Great Allegheny Passage || Day 7 || 48.6 miles
- Date: June 20, 2022
- Start: Husky Haven Campground (GAP Mile 43.4)
- End: Connellsville KOA Campground (GAP Mile 92)
- Cumulative Distance: 276.5 miles
The lovely water feature (aka the drainage pipe) near my campsite at Husky Haven Campground did its job – making just enough white noise that I slept like a baby. Even though I woke briefly to the sound of train horns across the river, the gurgle of the water always lulled me back to sleep like a champ.
I’d been expecting the cold front that came in yesterday to continue for another day, and I wasn’t disappointed. The overnight temperatures to dropped down to a brisk 50°F, and I was glad I’d had the forethought to wear a lightweight jacket as well as a buff over my ears to keep me warm during the night.
This simple strategy seemed to work well, because I didn’t feel cold at all. That is, until I had to abandon the comfort of my down quilt to walk over to the port-a-potty early this morning.
As I nestled back into my quilt, I relished the quiet surroundings in the campground. There had only been one other cyclist staying overnight and we hadn’t said a word to each other. He was already zipped up in his tent when I returned from the brewery near dusk yesterday, so I’d eaten my not-so-fancy dinner (courtesy of the local Dollar General) all by myself and then gone to bed listening to an audiobook.
I briefly saw him again early this morning as I was returning to my tent from the port-a-potty. He’d quietly packed up his things to join a larger group of cyclists – probably a dozen of them in total – who were waiting for him at the edge of the trail and peering down onto the campground at 7 a.m.
Once he departed though, I was completely all alone. No noisy campers or kids riding up and down the trail. No wildlife. Just me and my thoughts.
And so, I lingered in my tent later than normal, reading a book and lounging because I was planning another easy day on the GAP. It was only 29 miles to Ohiopyle State Park where I was headed for the evening. My tentative plan for the day was to stop for lunch in the town Confluence after an 18-mile morning, and then cruise in the state park with lots of time to explore the local area.
And so, it was well after 8 a.m. when I finally decided to pack up my gear and roll north out of the campground.
Poor timing
A number of tiny raindrops fell on me as I rode down the groomed trail, and I still wearing my jacket because the air was so nippy. Yet the thing that stood out the most to me was how much easier the GAP was this morning, with its flat, gentle downward slope. Yesterday morning tired my legs immensely as I rode the incline to the Eastern Continental Divide, but today – I feel like I was flying down the path.
I crossed the Casselman River multiple times, and when I got near the town of Markleton, I came to the Pinkerton Tunnel. The GAP forked here, providing cyclists with a choose-your-own-adventure set of options.
One possibility was a short tunnel through the Pinkerton Horn, a hilly and narrow peninsula formed by a hairpin bend in the Casselman River. Both ends of the tunnel were flanked by bridges over the river, and the tunnel had to be stabilized with giant pieces of corrugated metal in 2015 to prevent it from collapsing on itself.
Or, in the alternative, riders could use a scenic 1.5-mile bypass trail to go around the Pinkerton Horn through the nearby railroad shoofly (temporary route) built for the nearby B&O line back in 1871.
Both options were appealing, but I chose the shorter path – over a bridge and through the tunnel and then another bridge – just to enjoy the novelty of this unlit portal through the horn.
The relative easy conditions this morning put me into a bit of an unusual spot. I’d been just tooling along a nice pace, and surprised myself by rolling into the town of Confluence at 10:15 a.m. – well before lunchtime.
I might have normally whiled away the extra time with a cup of hot coffee somewhere or exploring the town, but that wasn’t really an option here in Confluence. It was a Monday, and nothing in town was currently open! In fact, the handful of places that did have business hours today wouldn’t even open until 11 am.
As I weighed my options, my eyes darted up to the trail sign that showed the town of Ohiopyle was just a mere 10 miles further north. I could pedal there instead. According to my guidebook, Ohiopyle was a much bigger tourist destination. And it appeared as if that all of Ohiopyle’s coffeehouse and restaurants were all open today. I’d have my pick of places to patronize if I just pressed on another hour down the trail.
And so, I said goodbye to Confluence. It looked like a cute town to visit, but my timing was just off. I’d had the misfortune of rolling through on a Monday.
Ohiopyle
The scenery changed a bit once I passed Confluence, which got its name because of where it sat at the confluence of Laurel Hill Creek and the Casselman and Youghigheny Rivers. I was now paralleling the expanse of the mighty Youghigheny, which I’d follow for the next 70 miles.
The Youghigheny River (pronounced Yawk-a-gay-nee), was quite the popular place for water activities too. I noted several vans and trailers from rafting outfitters parked in the small riverside lots beside the GAP. And even though it was a bit cool today for a water adventure, it appeared as if lots of people clamoring to get out on the river this summer.
I continued riding north, counting down the mileposts until Ohiopyle. I’d only had a light breakfast back at the campground, and I could feel my stomach was grumbling. It felt as if the distance between the markers was getting just a little bit longer with each mile, and I wondered whether it had been a wise decision to try to push myself 28 miles before lunch.
When I eventually reached town, I was greeted by another refurbished train depot. Like many of the other train stations I’d passed on the GAP, this one had been lovingly overhauled and turned into visitor center with public bathrooms. Inside the building, there was even information about the attractions in and around Ohiopyle, including tour to Frank Lloyd Wright’s nearby Fallingwater and Kentuck Knob.
Ohiopyle
I was now in the right in the midst of Laurel Highlands, one of the more scenic and popular outdoor spot in the state, and Ohiopyle was filled with families and tourists alike. Though the town was small, it had a coffeehouse, ice cream shop, and several restaurants with people queuing up to order food.
I went to the quietest place I could find, and settled in for a sandwich and beer near a charging outlet and let my butt rest. I’d cycled 28 miles before lunch and was only about a mile from the campground where I planned to stop to the night.
I didn’t have a reservation at Ohiopyle State Park though. I’d checked online yesterday and there seemed to be plenty of availability. But as I sat there eating my lunch and contemplating my afternoon, I wasn’t sure I was in the mood to just set up camp and go see a bunch of waterfalls like everyone else who’d driven here. I think I wanted to keep riding.
Connellsville was just another 17 miles up the trail. There was a free hiker-biker camp on the far edge of town, or I could push another 3 miles beyond that to a KOA campground with showers and laundry.
I didn’t need to do laundry just yet. It had been so cool out the last two days that I’d barely broken a sweat. But a shower sounded nice. And it would probably be a lot less overwhelming for me to camp there than in Ohiopyle State Park with all the young kids running around enjoying their freedom.
And so I rode on, following a bridge over the Youghigheny and back into the green tunnel of southern Pennsylvania.
Trail maintenance
I mentally prepared my myself for the afternoon’s ride with a plan. I knew the fatigue would hit me eventually and I’d need more and more breaks to rest my butt. So I was going to take a nice long break ten miles up the trail, then I’d ride the rest of my way to Connellsville from there.
I was only about eight miles into the ride, when a couple on bicycles heading toward me shouted a warning about some loose gravel ahead. That gesture was kind of them, so I slowed down to make sure I didn’t hit it too fast.
I didn’t see the gravel they were talking about during the next half mile, and I was beginning to wonder if it was just on their side of the trail.
Then I finally hit it.
The issue wasn’t actually some random loose gravel as I’d been expecting. It was four new inches of base material on the path. The trail was being rebuilt here with a soft layer of sandy base material that was semi-compacted, but still loose enough to make cycling over it more akin to being at the beach than on a trail.
I suspected this sand was just the first layer, and a second layer of larger crushed aggregate would eventually go over it to make it more like the trail I’d been riding on since Cumberland.
Yet the slow, soft material seemed to go on forever and my quad muscles were burning up trying to pedal through it. After nearly a mile, I saw the trucks and roller ahead of me. Whew! I was almost to the end of this nonsense.
How bad is the C&O?
Another cyclist was stopped behind the construction equipment, and I didn’t know if he was waiting to go around them (since the dump truck took up the entire width of the trail) or whether he had just competed his bypass.
I stopped to chat to him and learned his name was Raymond and he was from North Carolina. He was riding from Pittsburgh to D.C., and he told me this was where the construction ended (or where it began depending on which direction you were headed.)
As we stood aside out bikes talking, Raymond asked me a few questions about what lie ahead for him. Like several other cyclists I’d crossed paths with on this journey, he was very concerned about the trail conditions on the C&O. He’d read they were horrible.
This comment surprised me – once again! He’s at least the fourth person who’s expressed this concern. I don’t know if there’s a cycling forum out there spreading this rumors about the the trail conditions or if it’s just fear mongering. But honestly, I didn’t think the C&O was bad at all.
Sure there were places here and there that could have been better. And it did get a bit slick in the rain. But it’s a trail, not a sidewalk. It was totally fine. After all, if I (a truly novice cyclist) could do it, then it couldn’t be all that difficult, right?
I said goodbye to Raymond before carefully worked my way beside the truck that was currently dumping the soft dirt onto the trail ahead of me. The construction equipment was so wide it took up the entire width of the GAP, so I had to carefully push my heavy bike off-trail to bypass the equipment, while hoping that none of the branches or debris on the side of the trail punctured my tires.
On the far side of the equipment, a large truck was slowly dumping its contents onto the trail, and two more dump trucks filled with more soft sand were lined up patiently waiting to empty their loads too.
I slowly maneuvered by while trying to scout for somewhere to rest. My legs were toast, and I was well past my 10-mile rest point for the afternoon. I hadn’t anticipated I’d be encountering a construction zone when I made my rest plan on the way out of Ohiopyle.
I cycled up the trail hoping I’d see a bench where I could prop my bike and sit for a spell. Unfortunately, the first bench I came upon was filled by a lady and all her fishing gear. So I peddled onward.
About a half mile later, I finally found an empty bench and hopped off my bike for some much-needed rest. I was barely there a few minutes though, when two (now-empty) dump trucks came flying up the trail going at least 35-40 mph and kicking dust up into the air! What an afternoon.
I guess that was my signal to keep moving. If I wanted to rest without inhaling a lungful of dirt, I’d need to just get myself to camp and do it there.
Connellsville
I was nearly to the town of Connellsville, when a lady on a bench beside the trail began to wave me down. Figuring she might need assistance, I rolled my bike to a stop in front of her and asked if everything was ok.
The woman immediately pulled out here clipboard and started to introduce herself. She said was doing a survey on GAP usage and trying to get metrics for all the people coming by. How many people were there? Were they on foot or on bike? What distance were they traveling on the trail? And where did they call home?
I think I might have made this demographer’s day when I told her I was from Eugene, Oregon. That was the farthest distance away for any trail user she encountered that day. After answering her question, I waved goodbye to her. But I secretly wished I could see her face in a day or two from now when Bridget rode by and announced she came all the way here from Germany!
The last few miles of my afternoon took me on a paved path thru Connellsville, past several interesting murals, a park with an old cabin, and then to the hiker-biker campsites on the edge of town.
The hiker-biker camp actually looked pretty nice and had three Adirondack style cabins on it. A female cyclist had her tent set up inside one of the cabins (tsk, tsk – apparently she didn’t know shelter etiquette), and I almost wished I’d stopped there for the night. But I’d already mentally decided to push on to Mile 92 – to the private KOA campground – where a warm shower was calling my name.
It was after 4 p.m. when I finally made it around the wide bend in the Youghigheny River and to the KOA campground that I’ve been aiming for all afternoon.
I’ve stayed at dozens of KOAs while were traveling full-time in our our RV from 2018 to 2021, and I’ve found them to be consistently clean, well-maintained and family-friendly. This campground was no exception. They had a giant outdoor pool filled with kids, a camp store, and plenty of level green space to set up a tent.
It would have been impossible to miss the campground too. It literally straddled the GAP, with most of the campground amenities on one side of the trail and a large portion of RV and tent campsites on the other side.
I was the first cyclist to arrive this afternoon, so I had my pick of where I wanted to set up my tent for the night. But it wasn’t long before I was joined by two other cyclists, John and Chris from New York City.
They were riding the opposite direction – from Pittsburgh to D.C. – and just started the GAP this morning! Here I was, proud of myself for riding nearly 50 miles today, and they’d ridden 60 miles on their very first day! Talk about impressive.
And so, the three of us sat at a picnic table as the sun went down, chatting about different adventures and sharing the bottle of wine that John and Chris lugged out of town.
They were also eager to hear about what lay ahead for them on the rest of the trail. What had I experienced? What towns should they definitely stop and visit? But their biggest question of all… “Were the conditions on the C&O really as bad as everyone said they were?”
Sigh!
Highlights
- Ohiopyle was the perfect lunch spot today, and I plan to return after this trip ends just to spend some extra time visiting the iconic Frank Lloyd Wright homes nearby.
- I loved seeing the survey demographer’s eyes light up when she asked where I was from. I suspect 99% of the GAP users live within 100 miles of the trail. So telling her I’d come all the way from Oregon to enjoy the experience seemed to really make her day.
- The evening camaraderie with Chris and John was just what I needed. I love traveling solo, but I definitely relish the chance to talk to others and share my day when I’m relaxing in camp.
Challenges
- It was a little disheartening to arrive in Confluence earlier than expected this morning, only to discover that nothing seemed to be open on Mondays. Luckily Ohiopyle was there to save the day.
- Trying to make through the one mile of trail that was under construction! Not only was the soft sandy material extremely difficult to ride on, but the dump trucks racing by at 35 mph were downright scary!