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After all the morning stress of getting my bike fixed (see day 1), we were looking at yet another 1pm ride start. The plan had been to ride the western portions of the UnPAved of the Susquehanna Full course. Even with the Purple Lizard map I'd picked up at the shop, we weren't sure how we would shorten the route to meet our time allotment--too many gated/deadend roads, unknown road conditions, missing bridges, etc. We headed out, deciding we'd figure it out as we go.
We parked at the little community park in tiny Coburn and started with a bit of pavement. We actually saw three road riders rip past as we turned onto the road, as well as signs warning of bikes on the road. Thanks to Strava's FlyBy feature, Dad later discovered one of the riders, who had labeled the ride "B.G.C." but we've been unable to determine what that meant. We hit the first gravel climb pretty quickly, but almost as quickly were rewarded with our first scenic vista, which was nice. There were a few of these today and generally some more interesting features, but again I was kind of disappointed that we spent most of the day in the tunnel of trees without much else to look at. Other than a few motorcyclists, several cars, and a tree crew, we didn't see many people all day either.
We descended into Poe Paddy St Park and filled bottles, then headed out for another climb. It still shocks me how low the elevation numbers seem for the trip; I would've guessed we were well over 100ft/mi each day, but we were right in that range. I guess I'm just not used to having miles long climbs balanced out by miles long descents!
The roads in Bald Eagle State Forest were generally quite nice--lots of hero gravel and hardpack. As we got to the farthest point of the route, though, we decided to start shortcutting and this is where things went south. Even though the signage said 4WD was only "recommended" Stone Mountain Road proved to be quite technical and challenging. We crawled up the climb and down the descent, as both were strewn with large, loose rocks kicked up by motorcycles and ATVs. It was a bit demoralizing. After rejoining the race route and backtracking to Poe Paddy we had to decide again: keep backtracking and face a 1000+ foot climb back to the car, or gamble and cross the river on the one remaining bridge (formerly RR, now rail trail) and see what the eastern side of things yielded. We decided for the latter, even though we had no idea of the distance (I guesstimated at 15; a park ranger thought 6!) and daylight was waning.
We crossed the old bridge (pretty river, but no trestle or anything) and went through the tunnel (nicely restored, but disappointingly short) and quickly completed the rail trail segment. Rejoining gravel roads, we thought we'd be ok, as the Purple Lizard map had them all categorized as regular gravel, no double-track, etc. Wrong. After only a few miles we turned on to a much rockier road and started climbing--slow going again! A quicker descent thankfully followed, but we were mentally spent at this time after a short, poor night's sleep, all the stress of getting the bike fixed, the late start, the constant re-routes resulting in poor road conditions, etc. That said, we were both surprised that our legs kept responding--thank goodness! We came across unexpected gates (misread the map) and private property, and were bummed to discover the last climb, which was supposed to be paved, was not. Finally we rejoined the paved road back into Coburn and made it back to the car as the sun was setting.
At this point it was past 8 and we just wanted food, showers, and bed. We decided to drive back before eating. We went to the Broken Axe Brewhouse, which was quite nice and had a fun live trio playing some great covers. It was hard to enjoy, though. I was in a pretty bad funk, had a stomach unsure what it wanted, the food took too long to come (but was yummy!), and I just wanted to be in bed (so badly that when we got home I nearly crawled in before realizing I still had to shower!). We also had to take time to figure out what to do the next morning, as we'd realized over the last two days that we had grossly overestimated our pace (10mph was actually a challenge!) and the planned route would be too long to get home at the desired time. We planned this together, struggling to cut enough length to fit the time window, and though I didn't say it, I was honestly hoping Dad would say he'd rather just go home. He didn't, though! Another bedtime past 11, with no relaxing time--not what we had hoped for...
By: | Eric Tippett |
Started in: | Centre County, PA, US |
Distance: | 55.0 mi |
Selected: | 55.0 mi |
Elevation: | + 5314 / - 5336 ft |
Moving Time: | 05:37:44 |
Page Views: | 185 |
Departed: | Aug 24, 2019, 1:12 pm |
Starts in: | Centre County, PA, US |
Distance: | 55.0 mi |
Selected distance: | 55.0 mi |
Elevation: | + 5314 / - 5336 ft |
Max Grade: | |
Avg Grade | |
Cat | |
FIETS | |
VAM | |
Ascent time | |
Descent time | |
Total Duration: | 06:49:22 |
Selection Duration: | 24562 |
Moving Time: | 05:37:44 |
Selection Moving Time: | 05:37:44 |
Stopped Time: | 01:11:38 |
Calories: | 4236 |
Max Watts: | |
Avg Watts: | 211 |
WR Power | |
Work | |
Max Speed: | 26.8 mph |
Avg Speed: | 9.8 mph |
Pace: | 00:07:26 |
Moving Pace: | 00:06:08 |
Max Cadence: | 245 rpm |
Min Cadence: | 10 rpm |
Avg Cadence: | 67 rpm |
Max HR: | 172 bpm |
Min HR: | 85 bpm |
Avg HR: | 139 bpm |
Heartrate zones: | |
Zone 1: | 27 minutes |
Zone 2: | 32 minutes |
Zone 3: | 1 hour 2 minutes |
Zone 4: | 1 hour 53 minutes |
Zone 5: | 10 minutes |
Best format for turn-by-turn directions on modern Garmin Edge Devices
Best format for turn by turn directions on Edge 500, 510. Will provide true turn by turn navigation on Edge 800, 810, 1000, Touring including custom cue entries. Great for training when we release those features. Not currently optimal for Virtual Partner.
Useful for uploading your activity to another service, keeping records on your own computer etc.
Useful for any GPS unit. Contains no cuesheet entries, only track information (breadcrumb trail). Will provide turn by turn directions (true navigation) on the Edge 705/800/810/1000/Touring, but will not have any custom cues. Works great for Mio Cyclo. Find GPS specific help in our help system.
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