Bedford Covered Bridges Tour
This past Sunday was supposed to be the monthly NRR lunch ride. The destination was the Hotel Manor in Slate Run, PA. Good food and great riding all around the place. I awoke to wet roads but it looked like we might get lucky and the rain would hold off. I suited up and headed over to Kissell’s expecting to find a few hearty souls. I only found one, John Johnston. John was this month’s ride leader but wasn’t expecting anybody either. We waited for about 15 minutes and decided to bail on the days plans.
At this point I whipped out my handy netbook and sent out an email to let people know I would hang out a bit longer if anyone wanted to head out a little later. The band of storms was very thin and would probably only rain for about 5 minutes once it passed through. When I got no response I decided a change in plans was in order. The storm was heading northeast so I decided to head southwest. I’d put together a nice little route heading down to Bedford county and linking together some of the more prominent covered bridges in the area. With the route loaded into my GPS I was off like a prom dress!
I headed out to Marengo Road and out Route 45 to Water Street. Heading east on 22 a days old fawn ran (walked) out in front of me. He slipped an fell as I was just about stopped next to him. Just a side note. Your rear brake doesn’t work all that well when the tire is in the air. I turned shortly after that and took the back way into Williamsburg. Then it was pretty much a straight shot down 866 to 869.
Our first bridge was the Osterburg-Bowser Covered Bridge off of Fish Hatchery Road.
Then is was a short hop over to Snooks Covered Bridge.
You can see in the picture above that I was headed toward one of the storm cells that I figured I would have to ride though at some point. A little farther down 671 the sky went from “I might have to grab my rain jacket” to “I’m looking for the funnel cloud”.
Like any good adventurer I pressed on.
Just a little further down 671 I came upon the Ryot Covered Bridge.
Heading south on 96 I went to the site of the Cuppett’s Covered Bridge. Much to my chagrin, a brand new modern bridge with no style or panache was in it’s spot. Luckily, the county moved the original bridge across the road.
Take note of the sky in the above picture. I’m only about 2 miles down the road from the last picture. Foiled again nature!!
At this point I took a brief detour to run up to Gravity Hill. Unfortunately, the only thing gravity was working on at this point was the clouds. The sky opened up for exactly 4 minutes. After that the sun came out and the rest of the day was gorgeous, albeit a bit windy.
From here it’s east on 30 to the edge of Shawnee State Park and the site of the Colvin Covered Bridge.
The last bridge of the day would be the Claycomb Covered Bridge.
I made sure to remove my panniers so I was below the weight limit.
At this point I was bridged out and hungry. A short hop north on business 220 put me at Ed’s Steakhouse for lunch.
No pics from this point on I was headed for home the long way. Lower Snake Spring Road is a nice alternative to head north from 30 to Loysburg. I then hopped on 36, over to 26 and up to 913. A quick stop for fuel in Saxton and I continued across 913 to 994 up over the mountain. I then followed 829 north on the east side of Raystown Lake up to 22. At that point it was the usual suspects heading home through Huntington, McAlevy’s Fort, Pine Grove Mills, then back to Stormstown.
Total mileage for the day was 260.
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