The Road To Alice's Restaurant - Day 2, Philly to Mansfield PA

It was so rainy last night in Philly that they CANCELED the 4th of July fireworks. It was also warm and muggy, as is usual for the east coast. Unfortunately the air conditioning in our hotel didn't work either -- and about 1am we called and had them move us to a room that did have AC. So suffice to say we were a tad concerned about the weather for today.

However, it dawned dry, and only a tad humid, and we walked down the block to a small diner for breakfast, then caught a cab to Barb's Harley Davidson, in Collingswood NJ, just across the Delaware River from Philly. We got there just as they opened up and spent an hour doing rental paperwork for the two bikes. Tony's riding a black 07 "Road King Classic" with white wall tires! I'm on a Cobalt Blue 07 Heritage Softtail Classic.
Right behind us in line were two chaps from the UK who were here on business renting for a day ride, and we had a chance to chat and swap stories of riding in Scotland. We also kept a wary eye to the North West, watching a large black cloud drift closer. After all the time spent on paperwork, compounded because Tony forgot his proof of insurance card, we loaded up our suitcases on the bikes, did our customary "high-five", and drove across the street to pick up some supplies and hit the road. About that time the large black cloud decided to pour down rain on us, so we promptly went back across the street to the dealer, where Tony says I was more grumpy than usual. We waited out the storm for about an hour, with Tony checking the weather radar on his Blackjack computer. When he said it looked like the coast was clear, we loaded back up and headed out.

Getting out of the Philly area entailed riding on the freeway as far as Trenton, which wasn't really all that bad, except that it started to rain again. But it was just a brief shower, and at Trenton we exited, as per the instructions from Meg Crouse from the Camden NJ HOG chapter, and picked up NJ 29 which runs along the Delaware River. It was a wonderful ride up the river, twisting and turning, very little traffic, and charming small VERY OLD towns. It was surprisingly rural as well -- we didn't know what to expect, and we always tended to think of New Jersey as a big ugly suburb of New York. It was not the case. We both found this stretch of NJ a very pleasant place. We even went through the park where George Washington crossed the Delaware during the Revolutionary War. We wanted to stop and take a picture of one of us and call it "Washingtonian Crossing The Delaware", but we were running late because of the storm and wanted to keep going.

As is par for HOG Chapters, who's unofficial motto is "Live to Ride, Ride to Eat", playing off Harley's tag line of "Live to Ride, Ride to Live", Meg suggested stopping at one of their favorite places, Hot Dog Johnny. So we stopped for lunch there and a break, and took time to take off all the leather which was getting a tad warm. We also stopped to put on sun-screen which we really didn't need when we took off under the overcast damp skies earlier in the day.

We picked up Interstate 80 for a quick hop into Pennsylvania. It's a nice tie to home to realize that this is the same I-80 that winds its way back to where I come from in the West, and I've always loved the fact that I can be on a road that goes through my home-town and no matter where I am, if I stay on that road, I'll make it home. I-80 is one of those, as is US-89 and a few others. Indeed we'll spend a fair amount of time on this trip on US-6, another road that leads "home" as well.

Right after we crossed into PA, we exited off and picked up US 209, which runs through the Delaware River Water Gap recreation area. The sun had come out by now, and it was warm and the road quiet, and no towns at all. We swing off of US 209 and took a short-cut up and over the crest of the Pocono Mountains and dropped onto I-84 into Scranton PA. There we picked up US-6 for the run to Mansfield.

However, by now the afternoon thunderstorms had built up and as we were coming up Clarks Summit, we saw a solid black cloud in front of us. We pulled off into a gas station to debate whether or not to put on the rain gear, while Tony checked the radar on his Blackjack. What he saw made us cringe -- a solid wall of yellow and orange radar between us and Mansfield, right along US-6. Just then the thunder clapped and it started to pour. We scrambled into our rain gear and cursed the skies. Riding in the rain is not exactly fun -- even in a rain suit. It's hard to see, your goggles get all covered with drops, you get wet no matter what you are wearing, cars splash you, and it's cold.

All that being said, we found US-6 for all those miles between Scranton and Mansfield one of the darn right prettiest rides we've ever been on. It is listed as THE ride for PA in the Harley Road Atlas, and apparently for good reasons. Had the sun been out it would have been spectacular, and even in the rain, which ran the gamut between showers to mist and even a couple of dry spells (those were just teasers though, lasting only a mile or two), this road ranks high on our list of great rides. It dips and weaves through the rolling hill country of North Central PA, past tons of small farms and quaint old towns founded in 17 something-or-other. We saw many rainbows on the way, but no pots of gold, and the traffic was very light.

We made it to Mansfield by 7p, and checked into the Quality Inn, which is full of high-school boys for some sort of baseball tournament in town. We changed out of our wet gear and dried off. The rain of course went away as soon as we got here, and we rode back into town for dinner. Mansfield is a small university town, and is set along the Tioga River, and from the first glance before the sun went down, quite a nice little town.

Tomorrow we are going to meet Tony's half-uncle and aunt for the first time (it's their daughter who's getting married, and why we are in this part of the country to begin with.) We'll also run up to Corning NY to check out Tony's father's home town. We put just close to 300 miles on the bikes today -- nothing close to the distances we put under our belt last summer on the big ride, but our buts are feeling it none the less. We'll be here for three nights, with the wedding on Saturday (which we'll be going to in our Kilts -- this should be really interesting on the bikes!)

From the Quality Inn in Mansfield PA, somewhat damp still...
Gary and Tony