Michaux State Forest Fall Foliage

Vanlog, Piney Mountain Parking Lot, Michaux SF

October 17, 2020

A late morning waking up to 36 degrees in the Piney Mountain ATV parking lot. A short drive after breakfast to the Pole Steeple Trail in Pine Grove Furnace SP. At the trailhead we saw great reflections in Laurel Lake. Then it was a moderate 1-mile hike to the overlook at the top. 

Here’s Brian after the hike:

We then drove to the Pine Grove Furnace and wandered around a bit before heading south on 233 to Caledonia SP, where we had a picnic lunch.

 

Our next stop was at the Audubon Center at Waggoner’s Gap, a place where migrating raptors are often seen. After circling the parking lot like raptors ourselves trying to find a spot to park Vanna, we followed the orange painted hawks on the rocks about 0.5 mi to the rocky overlook. We only saw a few red-tailed hawks and a bunch of bird geeks with large telephoto lenses. 

Then we took a hike around Opossum Lake where we stopped after seeing a small snake cross our trail. And a quick photo stop at Ramp covered bridge.

Then we drove back to Pine Grove Furnace SP where we grilled some steak and tin foil meals over charcoal. Apparently this weekend is usually a huge fall festival at the park which was cancelled this year due to COVID. A mom and her daughter were there making scarecrows and carving pumpkins to carry on their family tradition even without the festival. After a nice dinner we retreated back to our free spot in the Piney Mountain parking lot. 

Promised Land State Park

 Vanlog, Lancaster, PA

October 11, 2020

For mid-October, it was a pleasant temperature to sleep last night--not too hot, not too cold. We slept in a little this morning and took our time getting underway. Then we drove about 15 min to Promised Land State Park. After walking around the beach area for a few photos, we drove on Park Avenue to Conservation Island, a part of the park that we had not explored on our previous two outings here. We made a 1.3-mile loop around the island, just admiring the fall colors. 

Then we explored the Little Falls Trail near the campground. This was an easy (but muddy) 1.1 mile out and back to a small cascade set in a lovely glen of golden maple trees. The trail was a popular one with families, so there were dogs, kids, grandparents, and people of all shapes and sizes. It was a little too crowed for my tastes. We had a lovely picnic lunch by the lake and then headed home. We both remarked how the leaves are especially good this year--the best in many years. 

On the drive home, we stopped to visit my family near Reading, PA. Dad helped us with a few repairs in the van. The flip-up counter in the doorway next to the sink was loose and had fallen off last weekend because the screws for the hinges were a little too short. So we went to Dad's Hardware Store and got some longer screws to hold the hinges on better. Then, the swinging door on the outside of the fresh and gray water cabinet was not closing correctly. It appears as if one of the hinges got bent backwards. So we took that off, straightened it, and added some new magnets to the closure mechanism. Everything else worked great on the trip. We are both very happy with the Dometic fridge and how spacious it is with the dual zones and how little DC current it draws overnight when the solar panels aren't charging. Likewise, we used the WeBoost cell phone booster to greatly enhance our upload speed when writing the vanlog or downloading photos from the Cloud. I was able to use the sink faucet and heat up some hot water in a pot and have a hot shower out the sliding door of the van this morning and we are getting used to when it's worth using the bucket toilet and when it's just better to go in a Solo cup! Not everything about vanlife is glamorous and space is certainly a premium, but you can't beat having everything you need in one place permanently and being able to just pack a few things on a moment's notice to get away for the weekend. The DCNR in PA is excellent. Usually, I can reserve a campsite for the weekend only a week in advance at one of the state forests and it is 100% free. Free camping, reservable, and usually very private with a fire ring and picnic table. You just can't beat vanlife especially during fall foliage season. 

Delaware Water Gap in the Fall

Vanlog, Maple Run campsite, Delaware State Forest 

Oct. 10, 2020

We drove up to the Delaware State Forest last evening, arriving around 9:15 PM. Woke at 7:00 and drove over to the NJ side of the Delaware Water Gap at the Kittatinny Visitor Center where a friendly ranger gave us the lay of the land. We climbed Mt Tammany using the red dot trail up and the blue dot trail down. It was a steep climb to the top but the views were well worth it. It was a beautiful day for hiking, a mild Indian summer in mid-October and sunny skies. The fall foliage was at its peak and so were the crowds at the top and on the trails. Mask on, mask off, clean the fogged glasses, etc. The total distance on this hike was 4.2 mi. The roles have been reversed. It used to be that “vacationing with Brian” meant no breakfast, racing up the trail, and leaving everyone else in the dust. Now that is what we call “vacationing with Jessica,” who has a quest to hike 100 miles in PA in a year for Keystone Trail Association bragging rights. She is a true Warrior Princess (her new trail name).

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After an early picnic lunch at the now very full parking lot, we drove north to Millbrook Village and then on to Blue Mountain Lakes, where we hiked another 3.1 miles. We also drove the gravel Skyline Drive to Crater Lake, where we tacked on another 0.3 mi wandering around it’s edge admiring the fall colors.

We drove the scenic Silver Lake Rod back through the Delaware State Forest to our campsite, where we had mammoth-sized steaks and broccoli cooked on the coals and then a nice early campfire! Living the loca #vanlife vita. 

Falling for Fall in the PA Grand Canyon

 Vanlog, Lancaster, PA

October 4, 2020

Our journey began on Friday, October 2 after my class was kind enough to change its start time from 6:30 PM to 3:30 PM, so that I could get home by six. I had asked Jessica to have everything ready by then, and wouldn't you know it? We were in such a hurry to send off that neither one of us had remembered to unplug the shore power from the house. We made it about a mile down the street to the gas station before a man came over and said I have been beeping at you for the last mile--you're dragging your extension cord down the road and I didn't want it to hit anybody! You just can't make stuff like this up! The sagas of 3vanlife. We had a four-hour drive ahead of us in the dark, the last four miles on gravel forest roads to our campsite in Tioga State Forest. There was no cell service here of course and our satellite navigation was going in and out. All we had to rely on was an email from the state forest district office with the GPS coordinates and a description that it was just off the road. We stopped where we thought it was and set up camp. 

This was our first time taking the bikes with us, so they had to sit in the aisle of the van between the kitchen and the bed/bench (in bench mode). Jessica was unable to fold out her bed unless we left the bikes unsecured outside the van, which we did nto want to do because we were literally "just off the road." So she squeezed into the twin size bed with me, the bed that is already too short for me to lie fully straight from one side of the van to the other. Needless to say, it was not a restful night of sleep. 

October 5, 2020

We did sleep on the later side and didn't break camp (aka drive away) until about 8:30. We headed first tot he very busy Leonard Harrison SP side of the PA Grand Canyon. Because part of the canyon was still in shade at this hour, we opted for a 2.2-mile hike down tot he canyon floor and back. Along the ay we passed a fairly dried up waterfall. At the canyon bottom, we intersected with the Pine Creek rail trail, where we were going to bike later in the day. On the return ascent, 744 feet, we really booked it, not wanting a pair of fit 20-something year old girls to show up us 50-something hikers! Jessica was amazing, blazing up the trail like it was gravy without any rests at all. 

After our hike, we drove tot he other side of the canyon to Colton Point SP and parked in the lot opposite the trail to Barbour Rock. The leaves were beautiful in the sunlight and the canyon looked much nicer from the west rim. We hiked another 2.3 miles here.

We then got our bikes out of the van to go for a short ride down the road to Colton Point. However, Jessica's front tire was flat and would not hold air when we pumped it up. So we used a spoon to pry the tire away from the rim and found the pinhole leak. We repaired it with a dab of Super Glue (not sponsored!), waited five minutes for it to seal, put the innertube back in the tire, the tire back on the wheel, and the wheel back on the bike and then we were off. I was very proud of our "McGuyver moment." The views from Colton Point were also nice. 

We then drove to Darling Run down in the canyon on the Pine Creek trail and drove our bikes along the gravel rail trail along the Pine Creek to Turkey Path, the same place we had hiked down to earlier in the day. On the drive back to Darling Run, we saw a bear that had just crossed the creek to the other side. Back at Darling Run, we watched two tourist horse-drawn carriages pass by on the trail. 

We then drove back to our free campsite in the Tioga State Forest, had a steak for dinner, and watched a movie in the back of the van. 

October 6, 2020

After another restless night crowded into the twin bed in the van, we woke to dreary weather and left camp by 8:15. We stopped at Shikellamy State Park Overlook in Sunbury on the way home, had lunch at the Red Rabbit drive-in, and arrived back in Lancaster by 2:00 PM.