Weather: Sunny, 40s
Music: King Crimson - Beat and double shots on 104.5!
Saturday night was just about perfect---beer, tons of Arrested Development, and an 11:30 bedtime. So, at 7:30 I was feeling great and at 8:30 I was rocking with an MMR Music Marathon.
The trip was uneventful up to the turnoff to Ridley Creek, over a reservoir, and into some woods. My directions said to stay on PA-252, signed as Newtown Street Rd., up to Lancaster Pike (US-30), but at some point I broke out of a daydream to find that I was on "Darby-Paioli Road" and no 252 signs were in sight. Thinking I had missed a turn, I took a left onto what looked like a main road; it turned out to be Darby Road. After a few minutes, I pulled into a lawyer's parking lot to check the map, which was completely useless, but fortunately a "Lancaster Pike" sign quickly came into view.
The Newtown Street/Darby-Paioli was apparently just a mistake; perhaps more annoying was Google's choice to denote the next turnoff as "Conestoga Road" rather than as PA-401. It was indeed Conestoga Road, but was only signed as PA-401. Fortunately, a sign said that his was the road to Elverson so I didn't miss the turn. The same thing happened later; I was looking for Bulltown Road and found PA-345, but again a next-city sign bailed me out.
After manufacturing a space (thanks Escort!) in the surprisingly crowded parking lot, I got going just after 9:30. The trail followed a rocky old road for about a mile before leaving the road to lose quite a bit of elevation. A couple of miles in, the trail passed just R of a large, overgrown pile of rocks, maybe 75 feet high. There wasn't much to see at the top, but it was a nice place for a break.
Soon after, a pack of mountain bikers went by in amusing fashion.
Biker: Hey, there are about 9 more of us back there. I got a head start!
[Two more bikers come]
Biker: There are five more coming!
[Two more show up]
Biker: Five more of us left!
[A few more go by]
[The last one shows up]
Biker: I'm it!
Unfortunately, I didn't manage to get an accurate count...the safety measures were very cool and impressive though. I passed a couple more groups during the trip and all of them yelled "Hiker!" even when I'd already gotten off the trail. Riding safe must be part of the fun.
The trail split a couple of times and I must have missed another one since I went right instead of left without realizing and was vaguely unsettled about where I was for a while (the park office didn't have any maps). Still, despite the lack of scenery, the hiking was good--the mud was frozen hard, and the footing was good. The trails were well-maintained but fairly sparsely marked, allowing for a little bit of focus on routefinding.
Near the end, after I passed into the "Hopewell Historic Area", some random artifacts--a rusted model car, a little building over a section of creek--started to show up. Later, I learned that Hopewell is a replica of an old iron-working town. Without any obvious stopping points, I generally kept moving and was back to the car by 12:30.
The ride back felt great--the hike was long enough for me to feel pleasantly sore, the sky was stunningly blue, the speed limit was 45, and I knew where I was going. I took Lancaster Pike all the way to 252 to learn that the earlier panic had been unfounded. At some point (can't remember where), I passed what appeared to be a unique intersection. The two-lane road split, with the left lane going over an overpass and the right running down to another state road--where it hit a traffic light! Can't remember ever seeing a traffic light and grade separation combined into one interchange, especially not between two relatively lightly-traveled state roads.
Finally made it from 252 back to Yale Ave without incident, and remembered that it was Swat's Opening Day. Freshman hurler Neil Mejia looks like our Roy Oswalt. Baseball...
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