Working on the Railroad

07/13/12 239# 42m

Rode on the Montour Trail, starting at Boggs at 0600 and riding to McMurray and world-famous FarmHouse Coffee. This morning's weather was a pleasant change, a bit cooler and overcast skies. It appears that the fracking wastewater processing plant near Boggs has been removed, leaving a very X-Files-ish scene where something used to be.

Encountered a detour just north of Route 50 / Venice for the installation of fence between the trail and the rail line.

At the two new bridges at Morganza Road and Georgetown Road the trail is (re)surfaced all the way up to the new bridge decks, it looks very nice and might just need a light rain to help settle the limestone.

Stopped at FarmHouse Coffee. Indulged in a ham/swiss/two-egg croissant and coffee, very very good. Back on the trail, folks were posting announcements for a July 27 Twilight Walk, which may (or may not) include extremely attractive, romantic young vampires.

Travel was halted north of Route 50 / Venice because of rail construction. The new rail line was being used to shuttle additional track segments down to a site where even more track was being set in place. For all the talk of self-building robots in recent years, this almost seems like a self-building railroad; once they get a bit of train track, they use that to build more.

In the photo below, temporary carriages travelling along the new rail line are supporting parallel rows of new track; the entire assembly moves back and forth along the track (and across road and trail crossings) as the track is laid.



A minor kvetch, but there were two different work crews - the fence installers, and the track installers, and between them they closed both possible routes along the trail. But the forced wait was only about twenty minutes, they were clearly working at it, and the time passed and it was back on the bike.

An easy ride back to Boggs, it was nice to get the ride in early. 42 miles.

Tree Down; Coffeeneuring Confirmed

11/04/11 #235 21m

50F. Rode 21 miles on the Montour Trail, from Boggs to Route 50 and back. Encountered a tree down across the trail right at milepost 16, but you could work your way through it. The new trail surface between MP14 and MP12 is a thing of beauty. A brilliant blue, mild day.

Officially recognized by MG of Chasing Mailboxes as successfully completing the Coffeeneuring Challenge, which involves rides of at least two miles to seven different coffee shops over the course of the past six weeks. Riding your bike to coffee- finally, something I'm naturally inclined to do. Thanks to MG for organizing the Challenge.

Boggs to Farmhouse Coffee

10/31/11 #234 43miles

Rode 43 miles on the Montour Trail in 45F.

I started off at my fave LBS (local bike shop) the Ambridge Bike Shop, where they quickly set my left bar-con shifter right and sent me on my way. I placed an order for my Christmas present, a new ABS bicycle kit. You've got to support your local bike shop.

I planned to start at the Boggs Trailhead riding west. The name 'Boggs' has prompted me to shut off my Droid phone's auto-spellchecking because it turns Boggs into something unfortunate.

It was 43F when I started, and I've come to realize that I need to dress differently for every ten degrees - 45 is very different from 35 or 55. Today I started in my bicycling shorts (no overpants), an UnderArmor ColdGear shirt, my helmet cover, and lightweight full-fingered gloves.

There's a lot of improvement work being done to the trail west of Boggs, between MP12 and MP14 - new drainage, grading, and in places they're redoing the bed of packed limestone. There were quite a few volunteers out working.

The received wisdom is that you're supposed to be cold for the first few miles and then you'll warm up, but I was quite chilly after six miles so I added a jacket.

Around MP20 there's a lot of clearing and bulldozing to prepare for the new railway servicing the Marcellus Shale frac-water. I've been told that the train tracks are going to be placed over the existing trail (which was, of course, a trackbed) and that a new trail will be built next to the tracks.

I rendezvoused with R. around Route 50 and we rode south together. The National Tunnel is awesome but there's water continually dripping from the ceiling, and once the temps move into freezing you really can't safely traverse the tunnel so I was glad to get out there again before it's unusable over the winter.

At Morganza Road the trail detours for the construction of two bridges, and the detour (on a small road) takes quite a bit longer than I'd have expected. Then you use an underpass to go below the trail and onto the golf course side of things, and join the trail there. It's well laid out and well marked.

We continued to trailside FarmHouse Coffee, a favorite stop. I had hot chocolate and a doughnut. It was nice to get inside a warm up, and we lingered a while.

When we got back on the bikes and reversed course we could feel the rain beginning, and as we continued on I realized I wasn't feeling very well in a blood-sugar sort of way, a bit lightheaded and dizzy, so we stopped for a while. R was very patient, and after a respite we got back on the bikes.

Just before the National Tunnel I felt better again, I think the hot chocolate may not have been a smart move on my part, I believe I had a sugar rush and an insulin crash from it.

We finished the ride in a light drizzle, I was glad to have the helmet cover on and the ride was really pretty comfortable. I got back to Boggs at 6pm, a little before sunset, and I was impressed to see an Allegheny County police vehicle checking on the trailhead as I left. Those trailheads are pretty isolated places and it can't hurt to have an occasional check.

It was a great ride.