Vampire Road and other places near that thing
I’ve been trying to ride a bit to get used to riding a bit. Tuesday I did 200ish miles, from here to Altoona and back again.
Yeah, I was just in Altoona. And yeah, I saw some things that I had already seen. But I also saw things that I missed. And mostly, I just had a good ride.
The night before, I printed out the directions and that morning I taped them to my scooter. This was also a dry run for how things will work on Scoot 66. The taping of the directions to my headset will be a daily ritual. Most days I’ll be able to fit everything on it. Some days will require some changing midway through.
I left around 11:30am. It was still pretty cold. The thermometer on the scooter read 48 degrees. However, the thermometer reads about 2 – 5 degrees warmer than it actually is. As I rode through Mifflinburg, it climbed to 50. But as I made my way through the hills of the west end of Union County, it dropped to 44.
I’ve always liked the ride between Mifflinburg and State College area. It’s quaint and the road has changed little since the late 1700’s. There is even a mile marker from 1798, preserved with a plaque. It claims there’s another five miles west, but I couldn’t find it. The original road ran from Youngstown (Mifflinburg) to Old Fort (just south of Centre Hall). It’s kind of surprising that two mile markers remain.
I’ve driven and even ridden the section between Mifflinburg and Boalsburg (just south of State College) many times. However, the section of Route 45 that extends west from Boalsburg to its western terminus in a town called Water Street was entirely new to me.
Route 45, after it crosses the Bald Eagle State Forest, is straight and flat until it reaches Boalsburg. Then it runs through hills and over streams, eventually twisting through a one-lane railroad underpass.
With Route 45 behind me, I got to test my directions. One thing I realized is that GoogleMaps, which I used to map out this excursion, isn’t entirely accurate. Thankfully, I’ve got an ok sense of direction. GoogleMaps tells me that Route 45 goes to US 22. That’s not true. They’re connected by Route 453. I didn’t know that, but figured it out.
Having just come through the mountains to an even higher elevation, I was cold. Really cold. It was 1pm and the temperature hadn’t climbed a bit. My brain was mostly focused on the cold and I got a bit lost.
There was some confusion heading through Hollidaysburg as well. Things on a map and things in real life are often two very different things. No amount of planning can change that. Routes 22 and 220 have been drastically changed since the last time I was through here. I was looking for (and found) Old Route 22.
There’s an even older alignment that I missed due to me being a bit confused. It’s now called Foot of Ten Road and runs by the foot of the Number 10 incline plane of the Allegheny Portage Railroad. This is a pretty fascinating thing which I’ve never really looked into. Someday, I guess.
Old US 22 heads west through Cresson, my first destination. Last time I was through here I stopped in Gallitzen to look at a couple of train tunnels. I was also looking for Vampire Road, but simply couldn’t find it. Since then I had rechecked a map and knew exactly where it was. I was within 20 feet of it last time.
This time, I drove the entire two mile length of it. What does it have to do with Vampires? Beats me. I’d love to find out. What’s weird is that the fine folks who live along Vampire Road seem to not care that it’s called Vampire Road. I mean, if I were blessed with an address of “Vampire Road,” I’d proudly proclaim it. These folks have basically named their driveways things like “Meadowbrook Road” so that the sigma of “Vampire Road” will haunt them no more.
Whatever. These people are dumb.
No trip to this neck of the woods would be complete without a stop at Horseshoe Curve. By this time the sun was out and I was warming up. Just as I pulled in, I heard the rumblings of a train. Sure enough, just as I parked my scooter, a train came in from the east.
This time, the museum was open. I poked around in there a bit and picked up a time table for when the trains were coming through. This place was busier than I thought.
Another train passed as I was climbing the stairs. Also, climbing the stairs showed me (yet again) how amazingly out of shape I am. Thanks, stairs!
Up top, at the park where you watch the trains, four old guys sat talking about railroading and the curve. I didn’t join them. Part of me wanted to, but I just kept to myself.
I moved to the rear of the park and heard a train whistle in the distance. A few minutes later I heard rumbling, but couldn’t tell if it was coming from the east or the west. It got louder and I thought I was hearing an echo as I swore (to myself, though I would have sworn to the four old guys if I had the chance) that the sound was coming from both the east and the west.
A few minutes later would prove me right.
I had the wonderful (to me) fortunate of seeing two trains passing each other at Horseshoe Curve. Now, I realize that pretty much nobody reading this is all super excited about the opportunity to see two trains passing each other at Horseshoe Curve. And that’s fine. I totally understand that. But for me, it was the bee’s knees. Why? I have no idea. But I dug it quite well.
After that excitement, it was quite awhile until another train showed up. During that time I thought it would be fun if I called Sarah to see if she could see me on Horseshoe Curve’s web cam.
No such luck. They have it set so that you can see the trains quite well, but simply can’t see the people watching the trains. This is a bad things since half the fun of watching trains is watching the people who watch trains.
Horseshoe Curve was closing and it was time for me to start heading back. I put my camera in my pocket, hopped on the bike and rode away.
Heading into Altoona, I noticed that my camera was in my pocket. This was a bad thing since it can easily fall out of that pocket. Usually, it’s in my glovebox. I needed to get gas, so I figured I’d just move it to the glovebox when I stopped.
And when I stopped, I stuck my hand in my pocket… and no camera. SHIT! That’s right, it fell out somewhere in the streets of Altoona. I gassed up, hopped back on and retraced my steps. After a few turns, what did I see? That’s right, my camera lying face up in the middle of the street. I pulled over, picked it up. It was pretty beaten up. Luckily, it’s got a metal body. It survived. Everything worked just find on it. I was very amazed.
What didn’t amazing me, however, were the ridiculously craptastic directions GoogleMaps gave me to get through Altoona. I got very very lost. The roads I was told to look for didn’t exist and the ones that did exist, weren’t named what I thought they were going to be named.
I knew which direction I needed to be heading in, so when I took PA 36 North, after a few miles, I realized that it was bearing to the west a bit too much. I turned around and somehow found a road called Old Sixth Street. Old roads are a love of mine (have you noticed?), so I took it north as far as it would go. I knew I was a bit west of where I needed to be, but I wasn’t getting any wester, so I seemed to be paralleling my intended route.
My next stop was the town of Bellwood. Old Sixth went right into it! So all I had to do was find the road I needed and I’d be back on track. Without too much hassle, I found the road, PA 865 East. I took that, dipped under the new I-99, took a left and was on a steep cliff-side road on my way to Fort Roberdeau, a fort from the late 1700’s.
According to GoogleMaps, there is a road called “Hobbit Hollow Road” just off of the road I was on. Saddly, many of the roads weren’t marked. Maybe next time I’ll do some more exploring.
A few miles later and I got to the fort. I had been there before, or so I thought, but had no real recollection of it looking like this. It was really well done!
To my dismay, the fort wasn’t open. I couldn’t even get inside the stockade. It opens May 1. Maybe someday I’ll see it. Last time I was there, it was just a tall stockade with nothing much around it. I didn’t even look like the same fort. Hm. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe I’m thinking of something else. Who knows.
The sun was dipping lower in the sky, so I had to hurry home.
In my haste, while retracing my steps, I took a wrong turn. Again, I knew it was a wrong turn a few miles after I took it, but saw that I was going in the right direction, so kept going. I should have come out at Bellwood, where I began this side trip. But instead, I came out perhaps six miles north, in near Tyrone. I saw a sign pointing me to Tyrone and I was soon back on my original road, in this case, the Appalachian Throughway.
Construction upon I-99 has really messed everything up. However, I didn’t get lost again. I thought I was lost, but it turns out that I wasn’t. Go figure!
Pennsylvania certainly doesn’t make things easy on me. I was following PA 144, south from Bellfonte, heading towards Centre Hall, when I saw a sign telling me that 144 South goes straight… and goes right. What do I do here?
Well, what I did was went straight. Going right just didn’t seem, well, right.
And what do you know, I was right. In very little time, I was on PA 192 heading east back to Mifflinburg. The temperature was again dropping, especially as I climbed the mountains near Halfway Dam.
By the time I got home, nearing 8pm, I was fully chilled. Not quite cold, but the coldness was setting in. After 200 miles I was ready to call it a day.
