Horrible Hills, Catawissa, and More Horrible Hills

I did another afternoon bike ride yesterday, this time a 26-mile ride to the Catawissa area. From the neighborhood, I proceeded onto Pennsylvania Route 487 and then Arbutus Park Road, where I left the road and took a shortcut through the fields on the outskirts of Bloomsburg University's Upper Campus. It was only a gentle rise, but on the grass and dirt trails, it was almost as difficult as any major hill. There were some views of Bloomsburg, the Susquehanna River valley, and Catawissa Mountain at a clearing around the 1-mile point. Soon afterwards, the trail arrived at a parking lot and a road descended towards the main campus. Stupidly, I missed the turn for Country Club Drive and ended up detouring through via Route 487 and York Road to get there. Without further incident, I descended into town and headed west on First Street before crossing Fishing Creek into Fernville. From Fernville, I headed west, and crossed Hemlock Creek and entered Montour Township. The first serious climb of the ride came soon afterwards. Unofficially, it's known as Welliver Hill to some, despite the fact that most of the climb is actually on Ridge Road. Officially, it's part of Montour Ridge. I eventually ascended it and then descended Welliver Road into the Dutch Valley. After crossing US Route 11 and Montour Run, a far more difficult hill, Deussen Drive, loomed ahead.

Deussen Drive snaked and switchbacked through a forest and out of the Dutch Valley, climbing about 300 feet in just over half a mile. In peak condition, I might've been able to make it up in one shot, but being as rusty as I was, I ended up stopping twice on the climb. Soon after reaching the top of the hill, Deussen Drive dead-ended into Grovania Drive, which passed a Christmass tree farm and went up and down some rolling hills before making its final steep descent towards Catawissa. I built up a lot of speed on that downhill, though I don't exactly recall how much. From the bottom of Grovania Drive, I crossed the Susquehanna River on a pedestrian bridge alongside Pennsylvania Route 42 and entered Catawissa.

A few side roads on the outskirts of the borough took me to State Route 3016, which made a long and relentless climb into Catawissa Township in the valley of Corn Run. To the left, there were some interesting rock formations; it seemed as if the road might have been blasted out of the side of the valley. To the right, Corn Run rushed through some backyards. The climb wasn't hard at first, but the further I went up the Corn Run valley, the steeper it become. Eventually, the road left Corn Run and began paralleling an unnamed tributary of the stream. Soon, there was a brief reprieve as I reached a small downhill. As I flew down the hill, I passed a steer with massive horns giving me an unfriendly look from behind a wire fence. Steers are like that, I suppose. There was a small uphill and then I reached Route 487 and the neighborhood of Breezy Acres. The climb was over and it hadn't been as bad as I had thought it would be.

After leaving Breezy Acres, I descended Deer Road, a small back road that made a long and forested descend into Main Township and the Catawissa Creek. The mile on Deer Road (the 13th of the whole ride) was the fastest mile of the day and one of the two or three fastest of all time: 2:53. At the end of Deer Road, I began heading west towards Catawissa Township and Catawissa on Sycamore Road, which doubles as BicyclePA Route V. I rode a couple of fast miles, stopping once or twice to gaze upon Catawissa Creek, which flowed briskly at the bottom of the valley. After a while, I came upon a fork in the road, and took the left fork. A slight detour from my original plan, but it was less busy and hilly and even had a covered bridge that spans Catawissa Creek. After crossing the bridge, I followed a road along the creek back towards Catawissa and then crossed Catawissa Creek into the borough proper and spotted a pretty-looking dam from the bridge. Once in Catawissa, I continued following the creek via the unpaved Creek Road. At one point, there were odd stone structures in the middle of the creek. Perhaps a bridge used to be there? At another point, two geese crossed the road and one of them offered its offical opinion of humanity by relieving itself in front of me. Creek Road eventually swung around into the more urban part of Catawissa and I crossed the bridge over the Susquehanna River again.

I stopped and had a drink before tackling Grovania Drive. It was far harder than Deussen Drive, perhaps because I'd covered close to 18 miles by that point. I had to stop twice on the way up. From there, I descended Deussen Drive, carefully maneuvering around the switchbacks and applying the breaks until the very end. A long line of traffic at Route 11 gave me an excuse to rest for a minute, but I was soon on my way up a small climb up Welliver Drive. That climb was definitely made more difficult by all the miles I'd done by then. After that was the descent down Ridge Road towards Fernville. I then crossed Fishing Creek again and passed through Bloomsburg. Somehow, I ended up
on Ridge Ave instead of First Street and had to climb North Street to get back to first street. North Street climbed maybe 50 feet in the space of, well, about 50 feet. Not really the kind of thing I wanted to do after riding 22-ish miles already. After that, headed up to Upper Campus. It wouldn't have been that hard of a climb, but I was getting really tired and had to stop once on the way up. Fortunately, it was mostly level or downhill after that. I rode back through the grass and dirt
paths on Arbutus Park Road, scattering a herd of deer in the process.

From Arbutus Park Road, it was an easy half mile along Route 487 and through the neighborhood. My total time was 2:10:33 and my pace was 5:01/mile. Six or seven months ago, I could've done that distance at a 4:30 pace and not even been dead beat. Hopefully, it'll come again in time.



View Larger Map