush Ridge Road ski trail, but the balance consisted entirely of logging roads, most either lost or closed to bikes. Shoot.

But we were only 16 miles from Huntingdon, which is only 8 miles from the Allegrippis Trails, so I thought maybe we'd just drop down to see what the fuss was about - we were already halfway there.

The Allegrippis Trails were built by an IMBA trail crew in 2008 with support from the Army Corps of Engineers who oversee adjacent Raystown Lake (the largest in Pennsylvania). Since the Corps owns the most of the shoreline, there is very little development. There's some boating and fishing here. There's even a small tour boat. And the trails.


The trails were recently touted in Mountain Bike magazine, and receive rave reviews on line, with a reputation for super flow and speed. I was excited to experience IMBA's best, built to their latest standards, and compare them to what I know from the Keweenaw.

The roads to the trailhead were well signed, as was the trailhead. About a dozen cars, several bikes, and one shuttle van from Huntingdon were scattered about the parking lot. Pretty good for a late summer afternoon. A nice couple from Allentown (three hours away) rode off the trails claiming there's nothing like it in Pennsylvania. Smooth seems to be rare in the east. A reviewer on MTBR made direct comparison to the Kingdom Trails in northern Vermont - an IMBA Epic and probably the most highly regarded trail system in the Northeast - and Allegrippis did not come up wanting. I'd ridden some of the Kingdom Trails a few years back and found them excellent, having much in common with the best of the Keweenaw, but more so with 50 miles of flow and scenery arrayed around the town of East Burke.

So I had to know - where these the best since sliced bread? I only had time to ride some of the trails, so I quickly jumped in on Buck and Doe (marked beginner) then dropped onto the intermediate Sleek Dog. Excellent flow, with a surprising number of rollers and jumpable (for some) rises and mounds. And nice banking on dropaway and climbing grade turns. You can really carry you speed here. Some have compared it to a 30 mile pump track. Maybe not quite that (there's over 500 feet of elevation) but momentum is rewarded.

As I turned onto Eagle and then the advanced Hydro, I began to realize that the entire system had roughly the same grade and technical level - the ratings were mostly about total climb. In fact, the roughest thing I found was armoring on a beginner trail. I seemed to be riding what to me seemed like an endless, flowing, buffed ribbon of what I'd describe as intermediate, wide single track.  It all reminded me of Copper Harbor's Woopity Woo in terrain and soil type, without the ledges, and wider and much, much longer. That's how nice it was. Had to watch the rear wheel in a bit of loose broken rock over hard pack on some of the drop away turns and not to get air when I didn't want it on some of the rollers, but nothing interrupted the Zen flow.

It was a great ride, and I can't wait to go back and ride the rest. Especially when the leaves are down and the views of the lake really open up. The only vague regret I came away with could be described as "too much of a good thing". After a while, the trails were so singularly similar that I began to secretly wish for more variety. Maybe some different soil types, some tighter and some wider open sections. I feel guilty being so picky, they were so good.

As a trail builder, I was interested in examining the trail construction. This was my first experience with fully machine built single track. It wasn't always obvious, but usually (and especially on the benches) you could see the machine width. Maybe that was part of the variety I missed - the width was less variable. As vegetation grew back in some areas the width was somewhat hidden, but other areas support little under story and were visibly wider. That width adds confidence and safety at speed, and in these rocky soils what IMBA did would take years more with hand tools. Still, I harbor a soft spot in my heart for narrow, hand built trails, despite their impracticality for professional builders.

The trails had excellent maps at many intersections, and professional trail posts everywhere. This is about as good as it gets for marking and routing. Even a few benches for resting and taking in the views. All exactly an hour from our apartment to trailhead. Nice.

And how does Kingdom Trails compare to Allegrippis? For Kingdom: more variety of trail, more variety of scenery (New England farm fields, hardwoods, dense conifers, ferns and lichen, and a cute little burg. For Allegrippis: better signs and maps, scenic lake (only easily visible with the leaves down), and consistent flow and quality. Tough call, but I'd have to give nod in the end to Kingdom Trails. Maybe it's the variety, maybe it's just Vermont. I'd make a special trip for either, but I think I'd drive further to and stay longer in East Burke. I'll be back at Allegrippis regularly while we're in central Pennsylvania - you couldn't keep me away.

More photos for those interested at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jbp1111/AllegrippisTrails?authkey=Gv1sRgCOmFsayBqfrGLg#

A Trip to Old PA

As our first foray exploring the Quaker State, we took a weekend trip to Scranton, home of SteamTown USA National Historic Park. After so many years in Michigan's Upper Penninsula, where everything is far away, it constantly surprises us how close things are here. We threw a few things in the car and headed out.



Two and a half hours later, we were standing in the lobby of the former Delaware, Lakawanna, and Western depot checking in to our room. We found ourselves surrounded by brass, marble, and tile vaulted by a massive Tiffany skylight.  Built in the heady economic days of the early 20th century and remodeled as a hotel only recently, it was decidedly dramatic - over the top even. A unique reminder of past styles of wealth and display.

But our biggest treat turned out to be unanticipated. Happening through the hallway that night, we were drawn to the lobby by the sound of jazz. Not your usual Saturday night lounge music, but jazz standards played with swing, with style, with exciting solos. Ann and I  spent the evening enjoying the session with a few dozen others. One of our favorite concerts of recent memory, and we almost missed it.

The fact that the station was preserved and has flourished now as a hotel is a minor miracle. Scranton has been an iron town, a railroad town, and a coal town. That's three strikes against it in a more modern age, and it's been in decline since the 1920's. The historic park seems to have had a significant effect on the downtown, with a new mall between the park and main drag, and several newer hotels in addition to the restored Lakawanna station.





The park presented a variety of rolling stock (restored and not), interpretive areas, and demonstrations. Our favorites were the round house demonstration and some of the old unrestored stock. Seeing, hearing, and smelling a massive coal fired steam locomotive pull into the center of the roundhouse and spin silently on the turntable is not to be missed. Nothing stirs the blood like a steam whistle. And the wistful, elegiac feel of the bent and decaying Shay engine brought home the feeling of times past.

There's also early iron mining sites to visit and coal mine tours available.We thought Scranton well worth a stop if you're in the area and like trains and history. If you're interested in more of our photos from SteamTown, take a trip to:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jbp1111/ScrantonTripSteamtown?authkey=Gv1sRgCI708a395OiOOA#

Exploring State College by Bike

After Farmer's Market

We've been having loads of fun exploring State College by bike. In fact, we haven't been in the car since we got here and made a larder stocking run out the North Atherton strip.

My first goal after the fridge was full and our was gear was stacked was to get my hands on a city bike route map. Ok that was my second goal. First was to schedule someone to hook up the internet connection. Then I was free to go map hunting. I scored a beautiful map of the Rothrock State Forest trails at the first bike shop, but no commuter map. Used to have them, but were out. Same story at the next shop, and the next. Finally I was directed to the Visitor Center - the source of the maps. They too were at a loss until someone found a few tucked away in the back of a display rack. It was an excellent map showing both the extensive bus system here and the bike routes, bike paths, and regional roads classified by traffic and shoulder width. But it was 4 years out of date and there were to be no more - the expense was too great. Which is a shame. I can't imagine being a new biker in town and finding my way without this map. There are so many bike paths tucked in at the end of cul de sacs, service roads through university agricultural lands bypassing long stretches of strip, and rural highway with impossible to predict traffic and shoulder. I'd have gladly paid the $12 spent on the Rothrock map for my bike route map. With my rare treasure in hand, I headed home.

My Treasure Map

It didn't take long to find back routes to the Walmart, the Giant, and the Wegmans. The borough seemed to be trying pretty hard to be bike friendly. Little did I know how committed they were. Where there has been recent construction, bike paths, bike signs, bike lanes, and even bike tunnels abound. Bike routes through campus and along residential streets are well marked. But when you come up against the older trunk routes and strip highways, there's not much to make a biker feel welcome. Beautiful bike paths sometimes end at busy shoulderless roads, and it can be hard to string together the various facilities to make it past the ring roads and freeway in some directions. Some bike routes on busy roads end up being sidewalks, which is less than ideal. Definitely a work in progress, but still very functional, and up turn.

Path and Stream Share a Culvert

I tested how serious State College is about improving biking just a few days in. On my way to Eddie's Bikes to buy Ann a new lock I was negotiating a left turn onto a side street watching traffic, and, lulled by all the excellent storm drain grates around town, proceeded to drop my front wheel into a bad one on Calder Alley. Needless to say I did an over-the-handlebar dismount. I picked myself up, went back to retrieve my bike (issuing an angry hissing sound from the front tire), collected my precious bike map from the middle of the street, walked the rest of the way to Eddie's and paid him $12 to fix my flat.

Replacement Bike Safe Grates

When I got back to the apartment, I emailed the borough and described my accident and the hazard. I had an acknowledgement from them within the hour. I intended to photograph the offending grate that afternoon, but got another email an hour later from the Borough Operations Manager saying it had been replaced. No way! I went to see, and sure enough. Here's a photo of the fixed grates. And one like the one that ate my wheel, but in a safe location.

Wheel Eater in Safe Location

I emailed my thanks, and mentioned a pair of grates I saw on the way home presenting a similar hazard. Same thing - fixed the next day. I'm impressed. I'd say biking is on their radar and can only get better.

Not that everyone's on board. One day I sat next to my bike on a grassy shoulder at the edge of town to take a call. The homeowner (I assume) pulled in the driveway and asked me to get off his yard. I didn't know I was such an eyesore - and it really wasn't that nice a yard either. He did thank me when I moved to the neighbor's easement. Small consolation.

And drivers here sometimes seem unsure how to treat bikers. Some get confused at stop signs when Ann and I ride as vehicles. They try to wave us through, confusing us and other drivers. Some treat us as pedestrians, others as vehicles. Maybe it's all the students riding sidewalks, ignoring signs, and riding backwards against traffic. Others seem oblivious to us. Drivers here definitely give you less room when they pass than in Houghton. And I've already been cut off by a woman turning right into her drive - came right along side me and turned. Never even turned her head my way. I don't think she ever saw me. Very creepy. Definitely have to keep you eyes open.

Still, all-in-all a good biking town. I look forward to trying our low-car(b) diet.

Well, here we are....

It was, as always, a rush to get out the door on time. We were finishing loading the car just as our guest family arrived on time to move in to our house. They graciously offered to finish the mopping that we had not finished.

We're excited to have a young family in our house while we're gone. The kids looked thrilled with the yard, the paths, the play house and sandbox, and Ben's old toys. It's at its best with kids around.

Vicky the cat was not so happy about her part in this adventure, and gave a fine show of bad manners when she joined the Suits family. Wandering around the host's house hissing and yowling till you snort is not very Emily Post. Poor Griffy, the resident cat, seemed a bit stunned.

It was a busy few weeks cleaning out cabinets and closets, deciding what to store and what to bring. And an exercise in the maintenance of a 15 year old house before that. The furnace gave out last winter, we replaced the dishwasher soon before when it began redistributing food rather than removing it, and the clothes washer sprang yet another leak that would be hard to fix from Pennsylvania if it recurred. Oh, and the igniter for the hot water heater failed the week before we left. Was the house feeling betrayed by our leaving?

Did I mention loading the car? We decided to make this a 9 month experiment in living smaller - everything had to fit in, or on, the Subaru. Including Ben and his stuff for college. Four bikes (one laying in the pile on the roof), two 3x3 roof bags, a ski coffin, and whatever we could stuff inside with us. And we cheated, but just a little, sending some stuff to Ann Arbor with George and Helen for Ben when he resumes at Michigan.

The Subaru slowly settled into a lowrider stance - we were watching the tires pretty closely on the way down state. And other folks were watching us. Heads swiveling all along I-75 seemed to wonder if we were modern day Joads or the Beverly Hillbillies, lacking only granny tied in her rocker on the roof. We'd had to replace the battery only the weekend before and have the exhaust welded the week before that, but another 1,000 miles on top of 160,000 didn't seem to matter.



Part of our experiment is a 1 bedroom furnished apartment in downtown State College. Right across the main drag from campus, 2 floors above a Subway restaurant, and overlooking the 767 Lounge - that's going to be interesting on home football weekends. But Ann's psyched about the Starbucks next door, and more so about the dozen other local coffee establishments, including The Cheese Shop which offers a dozen varieties of brew every morning - self serve and leave your dollar on the counter thank you. We had to stop in when we saw a fair contingent of the State College police force out front hanging with the locals.



We're really happy with the apartment. The kitchen is a bit small, but very functional and includes the laundry, the bedroom is huge, offering plenty of room for the folks in the bed and Ben and all his college gear on the floor, and the living room has a beautiful view of the sycamore trees out front through a bumped out window wall. If only the air conditioner worked properly - that hopefully will be resolved tomorrow. Can't really leave the windows open at night with the 767 busy till late.

It's extremely convenient to downtown, which parallels campus and is very walkable, has one covered parking space across the street in a parking garage (we left the other car at home), and a 4x8 basement cage for each unit. For us it's a bike garage and tool shop. Still getting used to riding an elevator to my basement and always having my keys along to get into my shop or check the mail.

Ann can ride to work in 5 minutes across campus, and has easily settled into work at the Penn State IT department, with many friends and acquaintances met through her work with Internet2 around her. With roles both here and continuing with Internet2, time management is going to be a challenge. Ben is being a good sport about being stuck in a small apartment for 2 weeks with his parents, and has resorted to long walks (it was a tough couple days till we got internet service). And I've made preliminary contacts with the local trail folks, but for now I'm focused on exploring - by bike.