A Warm Frosty Valley Ride

It's been getting warmer again (73 degrees according to my Garmin) and I rode 25.3 miles in the rather oddly named Frosty Valley in the afternoon. As is usual with my rides that go into Bloomsburg, I rode over to Arbutus Park Road and took the unnamed grassy paths to Upper Campus. Despite having only a gentle rise, the paths were as hard as any major hill. Probably because of all the long grass. After about a quarter of a mile, I passed a row of hedges and the grass became a lot shorter and more rideable. Soon after that, around the one-mile point, I came to the clearing with one of my favorite views.

 

Looking southwest from the clearing

Soon after that, I got back onto pavement again and rode down into town, along First Street and then briefly on Main Street, and then briefly on Railroad Street. Town riding can be interesting at times, but it's annoying to stop at every other intersection and wait for traffic. Slows me down a lot. From Railroad Street, I crossed Fishing Creek into Fernville.

Fishing Creek. The summer colors are beginning to come back.

After Fernville, I headed north on Red Mill Road alongside Hemlock Creek. It doesn't look like a hill on Google Terrain View, but it is a long, slow climb. There seemed to be a lot of insects about; at one point a small but vicious-looking black insect landed on me and I had to stop and shake it off. I also passed by the very hilly Foxtail neighborhood, which might be worth exploring on a short ride. I eventually turned off Red Mill Road onto Frosty Valley Road, where I would spent the next five miles. The road crossed Pennsylvania Route 42 and began a fast descent to Hemlock Creek. At the bottom of the hill, the road began rising very slowly rising, with an occasional small descent. The road mostly went through peaceful farmland, but there were a few houses along the way and Interstate 80 was never far away. I saw a few dirt roads and marked one of them, Maggie Springs Lane, for further exploration sometime.

 Frosty Valley Road

 View from the road

Sheep. I saw a couple of horses as well, but didn't stop for a picture.

After a few miles, the road began to descend in the same gradual manner that it ascended in. Around mile 9, I passed the Montour County line and continued straight on Frosty Valley Road. I had never ridden on Frosty Valley Road past the county line before, so this was uncharted territory.

 Fields, I-80, wooded hills

 Frosty Valley Road looking back in Montour County

The bike in a state of repose

A few minutes further on, I passed through the village of Kaseville and got a glimpse of Kaseville Road, where one possible route to Danville would take me. It looked ominously hilly. Not long afterwards, I crossed Columbia Hill Road and continued onto Sidler Lane, a small, short road that was mostly flat until it dipped down a hill and up a short, but steep hill. After that, the road simply dead-ended into a private road. How strange. Google Maps had the road going about a third of a mile further.

 Kase Run

Looking south towards Montour Ridge from Sidler Lane.

After I got back from my brief excursion down Sidler Lane, I headed south on Columbia Hill Road. Some minor climbing, but nothing too bad. The real hill is a few miles to the north. After a bit, I turned east onto Cherokee Road. I had expected it to be a glorified path through the woods, but it turned out to be a fairly civilized paved road. It even had two lanes. That road spit me out onto Kaseville Road, which was probably one of the three hardest climbs, and that was with me only climbing a third of the hill. Riding the entirety of Kaseville Road would be rather difficult, to say the least. After a short distance, though, I turned off Kaseville Road and onto Garman Road and followed that through the woods, up and down some rolling hills. After a while, Garman Road became Gotschal Road, the road I explored last week. After passing County Line Road, Gotschal Road began to degrade into essentially a glorified path through the woods.

Flowers (cherry blossoms?) on the side of Gotschal Road

You call this a road?!

I then began climbing up Susies Lane. It was almost as difficult as Kaseville Road, possibly even more so since my tires kept slipping on the gravel. The same beagle that ran alongside me last week came out to the road again, but didn't stay with me for long. I did not go all the way to the top of Montour Ridge this time, but instead turned onto Mowrey Drive and began descending. The descent was pretty steep and wild in places; even with the considerable restrained needed to avoid crashing, I still managed to get up to about 30 miles per hour. I was barely able to slow down in time to stop and figure out which way to go at the intersection with Brobst Drive. After the intersection, the road (now renamed Mourey Drive by Google Maps for some reason) still continued downwards, but was more mellow. For a while, there was a hedge between me and some nice scenery, but I still managed to get a half-decent shot through a break in the shrubbery. Not a minute later, though, the road went out into an open field with plenty of opportunities for scenery shots. I always feel dumb when that happens, but I hit the brakes and took a few pictures.

 A somewhat overgrown vista

 A less overgrown vista that I came upon a minute later. If you look closely, you can see Knob Mountain in the center. It seems to be visible from just about everywhere.

 Mowrey/Mourey Drive

Yet another typical northeast Pennsylvania vista

Mourey Drive then became somewhat paved and took me to Frosty Valley Road. The next few miles where fairly uneventful, but it was mostly downhill going in this direction. I made good time, even on the few uphills. My mile splits were mostly between 14 and 17 miles per hour. After a while, I came to Maggie Springs Lane and decided to explore it since half of Sidler Lane had turned out not to exist. It was just another short, gently rising unpaved road. After a few tenths of a mile, the road forked and both forks were marked with angry No Tresspassing signs. Not worth coming back to.

 At first I thought the one on the left was Maggie Springs Lane. Luckily, it wasn't.

Very friendly and welcoming.

There wasn't anything to do, but return to Frosty Valley Road. I did so and after crossing Hemlock Creek, pumped up the hill to Red Mill Road. That too was downhill in this direction. I spent a lot of the ride towards Fernville looking at Hemlock Creek as it rushed over little rock ledges. Most of the very pretty stream reaches are out in the boondocks, but not this one. Soon, I came to Fernville and crossed the bridge over Fishing Creek back into Bloomsburg. I didn't want to deal with the one-way-street maze this time, so I turned onto the Bloomsburg Rail Trail with the intent to go around the main part of Bloomsburg instead of through it. The stretch that I rode on was nice, with a steep drop to Fishing Creek on the left and high reddish cliffs rising dozens of feet on the right. I hadn't ridden there since last October, when I rode straight into a fallen tree and crashed. There weren't any more warm days after that. Some way to end a riding season.

 Contrasting flowers in Fernville

 Bloomsburg Rail Trail

The bike next at the base of the cliff

The stretch of the rail trail ended at Irondale Road. I rode up that and then crossed Iron Street to Summit Road, which is one of the few roads that is more innocent than it sounds. It took me to Arbutus Park Road, one of several major routes up Turkey Hill and the only one that tackles it from the west. On one hand, it doesn't go all the way up the hill and it's not a full-frontal assault like Country Club Drive. On the other hand, the road is not in the best condition. The pavement began to get iffy as Arbutus Park Road headed out of civilization. Eventually, I passed a gate in the road and it began to get very iffy. At least the climb wasn't steep and wasn't too long.

 Clearing at the top of the hill

Some student housing next to Arbutus Park "Road".

Soon after the top of the hill, I passed another gate and Arbutus Park Road became a road again. I sped towards home, with only one short and gentle hill to slow me down. I ended up having a fairly fast finish. My total time was 1:53:10 and my pace was 4:28/mile (about 13.4 miles per hour). I didn't reach quite the same speeds that I usually reach; my fastest mile was 3:00. On the other hand, not many miles were terribly slow.

Vertical rise: 1811 feet. Elevation change: 3620 feet. Highest point: 1091 feet. Lowest point: 473 feet.

Route map. (source)(license)

Nescopeck

I did 31.5 miles this morning, riding to Mifflinville, Nescopeck, and Berwick. My longest ride of the year so far, but still 14 miles short of my longest ever. One of the nice parts of the ride was that the first nine miles were all pretty much flat or downhill. The temperature was in the low 50s, almost too cold for comfortable riding, when I started, but I warmed up after about a mile. The first leg of my ride took me on a few roads where I don't usually bike. I followed Central Road to Tower Road and then rode past the Lionsgate development to Neufer Hill Road, the first serious downhill. After an initial brief climb, Neufer Hill Road plunged 200 feet to US Route 11. The shoulders were narrow, but the road wasn't very busy.

 Neufer Hill Road

 River Hill (and someone's driveway)

River Hill again

After crossing US Route 11, I rode into Espy. Soon afterwards, I turned east onto Old Berwick Road, where I spent the next several miles. It was mostly flat, with only a few small and gentle uphills and downhills, so I averaged 15+ miles per hour. After Espy, I passed through Almedia and Lime Ridge (which lacks any sort of ridge, as far as I can tell). There wasn't much worth photographing in this stretch; most of it was just houses or hedges. I did see the Susquehanna River through a clearing at one spot and also passed the ruins of the ironically-named Safety Light Corporation factory, where they manufactured radium paint in the days before people realized it was a bit risky to keep radium on your person. In Lime Ridge, I passed the Central Columbia High School (which appeared to be undergoing extensive renovation) and rode under the Interstate 80 bridges (which have had road work signs for at least three or four years, though I don't recall ever seeing any work being done there). A few minutes after that, I came to the Mifflinville bridge over the Susquehanna River.

Susquehanna River

I probably shouldn't be riding on the walkway, but it's safer than being on the road.

On the other hand, at least I'm not on the I-80 bridges a mile downriver

 

From the other side of the bridge, I rode straight through Mifflinville on Market Street. From the parts that I could see from Market Street, it seemed strangely empty for a village of 1200 people. I did see a huge cemetery though; maybe the census takers don't just limit themselves to counting living people....By the time I got to the southern end of Mifflinville, the road had begun rising on its first serious climb.

Looking back on Mifflinville

Two roads diverged in the woods...and I took the hillier one.

 

The climb up Snyder School Road (that's the road rising on the left in the photo above) was bad, but perhaps not as bad as I expected. There were some moderately nice views and a steep ravine to the right. Eventually the hill began to ease off and went into the woods before coming out into fields and flattening out completely. That was by far the largest hill on the ride, with about 350 feet of climbing in less than a mile.

Near the top of the Snyder School Road climb.

 

After that, there was a small descent and the road wound its way through rolling hills for a while. The road took me on a course parallel to I-80 and Nescopeck Mountain. Later in the year, it might be fun to ride over the mountain, though I'd be looking at 500 to 800 foot ascents whichever road I take up there. Probably doable, but not without a few stops along the climb.

Nescopeck Mountain

 

After that, Snyder School Road plunged into a not-so-pretty patch of trees and hedges alongside I-80 before dead-ending into Hetlerville Road, which took me through--guess where--the unincorporated village of Hetlerville. The scenery here was mostly typical northeast Pennsylvania: hilly fields, forests, rolling country roads. I had to check the map a couple of times to make sure that I really was heading towards Nescopeck and not accidentally wandering off towards Zenith or circling back to Mifflinville. After a while, I entered the woods and began an fast and interesting descent towards Nescopeck.

Luzerne County line

 Whee!

 

After crossing the Luzerne County line, I descended through a steep and narrow valley with a steep drop off to the right. Near the top of the hill, I glimpsed a garbage-strewn stream at the bottom of the ravine, but the eventually made an abrupt turn and began descending towards Nescopeck Creek. I crossed the creek and north into Nescopeck. I rode along the outskirts of Nescopeck to a spot on Pennsylvania Route 93 near the Berwick-Nescopeck bridge, where I stopped for a few minutes to refuel.

 Refueling. Be back in five.

Some kind of marsh at the mouth of Nescopeck Creek

 

After refueling, I crossed the bridge into Berwick, returning to Columbia County in the process. After navigating through some annoying traffic at the US Route 11 intersection, I headed off down Market Street. From the end of Market Street, I headed northeast on Martzville Road, riding through the outskirts of Berwick. The Run For the Diamonds is partly on this road too, but goes in the opposite direction. I rode up and down some rolling hills, passing the Berwick Golf Club and crossing Glen Brook and Kashinka Hollow. At one point, I passed an entrance to Briar Creek Lake Park and contemplated riding through the grass trails there to get to Lake Road. In the end, I decided to take the shorter and smoother course and stay on the road. I still passed by the Briar Creek Reservoir on the west though.

Briar Creek Reservoir

 

After the reservoir, I continued on Lake Road across Route 93 and Briar Creek to Huntington Road. Huntington Road would've been much easier earlier in the ride, but I think it's still a more moderate climb than Brick Church Road, the other route leading out of the valley.

Some fields, a stand of evergreens, and a nice sky. My point-and-shoot didn't do a very good job of capturing the scene, but a DLSR would be too heavy to lug around on a bike ride.

 

Huntington Road eventually leveled out and curved past the stand of trees before dumping me out onto Golf Course Road. That road was smooth and slightly downhill, so I made good time. Before long though, I arrived at Ridge Road, where I crossed West Branch Briar Creek and started a hard climb. It was only 150 feet or so, but it did come after about 23 miles of riding. I stopped at the top of the hill for a while.

View from the top of the Ridge Road hill

 

What goes up does indeed come down; I continued following Ridge Road down a quick descent. There were a few more little bumps in the road, but none were as large as the first hill and I powered up them without much difficulty. At the intersection with Hidlay Church Road, I continued on Ridge Road, following the 12.2-mile course that was one of my favorite courses before I started riding seriously. Except for two small hills, the next two miles were downhill all the way to Lightstreet.

Summer Hill from Ridge Road

From Lightstreet, I slowly made my way up the hill on Papermill Road and picked up the pace on the gravel part. After a few minutes, I rode out of the woods and down a small hill. Soon afterwards, the road became paved again and approached Dennys Hill. Having already ridden 30 miles, I took it slowly on the way up. It paid off, since I was able to go at a decent speed on Shawnee Road towards home.

 Papermill Road. I come here a fairly often, both for running and biking.

Dennys Hill. It continues around the bend.

 

My time was 2:16:22 and my pace was 4:20/mile or 13.84 miles per hour. On the border between good and stellar as far as I'm concerned. My pace was under 4:00/mile until mile 9, when I ascended Snyder School Road. I managed to hit 31 miles per hour at one point, probably on the descent towards Nescopeck.

Elevation graph. The vertical rise was 1753 feet and the total elevation chance was 3516 feet. The highest elevation was 905 feet and the lowest was 469 feet.

Route map. (source)(license)

Two Ridges and Two Valleys

23.0 miles in the afternoon. As the title suggests, my route took me over two ridges and into two valleys. It was a bit colder than it has been the past few days, but not by much. Definitely the decision to wear long sleeves was a bad idea; I ended up rolling my sleeves up after less than a mile. On the upside, I did bring a camera (even if it is an ancient point-and-shoot), so there are photos this time. I started out on a similar course as my ride to Catawissa heading to Arbutus Park Road and from there along the grassy paths to Upper Campus. Slow going. I stopped at the clearing overlooking Bloomsburg and took some pictures.

 Looking southwest towards Bloomsburg

Looking south towards Wonderview

 The trail

Looking northeast towards Knob Mountain and some other very blue hills.

After that, I reached Upper Campus and descended into town, and then past the hospital to First Street. This time I went down the little hill near the Bloomsburg/Fernville Bridge on Main Street instead of Ridge Avenue (which is apparently a one-way street). After that, I crossed Fishing Creek into Fernville and continued straight. The village-like part of Fernville is basically blink-and-you-miss-it, and I was through within a minute or so. The road continued north as Creek Road, where I've never biked before, though I've run there a few times. It paralleled the rather muddy Fishing Creek, sometimes approaching to within a few yards, other times receding to dozens of yards. On the other side of the road was a steep hill/small cliff. The road was mostly flat, but there were a few little uphills. Eventually, I got to the mouth of Little Fishing Creek and the I-80 bridges over Fishing Creek. I stopped briefly for a drink. The noise of the cars above was tremendous and I contemplated that probably none of them realized there was a cyclist down below on a leisurely excursion while they were rushing along on the highway. I wonder how many cyclists I've overlooked as I've passed over that stretch of road. After the bridges, it was mostly downhill riding for a while, as Creek Road went onto a cliff above Little Fishing Creek.

 I-80 bridges, Fishing Creek, and miscellaneous graffiti.

A nice descent

After a while, I reached the bottom of the hill and started climbing up Schoolhouse Road. After crossing Pennsylvania Route 42, there were a few more small climbs. None of them were truly grueling, though they were a bit of a surprise since I remembered Schoolhouse Road as being mostly flat. Shortly after Ivey Road, where I've run several times, the road began descending past the Schoolhouse Garden Market to Pennsylvania Route 44. A short stretch on Route 44 brought me to Dahl Road, where I crossed Hemlock Creek and turned onto the very innocently-named Orchard Drive.

 Spring flowers

The beginning of the first brutal climb. Orchard Drive isn't innocent after all....

After crossing West Hemlock Creek, Orchard Drive began climbing up through a forested hollow carved in a ridge by some unnamed stream. In the lower part of the hollow, the climb wasn't too steep, but it got steeper the further I climbed, as hollows tend to do. After more than a mile, I rode back into civilization and soon afterwards reached the top of the hill. There were some tremendous views, but my point-and-shoot camera couldn't really do justice to them.

My bicycle slacking off near the top of the hill.

 Clouds

 Next destination, Montour Ridge

Then I started riding down Wagner Drive. There were even better views there; to the east I could see more than 20 miles, all the way to the nuclear power station, about a county and a half away. I don't know why on earth I didn't try to take a picture. Wagner Drive was a started out as a steep and curvy descent through farmland before abruptly becoming unpaved and entering the woods. After a few more twists and turns, I arrived in Frosty Valley and began paralleling Interstate 80. At one point I saw a large patch of skunk cabbage, but I didn't want to sacrifice my momentum by stopping to take a picture. After the skunk cabbage, there was a small hill, but I still ended up doing that mile in at about 18 mph. Soon after that, I reached the Columbia/Montour County line and crossed I-80 on County Line Road.

Looking back to where I came from (I rode down that ridge).

I crossed Frosty Valley Road and began the long, arduous climb up Montour Ridge. In the hopes of making the climb easier, I had tweaked my original route so that I could climb the ridge in two separate 300-foot climbs instead of one big 500-foot climb. It wasn't all that much easier. I had to stop once or twice even on the first stage of the climb. That part was my slowest mile of the whole ride: 7:20. I then turned onto Gotschal Road, a (relatively) flat road that went along the ridge about halfway up it. It gradually devolved into a rather interesting one-lane dirt and rock path. Another thing I wish I had taken a picture of. After some climbing and descending, it spit me out onto Susie's Lane, another one of those misleadingly innocent-sounding roads.

 A little creek that no one has probably ever thought of until now. I shall call it Jakob's Creek.

The bike on Susie's Lane

Susie's Lane was a steeply-rising dirt road. Who would've guessed that from the name? Fortunately I was only on it for a third of a mile. At one point I saw a tractor driving up the road and was surprised to notice that I was gaining on it. It must have been going very slowly indeed. I decided to see if I could catch it, but it turned onto another road. At another point, a puppy, a beagle I think, darted out onto the road and run alongside me for a few hundred feet before growing bored. Soon afterwards, I reached Tower Drive. At least the name wasn't so innocent-sounding at and least it was paved. A quarter of a mile on Tower Drive took me to the highest point on the whole ride and one of the highest points on the comparatively mellow eastern side of Montour Ridge (about five miles to the west, across the Mahoning Creek water gap, it evolves into a full-fledged mountain).

Looking back to the last stage of the climb and the hills to the north. Elevation: ~1240 feet. I still think the scenery was more impressive on Wagner Drive or even Upper Campus.

After that, the next mile or so was one long downhill and I rode my fastest mile ever: 2:11.3, or about 27-28 miles per hour. Also, it's probably the first time I've ever broken the speed limit (25 mph IIRC) on a bike. If I had let go of the brakes, I might've hit 30 miles per hour. Then again, I might've ended up lying in a heap on the roadside. That road was neither straight nor smooth. The descent eventually mellowed as I rode into the Dutch Valley.

Dutch Valley

That was the last picture I took for a while. After a few tenths of a mile of moderate descending, I came to Old Bloom Road. That was flat, so I was able to continue making up for time lost riding up Montour Ridge. Then came Welliver Road, but that was only a fraction of the climb that Montour Ridge was. And after it came Ridge Road, a long descent across Hemlock Creek and towards Fernville. After Fernville, I crossed Fishing Creek into Bloomsburg and rode up Blackberry Ave, a small but very steep climb. That intersected with Pine Ave, which I followed eastward. It wasn't much fun riding in town, especially with stop signs on every other block. As I headed east, I ran into another problem: the idiots who designed Bloomsburg must have deliberately made things difficult for people; half the town is a maze of one-way streets. I did well enough until I got past East Street and onto Third Street. It had a Do Not Enter sign. All the roads to the left had Do Not Enter signs. Going down to Fourth Street would've meant a climb up Spruce Street, something to be avoided even in the best of times. I ended up going up Third Street to Penn Street and past Carver Hall, one of the main buildings of Bloomsburg University.

Husky statue next to Carver Hall

I headed up Second Street, which at least wasn't one-way, through Lower Campus, where many students were coming and going. The street passed by some houses before heading back into campus as Swisher Drive. After passing the Rec Center, I crossed Pennsylvania Route 487 and rode up Country Club Drive to Upper Campus. That was the last uphill of the ride; it was, quite literally, all downhill from there.

Almost home

I went fast in the last mile in an attempt to get under a 4:40 pace. Didn't work. My total time was 1:48:50 and my pace was 4:44/mile (12.7 miles per hour). Still, not terrible. I consider 4:20 to 4:40/mile to be decent. And according to my Garmin, I hit 33.3 miles per hour at one point, probably on Tower Road.

 

Elevation graph. Auto-generated by my Garmin this time. Min elevation: 473 feet. Max elevation: 1232 feet. Elevation gain: 2178 feet. Total elevation change: 4353 feet.

Route map