PA Blue Knob State Park: Mountain View, Three Springs, and Pavia Lookout Trails

2022 52-Hike Trail Challenge: #24 Mountain View, Three Springs,  and Pavia Lookout Trails 5.5mi (interlinked loop)

So after Amos spent three long (but sleeping) hours in the truck while I had my meeting in Loretto, PA, I owed it to him to finish our camping trip with a long hike and a summit topper. We got up extra early and parked in the Tower Road parking area on the Ski Access Road and hiked the Mountain View Trail to the Three Springs Trail around the southern summit, then on to the Pavia Lookout Trail with a view.  All the trails were well marked and having intersection posts was helpful since trails interlaced all over the south summit. We made the Pavia Overlook around 8am and all was well with the world. Amos bagged his second peak for 2022, the first being Hawksbill in SNP back in June.

Stunted forest and frost shattered sandstone.

Not far from these trails is the highest point on Blue Knob on a knoll atop the ski resort. This area was used by the USAF during the Cold War as listening post, operated by the 772d Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron with many men who had been transferred here from Alaska. The weather on Blue Knob is so cold and sometimes so severe that those Arctic boys claimed it was worse than their base in Alaska. Not far down the mountain is the small village of Frigid, PA, and that should be a clue as to how bad it gets up here in winter. The natural clues of long, cold winters with high winds were frost shattered blue sandstone and the stunted forest. The way the mountain is positioned at the foot of the Allegheny Front makes it a target for fierce winter weather that comes racing over the wall of the Allegheny, funneled directly down the valley and up and over Blue Knob.

Blue sandstone

I loved checking out the blue sandstone as we hiked along. It ran in horizontal shelves with great blocks stacked one atop another, impressed with ripple marks and other sedimentary features from a long ago shallow sea. This rock type is one of many that represent the Burgoon Sandstone formation that underlies the Allegheny Plateau - which is really not a plateau in this area but a deeply incised erosional landscape of low mountains and deep ravines. 

Weather sign

At times the trail was old road, wide and gently rising. Other times it was a rocky path paved with blocks of blue sandstone. Either way, there was much for a coonhound to sniff and he was particularly interested in coyote and bear scat. I spotted old sections of chain-link fence posts that snaked up the hill towards the old military base and I wondered if some of the woods road we were following on the Three Springs Trail was a remnant of the military perimeter road. 

Pavia Lookout

Amos makes his second summit of the year! 

As we circled around the Pavia Lookout Trail through the forest I heard what I thought was a small motor, maybe a drone? The mystery was solved when a lady attempting to ride an e-bike down the rocky footpath and clearly not in control came bumping and tumbling by. I have no problem with e-bikes on appropriate trails but this trail was certainly not a good choice. We jumped off the trail just as she yelled "WHOA!" and hit a rock and tree root that sent her spilling over into the trail. I helped her right her heavy bike and offered to help her push it back to the woods road. She was a little banged up and I worried she might have really hurt herself. She declined help and said she would rest on the bench at the overlook and promised she wouldn't try to ride it back. Lesson learned? 

Perimeter fencing near the old base boundary

After our hike, I decided to drive the short distance back up to the summit at the ski lifts and take another look around. I tried to imagine the three great radar domes that sat up here, surrounded by barracks, officer housing, workshops, and an array of antennas. There are only a few clues of the mountain summit's former life: a large cement pad, a few 1960s-era buildings repurposed for the ski resort, and a collection of cement cable anchors that held the towers to the mountain. It was a beautiful place to sit and enjoy a rest from our final hike at Blue Knob. 

Summit of Blue Knob for a rest

Notes: 

A nice history of the Claysburg Air Force Station atop Blue Knob. https://www.claysburg.us/blue-knob-air-force-base.html

 

PA Blue Knob State Park: Chappell's Field Hike and Park Wander

 2022 52-Hike Trail Challenge: # 23 Chappell's Field Trail, 3 miles + wander

An Allegheny treasure.

We arrived early to our campsite at Blue Knob State Park, a new park for me in my quest to visit as many PA State Parks this year as I can. I set up camp pretty quick. I think I have dialed in my truck camping system pretty well. The screen tent, shower, battery recharge station, and dog run were done in 20 minutes. The site I'd reserved was right next to the 3 mile Chappell's Field Trail so within three yards of our site we were off for a circuit hike around the shoulder of Blue Knob Mountain. 

Camp is set and we're off 

Hiking right next door!

I've been working with a trainer/physical therapist for almost a year now (monthly) to counter the muscular-spinal damage I've sustained from sitting at a desk in front of a computer for 8+ hours a day for over twenty years. It's been no joke - a lot of hard work to reclaim spinal health and overall flexibility. Besides 30 minutes a day of daily stretches and weights, my trainer decided that it would be good practice to walk/hike/run/bike an hour for every hour behind the wheel or desk per day when possible. With a job closer to home now and a schedule that allows me the time to exercise and train, this has been a good plan. The Chappell's Field hike satisfied half the time I needed to counter the three hour drive and I followed up with a walking wander around other parts of the park later on for another two hours. With Amos in the lead (he was so eager to go!) I got a great workout that included some trail jogging. Gosh, I felt good!

Good for the soul and the body.

Oooooooo!

Building endurance and resilience this year has allowed me to tackle challenges on trail that I would have been so cautious of this time last year.  My cautiousness stemmed from breaking my leg on a trail fall a few years ago and my trainer helped me overcome a bit of fear as well. I didn't want to enter my 60s  afraid of doing what I love to do (hiking, biking, paddling) hesitant to fully embrace what I know will keep me good health as I age.  A fellow trails woman friend said "I've got - at best - twenty summers left to enjoy my outdoor life. I am giving my body and mind what is needed to be in the best shape physically I can be in my sixties and seventies and if I'm lucky, I can continue this wild life into my 80s."  Amen. 

Invasive species removal on the main fields to knock out Autumn Olive

Overlook from Blue Knob to the southwest over Pavia and beyond

Chappell's Field Trail encircles the farm that was here before the CCC arrived to transform degraded land into a demonstration national park. We stopped by the CCC-built overlook and enjoyed watching the stewardship mechanically crew rip out Autumn Olive, a highly invasive non-native shrub/ small tree. Back home, I do this work with volunteer crews on Lancaster Conservancy preserve land, all with hand tools and sweat labor. It was deeply satisfying to watch a forestry mower whack an entire embankment of the stuff down in fifteen minutes thinking it would have taken me and a crew two or three days to do the same work with saws and loppers. A park worker came by to pet Amos and said this restoration work will add to the already forty + acres of native meadow they've already cultivated in native plants. We stayed a bit longer to enjoy the southeastern view from the shoulder of Pennsylvania's second highest mountain. 

The sound coming from this meadow was a-mazing!

Restored meadow parallels the trail

The trail follows old farm roads through the woods, land that used to be pasture and field. I couldn't resist stopping at all the restored meadows to listen to the bees, late summer crickets, humming and whirring songs of winged things, and field birds.  Eastern Shortgrass Meadow is considered a threatened natural habitat here in the east due to development pressure, woodland encroachment, and invasive plants, but to look at the work the park has put into making so much of the mountain a safe haven for native flowers and insects made my heart smile. Of course, I kept an eye out for "my" bumble bee, Bombus terricola, in hopes that this altitude-loving species may somehow have found its way home to the Allegheny range where it was once common, but no such luck today. The only place where recent (2009 - 2017) sightings have been confirmed in PA is the high swamp at the Bear Meadows Natural Area in Rothrock State Forest in center-state. But I hold out hope anyway, so I kept checking.

 

Common Eastern Bumble Bee, Bombus impatiens

We completed Chappell's Field Trail where we started - right at the campsite! We had a nice lunch and then traveled to other parts of the park to check out meadows elsewhere. We walked a good portion of the state park road that  leads to Willow Springs and made sure to pay homage to the CCC crews that transformed the park from degraded farms and deforested slopes in the 1930s. The federal government transferred ownership to Pennsylvania in 1945 but signs of the CCCs work are everywhere preserved and celebrated in the state park.

From the shoulder to the summit view of Blue Knob Mountain.

Willow Springs, aptly named.

CCC-built maintenance and office complex is in great shape! 

Newly built CCC memorial at the site of Camp NP-7 on Monument Road

From the summit, 3,146' to the northeast

We finished off our day with a visit to the summit of the mountain which during the Cold War served as a USAF early warning radar station. Now managed as a ski and snowboarding winter resort,  the slopes here too are managed between the beautiful runs as pollinator meadows. They were just a-buzz with the late summer insect chorus. All told we probably did six miles today, but counting only Chappells Field Trail officially into my 2022 52-Hike Challenge, I was happy that we made up three hours of driving with over three hours of hiking and wander-walking.  Amos and I both slept soundly in the truck bed, modified as a small camper, me in my bunk and he in his dog bed loft. We fell asleep to the sounds of katydids, crickets, and barred owls under the blanket of the Milky Way. 

A beautiful hike! 

Notes:

Blue Knob State Park was just an amazingly beautiful and quiet place for some early week camping and moderately challenging hiking. Lots of CCC recognition here, too! 

PA Allegheny Portage NHS

 2022 52-Hike Trail Challenge #25:  Hiking Section of the 6 to 10 Trail, Gallitzin, PA

Trail crossing on old Rt 22

I had planned to hike most of 6 to 10 Trail from the Allegheny Portage National Historic Site (NHS) for a round-trip of 12 miles, but you know what my motto is, right? We plan, God laughs.  After giving the NHS a good once-over and seeing everything there was to see between the museum and the beautifully preserved/conserved/restored/reproduced buildings, we struck out on to the blue-blazed trail to see how far we could get. I had a meeting in Loretto, PA, at four o'clock and I knew we wouldn't get it all done, but a good strenuous walk it would be anyway. 

Main Line Route 

The engineering feat that was (and still is) the Pennsylvania Main Line transects Pennsylvania and served as an early 19th century trade and transportation route for west-bounders, freight, and Underground Railroad passengers. I live south of Columbia near the Mason Dixon Line where UGR routes crossed from Maryland into Pennsylvania. Roads and footpaths moved freedom seekers to the rail station in Christiana, PA, if they were headed to Philadelphia, New York, or points further north. The rail and canal intersection at Columbia moved freedom seekers west to Western PA or Ohio and beyond. As I descended the steep hill that once served as the sixth of ten incline planes on the portage railroad, I tried to imagine those passengers who were aboard the system to find freedom in and beyond Pennsylvania, a "free" state. 

Engine House No. 6 (replica on historic foundation)

Reconstructed gearing and tow rope machinery 

The steepness of the Allegheny Mountains is nothing to shake a hiking stick at.  The landscape was so formidable that native people rarely maintained settlements here other than temporary seasonal hunting camps in the secluded valleys or hollows. As settler farmers made the dangerous trek across the Appalachian Mountains in the 18th century, they were often dismayed to find the Allegheny Plateau any less challenging. The idea of a plateau vanished as people met deeply incised erosional valleys, heart-pounding hill climbs, and dozens of rocky river crossings. I couldn't imagine what it must have been like for those early settlers trying to navigate this landscape with Conestoga wagons through narrow gaps in the mountains which stood like walls against their progress. The coming of the Allegheny Portage Railroad section made it possible to carry freighter wagons, entire canal boats, and masses of people up and over ten of the steepest mountain barriers. 

Overgrown incline plane

The Six to Ten Trail roughly follows the path of five of the incline plane climbs with trailheads at each end, at the Allegheny Portage Railroad NHS and six miles east at the town of Foot of Ten. It is sometimes listed a bike path but riders should know that only about four miles of the eastern route are suitable/safe for riding. The hiking portion that Amos and I were on would not be a good idea on a bike. Seriously. We stopped to gawk at the strangely offset Skewed Arch Bridge which allowed a wagon road to pass safely over the railroad. Looking back up the hill from where we'd come I could see the white front of the Engine House at the highest summit of the portage through a narrow overgrown cut through the woods. So important was the engineering and skilled masonry of the great arched bridge that when the modern Rt. 22 came through, highway engineers split the road into east and west bound lanes to preserve the site. Hikers must cross this split highway to continue on the trail. 

View up the hill to Engine House #6 through the woods cut 

Skewed Arch Bridge

Stone cutters yard

Along the trail heading east towards Foot of Ten, we encountered each foot and summit of Incline Planes #6, #7, and #8. It was up and down hiking along the crest of hills that had been modified for the railroad below us. Of course I had to stop at every little seepage and mucky spot (there were lots) to look for salamanders. I wasn't disappointed. Amos caught sight of a deer that snorted and bolted up a hill and he hollered full throat for a good five minutes, but didn't try to chase or pull. Good boy, Amos. 

Moss and mushroom season is in full swing!

Logging railroad switchback - up.

When we got into really steep terrain, the trail followed the zig-zag switchback system of early 20th century logging rails. Like all of Pennsylvania during the early 1900s, this area saw complete deforestation as technologies like steep-climbing Shay engines that allowed for loggers to move timber down big hills. I stood for a rest and looked up and across the mountain near Incline Plane #8 and was amazed at the complexity of switchbacks, intersections, and landings visible through the mature second-growth forest. By the time we had descended our third ravine, I was getting winded. Add to that, the wider paths of the railroad switchbacks were sunnier and in spots there grew great swathes of stinging nettle. Oh no. I was wearing shorts and getting stung while Amos' nearly bare belly was already full of red welts. 

Can you spot the millipede? 

We pressed on down and up, up and down. We crossed creeks at the base of ravine valleys and hiked up rocky grades to climb out. I could barely make out the portage railroad below me through the thick forest cover. I was trying to wrap my mind around the fact that untold hundreds of quarrymen, miners, and laborers - mostly Welsh, Scot, and Irish - had created this path through a most daunting landscape. Still, even with significant smoothing of the steep mountain shoulders, many passengers were so afraid of the dizzying pitches that they elected to walk the thirty-six miles to Johnstown! 

Logging railroad switchback - down.

Climbing down a steep pitch to the portage railroad (Rt 22 beyond)

We climbed down a rocky set of boulder steps to finally intersect with the portage railroad bed near Incline Plane #8. By this time poor Amos was licking his burning belly and I was somewhat amazed at the crisscross pattern of red, raised slashes across my legs. Looking at the level path was a relief but not the mile or more of stinging nettle we would have had to push through to get to our planned turn-around at Muleshoe Curve. I bathed Amos' almost bare belly with cool water and slathered his welts with soothing insect bite cream, hoping it would help. Staring at the nettle covered path, I decided it would be best to turn around and save the rest of the trail for late fall or winter.

Itching and burning, we made this our turn-around at 3.2 miles

Back we went along the 6 to 10 Trail, huffing and puffing and careful to avoid anymore swipes with stinging nettle. Once back on the footpath and off the old logging roads, the nettle disappeared. We crossed again through the springs and seeps to look for slithery things or, for Amos, to drink from the sweet pools of water.  I found a little Garter Snake sunning on a log, his eyes opaque and blue, ready to shed his skin. It was a nice find and he sat perfectly still as I fumbled with my phone for a good shot. I keep wanting to get  my old Canon Rebel repaired so I can shoot again with that nice 250 lens that has the sweet macro. I wouldn't have to approach my slithery subjects as closely and disturb them as I do with the phone. But he seemed not to see me through his blue goggles so I was able to get a few descent pictures. 

Little Garter Snake

We arrived back at the Visitor Center in time to wash up, change into a descent not-smelly shirt and long pants, and get on our way to the meeting in nearby Loretto (also my middle name). Seated in my friend's office at St. Francis University, we laughed about the "great outdoors" and the suffering and pain it can sometimes bring us. Meanwhile, Amos slept soundly in the truck in a shady spot outside, the insect bite cream seeming to have worked giving him a soothing rest. 

Notes:  

The Pennsylvania Main Line is still considered (and celebrated) as an engineering feat. This NHS is dedicated to the entire route and operational history of the route and is located at the summit of the great portage rail system near Gallitzin. The canals and the railroad operated in unison as the Main Line system. https://www.nps.gov/alpo/learn/historyculture/pennsylvania-main-line-canal.htm  and https://www.nps.gov/alpo/learn/historyculture/allegheny-portage-railroad.htm give overviews of the two linked transportation systems. 

A well-researched article appearing in the online magazine "Funimag" (about the history of funiculars - "ladder hill" engineering) on the Allegheny Portage Railroad. The photo-linked chart at the end of the article provides a great set of aerial shots showing the full set of incline planes. These shots give you a sense of the difficult terrain!

The 6 to 10 Trail webpage spells it all out. 

Happy Birthday National Park Service! 

PA Forbes State Forest: Spruce Flat Bog and Beam Rock Ramble

 2022 52-Hike Challenge #22  (4 miles)

With the truck repaired and time to make a second try for the Laurel Summit area, we started out early in the morning to avoid the humidity and heat. Luckily a cold front had swept through overnight and the temperatures were pleasant, even cool at the top. Amos had some pep in his step at long last. Back up into Forbes State Forest we drove until we reached the summit and the breezy, cool parking lot at Laurel Summit State Park.

I combined two trails and a forest road to make a loop to encompass the high altitude bog and the outcrop of sandstone pillars at Beam Rock. It was slightly misty but the sun was beginning to burn through the rain clouds. Carpets of moss lay all around. White Pines and Hemlock towered over the CCC-era picnic area, dominating the tiny 6-acre embedded park within the state forest. Named for British Brigadier General John Forbes who commanded his expeditionary force to blaze a wilderness road in preparation for an attack on French-held Fort Pitt (Pittsburgh) in 1757. The old Lincoln Highway/ new-ish Rt 30 traces roughly the path through these mountains. 

Ghost Pipe barely above the height of thick moss

We walked out to a rare sight: a high altitude bog where acres of white Cotton Grass and Northern Pitcher Plant stopped me in my tracks. Each summer I seek out a bog just to visit the Pitcher and tiny Sundews and all the other acid-tolerant plants that make a bog or fen their home. This place, however, was special - ringed with krummholz and flag trees, a windy, cold environment that just now was enjoying a brief summer month or two before the cold Allegheny autumn returns. Dragonflies by the thousands danced in the breeze. Ravens croaked. The wet-carpet musty scent of a bear somewhere out in the berry bush caught our attention. Amos began to holler but didn't pull. 

Cotton Grass - a northern species more common in New England and Canada

In the mid-19th century these flats were covered in old growth Hemlock hundreds of years old. The loggers who found this summit called the trees Spruce - as anything evergreen with needles was called in the 1800s.  The logging continued through the early 1900s, then using various small engines and tramways to ferry the trees to the mills. The mountains were laid to total waste. By the 1920s the state stepped in to buy the degraded mountains, much to the chagrin of the locals and lumber companies, many of whom complained that the governor was wasting state money. But soon the CCC moved in and built park infrastructure, replanted forest using seed banks and sapling stock carried up from the less accessible ravine forests. 

Spruce Flats after the logging, c. 1910

The thick forests that blanket the mountain today are mature but not original. It is all second growth except for the bog where no trees returned except those that now encircle the shallow bowl of bog that formed in the absence of the ancient trees. Ecologists suggest that without the ancient Hemlocks to absorb the water naturally trapped in the depression of the flats, the bog formed in its place. Even in this dry, low precipitation month of August it is holding tons of water. I measured a standing six inches of water collected through rain, fog, and snow on the mountain. 

Northern Pitcher Plant - so many huge clumps I could hardly believe my eyes

Amos must have scared that bear out of the berry patch because suddenly I became aware of the silence. I had been so caught up in the spectacle of the bog I hadn't noticed he'd stopped hollering at the bear scent and had laid down for a snooze. A fit older woman came tramping out on to the boardwalk that juts out from the end of the trail. She swung off her pack and greeted me with "What a crazy amazing place!" Joan was hiking the Laurel Highlands Trail and detoured off to see the bog and to have her second breakfast. Amos asked for her turkey jerky and a breakfast bar which she shared with him. Joan has hiked all over the country, some long distance trails, some a week or two long. The Laurel Highlands Trail is 70 miles long and she was giving it a full week to complete before heading down to Washington D.C. to visit her older sister. She asked how old I was. I told her I just turned 62. She said she was 78. "Don't wait. Don't wait," she said as she hoisted her pack and headed back to the yellow blazes of the Laurel Highland Trail. How'd she know??

Woodland Sunflowers

From the bog we walked back to the picnic area to find a connector trail to the forest road that would lead us to the rocky overlook at Beam Rocks. Mushrooms were just everywhere in all shapes, sizes, and colors. I found a new (to me) mushroom that looked like it was bleeding and sure enough it was a Blood Tooth or Red Juice Tooth mushroom. So cool. The pines were soon overtaken by Chestnut Oaks and Mountain Ash and great thickets of Rhododendron. We found our way onto the gravel Laurel Summit forest road and past acres and acres of Woodland Sunflower. 

Red-Juice Tooth

Scarlet Waxy Cap

Silvery-Violet Cort

A mile or so later and we arrived at the first red blaze for Beam Rocks Trail. The path dipped down and down, crossed a boulder maze, and opened out on to the tops of pillars of wind eroded sandstone. The breeze lifted a cool mist up from the Spruce Run ravine. I looked out over the tops of Ironwood, Hop Hornbeam, and Black Cherry clinging to the steep slope under the outcrop. I watched three Broadwing Hawks soar south along the opposite ridgeway. Fall migration has begun for these long-distance hawk wanderers. 

Red blaze for the Beam Rock Trail

Boulder maze

Pillars of sandstone and a 30 mile view

We retraced our steps back up to the road and walked straight back to the truck, but on the way we passed by this wickedly cool, seen-better-days observatory that I later learned is an Airglow Observatory built by the University of Pittsburg in the mid-1960s. Although the Airglow Program through is still active, I wasn't sure if this observatory is still in use. It looked decrepit, a little sad, in need of some seal sealer and paint. The Airglow Program studies the ionosphere, specifically the aural spectrum and oxygen interaction.  At the time it was built out here, 25 miles from Pittsburg, the night skies were not as affected by city lights as they are now. But newer observatories have been built since in better dark/twilight sky locations in Peru and New England.  The program is still managed by Pitt.  It would be cool to know if this observatory has been decommissioned or is still in use. It would be cooler still to be able to see inside!

Airglow Observatory, U. Pitt/ 

Notes:

DCNR Laurel Summit State Park - elevation at almost 3,000' and home to the beautiful Spruce Flats Bog as well as a major trails intersection.

Forbes State Forest has units across three SW Pennsylvania counties, Fayette, Somerset, and Westmoreland. 

Purple Lizard Maps produces this excellent outdoor recreational map for Ohiopyle State Park which includes on one side all of Forbes State Forest and the many small state park units embedded within it. It was a valuable resource for me in navigation since I had no cell signal.  They make the best maps and are a local PA company!

From the most current grant funding statement awarded to U. of Pittsburgh for the Airglow Program:

A program of upper atmosphere dynamics studies is proposed that involves work at the University of Pittsburgh, at the equatorial Airglow Observatory in Arequipoa, Peru, and at the midlatitude Millstone Hill Observatory in Massachusetts. Determinations of Doppler shifts and widths of nightglow emission lines will be made by upgraded Fabry-Perot interferometer (FPI) instruments to yield velocities and temperatures. The FPIs are of both conventional and all-sky designs that make use of CCD detectors to provide greatly improved sensitivity. Accurate determinations of the Doppler shifts will be provided by zero velocity reference sources, either using the PIs newly developed oxygen afterglow reference source (OARS) that emits the forbidden OI 630.0 and 557.7 nm lines or by more portable Secondary Standard sources that will be interferometrically calibrated against the OARS standard. The improved precision will permit accurate determinations of the (small) vertical velocities, supplementing the usual horizontal velocity determinations to provide a 3-dimensional characterization of the thermospheric flow.

For the equatorial measurements in Peru, the new, multi-wavelength capability of the FPI will broaden the ongoing 630 nm studies of upper thermosphere dynamics to include mesopause wind and temperature determinations via OH (731.6 nm) nightglow line studies. The all-sky FPI at Millstone Hill will be used to examine coupling effects between the midlatitude lower and upper thermosphere by sequential determinations of their wind and temperature fields using the 557.7 nm and 630.0 nm airglow emissions. At both latitudes, the neutral dynamics results can be compared to the ionospheric dynamics measurements obtained by either the Jicamarca or the Millstone Hill incoherent scatter radar.

https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0221920