What started as a crazy idea a little over a month ago turned into a reality this past weekend. Doug Riegner and I would set off to ride our bikes from Pittsburgh to Washington DC all in a weekends time. The aggressive plan was to bike the 134 mile Allegheny Passage Trail from Pittsburgh to Cumberland Maryland on day one and then bike the 185 mile C&O Canal Towpath from Cumberland to Washington DC on day 2. The 318 mile trek would be hard both mentally as well as tough physically.
Day 1 - The Great Allegheny Passage
Doug and I awoke at 5:45 AM on Friday morning. We ate our breakfast and Jennifer drove us to the start of the trail in McKeesport Pennsylvania just outside of the city of Pittsburgh. We began our journey at 7:20 AM and planned for a leisurely 134 mile ride to Cumberland.
(The start of our 318 mile journey)
The bike I rode was a full suspension Cannondale Scapel mountain bike and Doug was riding a Cyclocross bike. The first leg of the trip navigated up the Yough river along abandoned corridors of the Pittsburgh Railroad and Western Maryland Railroad taking you through small towns such as Boston, West Newton, Dawson and Connellsville.
(Chad Outside of Boston, PA)
(Doug - aka Toona in Connellsville)
The plan was for Jennifer and her friend Lisa to drive to Cumberland after they were finished working so we knew that we had around 12 hours to complete 134 miles. Knowing that we had a lot of extra time, we made sure to make frequent stops along the river trail.
(100 miles to go to Cumberland, MD)
Our first major stop of the day was 60 miles into our ride at OhioPyle. We each ate a chicken wrap at the Firefly Grill and we quickly made our transition back into the saddle in route for the hardest part of the ride. Continuing on from OhioPyle the terrain begins to kick up slightly and once you reach Confluence, you have a 20 mile climb to a little town of Rockwood.
(Welcome to Confluence and the start of the climb)
By this point I was still feeling really good and was enjoying every hour that passed. Once we reached Rockwood we stopped at a local bike shop to refuel on Gatorade and continued to proceed onwards towards the Eastern Continental divide.
(Look out for the train)
This is also where we would surpass our first of three century marks of the trip. With 25 miles to go the rest was downhill, literately.
(Eastern Continental Divide)
Once over the Continental divide we made it to the Big Savage Mountain Tunnel. The tunnel is quite impressive to say the least. It spans 3,294 feet and began operation in 1912. Equally impressive was the unlit Borden tunnel spanning close to 1,000 feet. Once through the tunnel we biked across the Mason Dixon line and downhill towards Cumberland Maryland. Our first day of bike riding would conclude where the Great Allegheny Trail meets the C&O Canal Towpath.
(Finish of day #1 in Cumberland, MD)
We arrived in Cumberland at approximately 6:30 PM almost 11 and a half hours post our departure from McKeesport. Doug and I devoured a large pizza at Canal Place and met up with the girls shortly afterwards. We were both pretty exhausted and knew that we were in for a long day on Saturday. We stayed at the Gordon Farm house (in-laws) outside of Cumberland hoping to recover in time for another long day.
The C&O Canal Towpath - Day 2
On Saturday morning we all awoke at 4:00 AM, ate breakfast and drove to the trailhead of the C&O canal towpath in downtown Cumberland.
(The beginning of day 2 in the dark)
The history behind the towpath is quite extensive. Construction of the canal began with a groundbreaking ceremony on July 4, 1828 by President John Quincy Adams. The C&O was originally intended to extend to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania but construction ended after reaching Cumberland Maryland in 1850. This was due to the construction of the B&O Railroad, which had reached Cumberland 8 years ahead of the C&O. With only half of the planned canal completed, it was already outdated before the first boat reached the Cumberland terminal. The C&O travels 185 miles along the scenic Potomac River from Washington, DC to Cumberland, MD and covers an area of approximately 12,000 acres. The canal boats were pulled by two mules that walked along a dirt and stone towpath next to the canal. Coal was the usual cargo but corn, wheat and flour were also shipped by canal. Lumber, limestone, sand, and gravel made its way to Washington DC by canal also. The trip took about eight days and the average day extends from daybreak until dark. Most canal boats were privately owned and operated by families with every member helping. In 1938 the C&O Canal was turned over to the U.S. government by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad in lieu of a $2 million debt. William O. Douglas, then Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, stopped a proposal during the late 50s that would have turned the canal into an auto scenic parkway. Later in 1961 the C&O Canal was given the status of National Monument and on January 8, 1971, President Richard Nixon signed legislation creating the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park (reference from http://www.canalbird.com).
We began our bike ride in the dark at 5:16 am with a mounted light on the handlebars of each of our bikes. The first 90 minutes we encountered run ins and two close accidents with both deer and raccoon's. As the sun rose overhead, Doug and I soon realized that we were both in for a very long day. Unlike the Allegheny trail that was composed of smooth crushed limestone the C&O towpath was the complete opposite. The canal path was rocky, rough and at times muddy. This left us with an undesired slow pace. Not long after sunrise we arrived at the Paw Paw Tunnel.
(The Paw Paw Tunnel)
The Paw Paw Tunnel is a 3,118 feet long canal tunnel which was built to bypass the Paw-Paw bends, a six-mile stretch of the Potomac River containing five horseshoe bends. Construction on the tunnel began in 1836, and the tunnel was not completed until 1850. Although it was originally planned to be completed in two years, there were many difficulties in the process of construction. The tunnel was finally completed with a cost overrun of 500%. Though surpassed by many tunnels today, it remains one of the world's longest canal tunnels and was one of the greatest engineering feats of its day. The tunnel was by far the coolest part of the ride.
Our first stop of day 2 was in Hancock Maryland 60 miles into our second day. By now Doug and I were in the mood for a warm cooked meal. Drinking Ensure and eating Powerbars and PowerGels just wasn't going to cut it for us today. A local bike shop directed us to a local diner called the "Park and Eat" diner. To our surprise, Hancock was holding a Apple Harvest Parade that morning. Luckily the diner was still open. We spent around 30 minutes at the diner and a warm breakfast omelet had never tasted so good. It had taken us over five hours to bike 60 miles and by doing the math we realized that our plans of biking 185 miles to Washington DC in one day would not come to fruition. We called the girls since this was one of the first times that morning where we had cell phone service and alerted them that we were not going to make it to DC today. Our next plan was to determine just how far we were going to go. Harpers Ferry was 64 miles from Hancock and had vehicle access so that is where we decided to finish up our second day. We were both tired and sore all over and simply wanted the day to be finished. We were stopping every 5-10 miles until we eventually got passed by a pace line of 4 other riders. Now was our chance to give our bodies a break.
(Doug and I somewhere along the towpath)
We would ride the next 10 miles with the group of four until we got to Williamsport which was 25 miles past Hancock. Doug and I had thought that our ride to Harpers Ferry would be easy now that we were "drafting" but unfortunately Williamsport was where the other guys were stopping for lunch. We decide to push onward and leave the group behind. Surprisingly my legs actually felt pretty good the entire day but what hurt the most was my butt. Almost 24 hours into our epic ride, I was developing some nasty irritation down under if you know what I mean. We joked numerous times on how bad we'd get made fun of if we showed up in Harpers Ferry with a 3 inch gel cushioned seat. Doug even came up with this idea of wrapping our arm warmers around the seat for extra cushion. I don't know why I went along with his idea, but believe it or not it actually worked…well sort of. I had wrapped two arm warmers around my seat but somewhere along the way lost one of them and decided it wasn't worth losing the other. The 39 miles between Williamsport and Harpers Ferry for me was pure survival. My hands were going numb because of the static wrist position and the repetitive scenery was starting to play tricks on our minds. A break came near Shepherdstown where the trail had washed away. This required us to detour onto a public road. This was the first time in almost two days where we saw traffic. The detour wasn't very well marked so we had to wait until someone came along to show us the way and then it was back to the trail. We actually have no idea how many miles the detour added but if I had to guess it was at least 4 or 5. We arrived in Harpers Ferry at 5:07 p.m. that afternoon after our 11 hour and 51 minute day. We had covered 124 miles and still had two hours of daylight remaining, but there was no way that I was getting back on that saddle. The girls picked us up and we drove just north of DC where we planned to stay for the evening. That night I was exhausted. My eyes were bloodshot and all I wanted to do was go to bed. Instead we went out to dinner to a local Irish Pub. Doug and I both had burgers and I swear that it was the best burger I had ever had. We contemplated getting seconds, but I knew that wouldn't have been a good idea. I had hoped that we'd be celebrating over nice cold beers but instead we had to get up early in the morning for another day of biking.
The C&O Canal Towpath - Day 3
Day 3 began at 8:17 a.m. in Harpers Ferry just where we had left off.
(Here we are in Harpers Ferry ready to finish the journey to Washington DC)
We had 61 miles to go until we arrived in Georgetown. The morning was pretty much the same as where we had left off on the day before. The trail conditions were still rough and the most we could cover in an hour was around 15 miles. The first two hours flew by as we could practically smell victory around the corner. But that all changed not long after that. My butt still hurt which meant it hurt to sit and when I stood up my quads hurt. It was a lose / lose situation. We only stopped a couple times during the last 61 miles of the towpath. We stopped once for about five minutes to refill our water bottles but besides that stops were short and quick.
(The final stretch)
Once we reached the Great Falls 14 miles from Georgetown we knew we were very close. We took turns working together breaking the ride up into one mile increments. 14, 13, 12, 11…the miles began to fly by. We arrived in Georgetown at the end of the Canal Towpath at 1:17 in the afternoon. We were able to maintain that 15 mph pace the final 61 miles and finished the third day in just over five hours. The girls awaited us at the finish and Doug and I made it all the way to Mile Post 0.
(Mile Post 0)
The feeling of accomplishment was awesome and I enjoyed the challenges that the 318 mile journey brought us over the 2.5 day span.
(We were greeted in Georgetown with a very cool sign the girls made)
Later that afternoon we toured the American History Smithsonian and then headed back home to Pittsburgh. Special thanks to Jen and Lisa for being our support crew this weekend. We couldn't have done it without you two!
Day 1 - The Great Allegheny Passage
Doug and I awoke at 5:45 AM on Friday morning. We ate our breakfast and Jennifer drove us to the start of the trail in McKeesport Pennsylvania just outside of the city of Pittsburgh. We began our journey at 7:20 AM and planned for a leisurely 134 mile ride to Cumberland.
(The start of our 318 mile journey)The bike I rode was a full suspension Cannondale Scapel mountain bike and Doug was riding a Cyclocross bike. The first leg of the trip navigated up the Yough river along abandoned corridors of the Pittsburgh Railroad and Western Maryland Railroad taking you through small towns such as Boston, West Newton, Dawson and Connellsville.
(Chad Outside of Boston, PA)
(Doug - aka Toona in Connellsville)The plan was for Jennifer and her friend Lisa to drive to Cumberland after they were finished working so we knew that we had around 12 hours to complete 134 miles. Knowing that we had a lot of extra time, we made sure to make frequent stops along the river trail.
(100 miles to go to Cumberland, MD)Our first major stop of the day was 60 miles into our ride at OhioPyle. We each ate a chicken wrap at the Firefly Grill and we quickly made our transition back into the saddle in route for the hardest part of the ride. Continuing on from OhioPyle the terrain begins to kick up slightly and once you reach Confluence, you have a 20 mile climb to a little town of Rockwood.
(Welcome to Confluence and the start of the climb)By this point I was still feeling really good and was enjoying every hour that passed. Once we reached Rockwood we stopped at a local bike shop to refuel on Gatorade and continued to proceed onwards towards the Eastern Continental divide.
(Look out for the train)This is also where we would surpass our first of three century marks of the trip. With 25 miles to go the rest was downhill, literately.
(Eastern Continental Divide)Once over the Continental divide we made it to the Big Savage Mountain Tunnel. The tunnel is quite impressive to say the least. It spans 3,294 feet and began operation in 1912. Equally impressive was the unlit Borden tunnel spanning close to 1,000 feet. Once through the tunnel we biked across the Mason Dixon line and downhill towards Cumberland Maryland. Our first day of bike riding would conclude where the Great Allegheny Trail meets the C&O Canal Towpath.
(Finish of day #1 in Cumberland, MD)We arrived in Cumberland at approximately 6:30 PM almost 11 and a half hours post our departure from McKeesport. Doug and I devoured a large pizza at Canal Place and met up with the girls shortly afterwards. We were both pretty exhausted and knew that we were in for a long day on Saturday. We stayed at the Gordon Farm house (in-laws) outside of Cumberland hoping to recover in time for another long day.
The C&O Canal Towpath - Day 2
On Saturday morning we all awoke at 4:00 AM, ate breakfast and drove to the trailhead of the C&O canal towpath in downtown Cumberland.
(The beginning of day 2 in the dark)The history behind the towpath is quite extensive. Construction of the canal began with a groundbreaking ceremony on July 4, 1828 by President John Quincy Adams. The C&O was originally intended to extend to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania but construction ended after reaching Cumberland Maryland in 1850. This was due to the construction of the B&O Railroad, which had reached Cumberland 8 years ahead of the C&O. With only half of the planned canal completed, it was already outdated before the first boat reached the Cumberland terminal. The C&O travels 185 miles along the scenic Potomac River from Washington, DC to Cumberland, MD and covers an area of approximately 12,000 acres. The canal boats were pulled by two mules that walked along a dirt and stone towpath next to the canal. Coal was the usual cargo but corn, wheat and flour were also shipped by canal. Lumber, limestone, sand, and gravel made its way to Washington DC by canal also. The trip took about eight days and the average day extends from daybreak until dark. Most canal boats were privately owned and operated by families with every member helping. In 1938 the C&O Canal was turned over to the U.S. government by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad in lieu of a $2 million debt. William O. Douglas, then Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, stopped a proposal during the late 50s that would have turned the canal into an auto scenic parkway. Later in 1961 the C&O Canal was given the status of National Monument and on January 8, 1971, President Richard Nixon signed legislation creating the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park (reference from http://www.canalbird.com).
We began our bike ride in the dark at 5:16 am with a mounted light on the handlebars of each of our bikes. The first 90 minutes we encountered run ins and two close accidents with both deer and raccoon's. As the sun rose overhead, Doug and I soon realized that we were both in for a very long day. Unlike the Allegheny trail that was composed of smooth crushed limestone the C&O towpath was the complete opposite. The canal path was rocky, rough and at times muddy. This left us with an undesired slow pace. Not long after sunrise we arrived at the Paw Paw Tunnel.
(The Paw Paw Tunnel)The Paw Paw Tunnel is a 3,118 feet long canal tunnel which was built to bypass the Paw-Paw bends, a six-mile stretch of the Potomac River containing five horseshoe bends. Construction on the tunnel began in 1836, and the tunnel was not completed until 1850. Although it was originally planned to be completed in two years, there were many difficulties in the process of construction. The tunnel was finally completed with a cost overrun of 500%. Though surpassed by many tunnels today, it remains one of the world's longest canal tunnels and was one of the greatest engineering feats of its day. The tunnel was by far the coolest part of the ride.
Our first stop of day 2 was in Hancock Maryland 60 miles into our second day. By now Doug and I were in the mood for a warm cooked meal. Drinking Ensure and eating Powerbars and PowerGels just wasn't going to cut it for us today. A local bike shop directed us to a local diner called the "Park and Eat" diner. To our surprise, Hancock was holding a Apple Harvest Parade that morning. Luckily the diner was still open. We spent around 30 minutes at the diner and a warm breakfast omelet had never tasted so good. It had taken us over five hours to bike 60 miles and by doing the math we realized that our plans of biking 185 miles to Washington DC in one day would not come to fruition. We called the girls since this was one of the first times that morning where we had cell phone service and alerted them that we were not going to make it to DC today. Our next plan was to determine just how far we were going to go. Harpers Ferry was 64 miles from Hancock and had vehicle access so that is where we decided to finish up our second day. We were both tired and sore all over and simply wanted the day to be finished. We were stopping every 5-10 miles until we eventually got passed by a pace line of 4 other riders. Now was our chance to give our bodies a break.
(Doug and I somewhere along the towpath)We would ride the next 10 miles with the group of four until we got to Williamsport which was 25 miles past Hancock. Doug and I had thought that our ride to Harpers Ferry would be easy now that we were "drafting" but unfortunately Williamsport was where the other guys were stopping for lunch. We decide to push onward and leave the group behind. Surprisingly my legs actually felt pretty good the entire day but what hurt the most was my butt. Almost 24 hours into our epic ride, I was developing some nasty irritation down under if you know what I mean. We joked numerous times on how bad we'd get made fun of if we showed up in Harpers Ferry with a 3 inch gel cushioned seat. Doug even came up with this idea of wrapping our arm warmers around the seat for extra cushion. I don't know why I went along with his idea, but believe it or not it actually worked…well sort of. I had wrapped two arm warmers around my seat but somewhere along the way lost one of them and decided it wasn't worth losing the other. The 39 miles between Williamsport and Harpers Ferry for me was pure survival. My hands were going numb because of the static wrist position and the repetitive scenery was starting to play tricks on our minds. A break came near Shepherdstown where the trail had washed away. This required us to detour onto a public road. This was the first time in almost two days where we saw traffic. The detour wasn't very well marked so we had to wait until someone came along to show us the way and then it was back to the trail. We actually have no idea how many miles the detour added but if I had to guess it was at least 4 or 5. We arrived in Harpers Ferry at 5:07 p.m. that afternoon after our 11 hour and 51 minute day. We had covered 124 miles and still had two hours of daylight remaining, but there was no way that I was getting back on that saddle. The girls picked us up and we drove just north of DC where we planned to stay for the evening. That night I was exhausted. My eyes were bloodshot and all I wanted to do was go to bed. Instead we went out to dinner to a local Irish Pub. Doug and I both had burgers and I swear that it was the best burger I had ever had. We contemplated getting seconds, but I knew that wouldn't have been a good idea. I had hoped that we'd be celebrating over nice cold beers but instead we had to get up early in the morning for another day of biking.
The C&O Canal Towpath - Day 3
Day 3 began at 8:17 a.m. in Harpers Ferry just where we had left off.
(Here we are in Harpers Ferry ready to finish the journey to Washington DC)We had 61 miles to go until we arrived in Georgetown. The morning was pretty much the same as where we had left off on the day before. The trail conditions were still rough and the most we could cover in an hour was around 15 miles. The first two hours flew by as we could practically smell victory around the corner. But that all changed not long after that. My butt still hurt which meant it hurt to sit and when I stood up my quads hurt. It was a lose / lose situation. We only stopped a couple times during the last 61 miles of the towpath. We stopped once for about five minutes to refill our water bottles but besides that stops were short and quick.
(The final stretch)Once we reached the Great Falls 14 miles from Georgetown we knew we were very close. We took turns working together breaking the ride up into one mile increments. 14, 13, 12, 11…the miles began to fly by. We arrived in Georgetown at the end of the Canal Towpath at 1:17 in the afternoon. We were able to maintain that 15 mph pace the final 61 miles and finished the third day in just over five hours. The girls awaited us at the finish and Doug and I made it all the way to Mile Post 0.
(Mile Post 0)The feeling of accomplishment was awesome and I enjoyed the challenges that the 318 mile journey brought us over the 2.5 day span.
(We were greeted in Georgetown with a very cool sign the girls made)Later that afternoon we toured the American History Smithsonian and then headed back home to Pittsburgh. Special thanks to Jen and Lisa for being our support crew this weekend. We couldn't have done it without you two!
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3 comments:
Oh dear Lord, my butt is starting to hurt just thinking of it!!! What an adventure!! Love the pictures...and glad you guys survived (and had fun!).
love it! i've been on the C&O near DC but never as far out as you. that truly was an epic adventure. after reading this I want to do it!!! :) congrats!
You're crazy! But then again you always do stuff like this, I would be more worried if you didn't do something this crazy at least once a month :) Good job!
~Erin
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