R.B. Wynter State Park, State College, PA., Prince Gallitin State Park

by Joan

That morning, Eric was all for skipping out of RB Wynter State Park without paying. He figured that we had tried twice to pay, and the park had made it impossible. But Katy has more of a conscience. She said she'd feel bad if the campground hosts learned that we had skipped out without paying, after being so nice to us. She was right. So we went to the park office, found a self-pay envelope (I guess they had restocked that morning) and paid.

That day was a real turning point for our trip. It turns out we had really gone over the biggest mountains. Now all we had to do was ride the gentle, rolling hills--mostly downhill--between the ridges of the Appalachians. The ridges run from northeast to southwest. We were riding southwest.

Katy had had a hard time, like all of us did, on the hills. But she had an even harder time, because at the start of the ride, she didn't know how to draft. It's not an easy thing to do. Basically, you have to ride less than two inches off the back tire of a bike in front of you, while you're both speeding, and pray that the person in front of you doesn't hit the brakes, sending you both to the emergency room.

[ERIC: Drafting doesn't actually help much climbing hills, but Katy could get a much faster start on them if she stayed in my draft on the flats and gently downhills.]

That day to State College, Katy got comfortable with drafting. She later said that she was hurting so much on the hills, that she would try anything to make the riding easier. It was a perfect day to learn drafting, because we mostly went downhill. So after days of just inching over these killer hills, we were suddenly flying down the other side. We were really, really moving. My journal says we went 68km that day, or about 42 miles. But we went so fast, it seemed like we only went maybe 20 miles.

[ERIC: Part of the reason it seemed so short is that it was so pretty. Like a couple days before, we were in a long narrow valley with wood ridges on either side. The weather was perfect all day long. Also we didn't stop much because it was Sunday morning and all the towns were pretty much closed up. We couldn't find a diner for breakfast so we ate the white bread the campground hosts had given us and some peanut M&Ms.]

Somewhere along the way, while we stopped on the side of the road to catch our breath, Katy saw some cows with big identification tags in their ears. She empathized with them, as she was feeling like a bit of a herded beast herself. One in particular caught her eye. It had the number "47" in its ear. While the other cows walked away from Katy, 47 stayed near. In that moment, between cow and Katy, an unbreakable bond was forged. To this day, if you see Katy having a bad day, pat her on the back and call her "47" and she will feel better.

We rolled into State College in the early afternoon. Our first stop was an ice cream store. Over huge, huge ice creams, we borrowed a phone book to look up hotels. I was keen to get a hotel so I could write and email my column. And I didn't want a divey hotel. So we headed straight for the Days Inn--a budget luxury hotel. We got a great room for three for $80. It was worth every penny. The hotel even let us roll our loaded bikes right into the elevator, and the off the elevator right into our room.

It was great to be in a hotel because we hadn't slept indoors since New York. Also, we hadn't had a shower the night before. So we all got showers, and while we were waiting for each other, we relaxed on the huge double beds and watched television. Total luxury. That afternoon, while I wrote my column, Eric and Katy went out and did all our laundry.

That night, Katy had the best treat for us of the whole trip: ribs and margaritas at a Chili's restaurant! We had been fantasizing about ribs for days. And we had been fantasizing about margaritas since more than two weeks earlier, when Katy and Eric and I were forced to wean ourselves away from the margarita machine at Arriba! Arriba! restaurant in New York, because it was past closing time. Wearing fresh showers, sucking on margaritas, and wolfing down ribs is about as close as you can get to heaven in life. We loved it.

Then we went back to the room, surfed the channels, and watched Thelma and Louise and settled onto cushy, cushy beds.

The next day, our first mission in the morning was to make as much use of our hotel room as possible. So after going down to the breakfast buffet, we went back upstairs and lounged around until late in the morning.

That day we headed south to Tyrone then west, towards Indiana, PA, where Eric and Katy have lots of aunts and uncles. When we were first planning our route, back in New York, we figured that there was no way we would go to Indiana, because to get there, we would have to hop over too many mountain ridges, and it would kill us. So instead, we were planning on going through Johnstown, which Katy had always wanted to visit.

But as we got closer to Indiana, it became clear to us that there was no way we could skip a visit to family homestead, especially since we knew Eric's and Katy's Aunt Helen would welcome us with fresh bedding, great food, and ready access to showers (not to mention of course, the marvelous company of Aunt Helen and Uncle Clint). So we called Aunt Helen to make reservations. Good thing we called. She said we should come on over, but if we wanted to stay more than one night, we'd have to sleep outside in the trailer, because she was already committed to hosting six--count 'em, six-- choir boys. What a hostess.

When we finally left State College, we figured we'd take two days to get to Indiana. So that night, we aimed for Prince Gallitzin State Park.

It was a brutal ride. At first it was nice, pretty easy riding still between the ridges but hopping out of our nice valley, over a massive ridge was not easy. We conquered hills that we called "the wall," "the roller coaster," and Katy's favorite, "the ski slope." Drafting still helped us all, but it couldn't make up for walls and ski slopes.

[ERIC: "The wall" out of Tyrone, over the Allegheny Front, was probably the single longest climb of the entire NYC-Pittsburgh ride, but we knew it was coming and it wasn't as steep as some of the others so physcologically it wasn't so bad. Also, FYI, there's no easy way over the Allegheny Front. The route out of Tyrone was a good choice because the road was wide and traffic was light.]

The bummer about bicycling up hills is that there's really no way to share the terror with anyone when you retell the story. All you can say is that you went up a really steep hill. If you show them a photo of you pushing your bike up the hill, half the time it doesn't even look like a hill. It just looks like someone inexplicably leaning forward on flat ground. We have lots of photos like these. There is no good way to share the terror. All I can say is, it was very, very hard.

That night proved to be the worst of the whole trip. We saw on our Pennsylvania gazeteer that Prince Gallitzin State Park had camping. So we aimed for it. But it's really a big park. Just before we got there, we passed a strip of private campgrounds. It was dusk. From now on, if I'm ever looking for a campground at dusk, I'll take the first one I see, even if it isn't anywhere near where I thought I'd end up camping.

When Eric and Katy and I saw these private campgrounds, we rolled right on by. I figured camping in a state park would be way better than setting up our tent on a patch of gravel in the middle of a bunch of RV's with blaring televisions.

When we got into the park, we saw a little sign that pointed to camping. We rode a mile or so, and found a group camping site. That's a site that's intended for use by organized groups, like the Boy Scouts. We were tempted to camp there anyway, but we knew that state park wardens are really very strict, and would definitely kick us out if we tried. So we rode on, looking for regular camping.

To make a long, discouraging, aggravating story short, we ended up riding 12 hilly miles! before we found camping that night. On the way, we passed spots like "Headache Hill." We got lost a few times and had to get directions. By the time we found the campsite it was just a few minutes short of dark, and we were all itching to clean up and dive into our sleeping bags.

The check-in office was a drive-through. It was open. As we approached, we noticed a jeep, stopped in the road, with its headlights on. I wondered what was wrong. As we passed, we saw that the jeep was observing deer. Eric and Katy and I had seen lots and lots of deer all throughout the trip. We knew we had maybe 10 more minutes of dim dusk light left, and we didn't want to spend them watching another lousy deer. So we passed, and of course we scared the deer away. The people in the jeep are probably still telling their friends all about three insensitive bike tourists. Then the jeep passed us and beat us to the check in. They spent a long time there, talking about the deer.

Finally it was our turn. Pennsylvania State parks are high tech these days. The check-in clerk had a computer. She wanted all my vital statistics, before she'd allow me to pay for a campsite for the night. I gave her all sorts of information, but refused to give her a phone number. She didn't mind. Then she started to give us a car pass. I was standing over my bike, wearing a helmet, and so were Katy and Eric, yet somehow, after 10 minutes of talking to us, this woman hadn't noticed we were on bikes. I pointed it out. Then she let us go.

We raced into the campground to set up camp. While I was off in the bathroom, Katy and Eric started putting up their tents. A warden came along and started giving them a hard time, because Katy and Eric hadn't yet put up a little sign that the woman at the checkin office had given us as proof of payment. I wasn't there. But it sounds like the warden was a real jerk. After Katy and Eric showed him that we had paid, he launched into this long list of park rules, starting with, "The Governor has declared ...." It sounded comical, though Katy and Eric were not amused.

[ERIC'S DIATRIBE ABOUT STATE PARKS: Pennsylvania state parks are like some bizarre government experiment in American dictatorship. It's one place state legislature can actually tell you how to live you life. The signs don't ever say "please," they always say "must." Just about all vices are forbidden except TV. Church services are provided on Sunday mornings. They have lots and lots of rangers around to enforce the incredible list of rules. They probably have other rangers sitting around somewhere thinking up more rules so they can justify more rangers. They always make me feel like a prisoner with only a limited number of rights and priviledges. It's a long way from the idea that the people of Pennsylvania got together and decided to set some places aside for everyone to use.]

That night, after we all had showers, we cooked some noodles at the campsite. That evening's entertainment was a skunk. The skunk was apparently very accustomed to eating food from campsites. We watched with amusement and a little horror as that skunk terrorized several campsites, one by one, including ours. Twice it strolled nonchalantly by our tents, under our picnic table and on to the next campers.

next: U.S. Chapter 7, the Indiana, PA homestead

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