Pine Creek Rail Trail

We woke up pretty late...and once again it had rained in the night...

No bears discovered our food stuff.  We had parked the bicycles near the food since I had used beeswax on my panniers and I wasn't sure if bears would be attracted to the smell of it. 

We had been planning on this being a rest day, but changed our minds due the the presence of way too much stinging nettle.  We still took it very easy today...

I walked around before Tuck got up and enjoyed the quiet morning in the woods...

A deer bedding down above the trail at the top of a bank carefully watched me as I walked by and then took pictures of it...

I also surprised and was surprised by a doe nursing her fawn in the undergrowth near the creek...

As soon as she saw me, she kicked her fawn out of the way and watched intently as I walked by, making sure I wasn't going to attack...

 When Tuck finally rose from within his tent, I made a batch of pancakes...

They were easy to burn since the bottom of our pan was just thin steel, but they tasted amazing anyway...

My tent looked so comfortable and cozy...it had become my home.

  We were able to dry out the tents, sleeping bags, sleeping pads, and tarps completely before packing them away.  We finally got started around 12:00.  Shortly after we started, it began raining in spurts.  I decided to put my poncho on, since I was wearing the only dry clothing I had.  About one mile down the trail, we came upon a neatly mowed camping area with a water pump and toilets!  Oh well, we slept well despite the nettles and tall grass...

At the camp area there was cheerful group of elderly cyclists that had paused to don their rain gear.  They asked me to take a photo of them all dressed up! 

Unfortunately the water pump at that camp area had a bacterial warning on it, so we didn't fill up there.  Farther along the trail we passed through the small town of Cedar Run which had a tourist-oriented store not far off the trail...

The proprietor offered the use of his outside spicket for us to fill up our water bottles with.  As thanks, I bought a few pieces of very tasty, satisfying jerky.

We traveled pretty late, since we had to ride 40 miles....all in the afternoon.

The "Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania" was very beautiful...

The old railroad bridges were fun to ride over and pretty nice to look at...

As we neared our evening campsite, we stopped at a gas station/general store out in hickville...

There was a poor selection of poor quality foods available, but I bought some anyway.  The quart of cheap milk tasted better than just about any milk we'd had....to our starving bodies.   The spoiling, woody carrots weren't palatable, even to us!  I saved them for cooking another day...

Bonnell Flats, the camping site that was our destination for the day, was lovely.  There were fire rings, picnic tables, mowed grass, and easy creek access.  We were (at least I was) very happy to stop for the day...

 I fixed some tasty chili on our stove...but didn't use the carrots.  We drank half the milk, and reluctantly saved the rest to eat with granola the next morning.  It was good to have mowed grass and a place to sit.