Confluence Based

4.16.2016 25m Conf-Ohiopyle r/t
4.17 38m Conf-Rockwood r/t
mtd:88 ytd:421

Spent two days based in Confluence, PA, at the Outflow Campground. This is a very nice campground; on Saturday night it was quite full, and on Sunday it was only lightly occupied. Bike-in camping is $5/night until May 1st, which is a great deal. Real bathrooms with hot water; the showers building opens on May1.

Saturday I rode with BillM from Confluence to Ohiopyle and back, and it was a real treat to ride with somebody who knows the local history. He'd point out a pile of timbers and earth and explain that it was used to dump small carts of coal into trains below, stuff like that. Saw that there's a Duro-style tool workstation at the Ramcat trailhead now (so cool).

BillM is the most courteous of cyclists, offering assistance or information to others widely, but as we were riding his voice went kind of deep and he said to me: "don't make eye contact, don't speak, definitely don't stop" and when I'm in somebody else's neighborhood I listen to them. An opposite direction cyclist rolled by with something on the back of his bike that to me, looked like a portable ADF antenna. Later in the day, I saw the good folks at Confluence Cyclery took a picture of his rig:

Bill shows me trillium, and skunk cabbage, and an avalanche tube, explained how the remaining big rocks were all sandstone that didn't erode, and showed me a parking spot for a draisine which was very cool.

It seems like Confluence has a few restaurants that won't be opening in the spring- Sweeties and Shermans, for instance. The overnight at Confluence's Outflow Campground was very quiet after around 9pm.

Sunday I rode up to Rockwood, had lunch, and reversed. Saw this cyclist on a penny-farthing.


I love the Pinkerton Tunnel. I do think one of the portals would be a great place for a tools workstation; it's in the middle of so much nothing. I also learned that these posts in the Confluence campground are for hammocks; very cool.

S24O at Boggs Trailhead, Montour Trail

10/18/12 m

Wednesday night to Thursday morning I camped at the Boggs Trailhead of the Montour Trail, a S24O (sub 24-hour overnight) as a shakedown for an upcoming trip.

Boggs has been my long-standing fave trailhead, it's just a very pretty place, quiet and with fast highway access; it works in a lot of ways. They've recently added a hiker/biker campground that includes a table and benches, a fire pit, a supply of firewood (how cool is that), a tent site, and there's also the porta-john that was previously at the trailhead. Really the only thing that's missing (besides a Wifi-G hotspot) is a water supply, the nearest water is about 2 miles down the trail at MP13.5~ish.

I wasn't feeling very good on Tuesday-Wednesday, so I opted to make this a car ride to the campsite; R. rode his Rivendell.

Met R. at the campsite at around 5pm Wednesday, so we'd both have enough time to set up our gear and go through our learning curves before it got dark. It took me a few tries to shake out the mental cobwebs and get the rigging on the hammock quite right so I was glad we got out there early.

This was my first time using my Big Agnes sleeping bag (Lost Ranger, +15F, long version) which is built to accommodate an integrated air pad in the bottom.

Setting up camp went well. Cooking dinner went well, I was working with a JetBoil and made chicken-flavored rice and R was working with an Esbit stove and had soup, and we had Starbucks Via and cookies for dessert.

Turns out you can Bluetooth-tether a 'droid 3G phone with a 'droid tablet and surf the web, but it does use up the phone battery. It was a great night for camping, clear skies and lots of stars, light wind, no rain.

I really like the combination pad-bag for the hammock, it keeps everything from sliding around and getting astray. The temperature got down to 48F, and the bag was very comfortable.

There is a landfill adjacent to the trail, and there were trucks coming and going through the evening. Woke up at sunrise and it took us about 1+30 to have breakfast and break camp. Coffee is a wondrous thing on a cold morning.