Day 8

Homeward Bound

We woke up this morning to a wet, dirty tent. I was glad this was the last morning we would have to fold up a wet tent. The rain was so hard last night that dirt was all over the bottom portion of the tent, but at this point I really didn’t care too much, I would be cleaning the thing in a day or two. We got the big pieces off and stuffed it in its bag. Today would be a day of driving, which is fine with me, I sometimes prefer this, depending on where one has to drive, of course.

We packed the car and left. We were probably on the road around 9 a.m. Not far from the campground we saw a group of wild turkeys roaming around on the side of the road looking for food. I drove past them but then turned around and went back to find them. They were too far into the forest to get a good picture so we just watched them as they went deeper and deeper into the woods.

Continuing on NY 30 south, we passed through Speculator, Wells, Northville, and Cranberry Creek. This is an old town with large shade trees and old architecture. A lot of old people walking the streets, seems like a very quaint town. By now we were at the lower end of the park where the mountains are not as high and they are farther apart than they were in the heart of the park.

It was still a bit overcast today, but the sun was trying to peek through the clouds. The area south of the park is mostly old towns which, because they are close to the New York State Thruway (I-90), have expanded beyond their original size and charm. NY 30 becomes less and less populated the farther south we drive and more and more farms pop up. The road is still curvy but is rather flat with the hills off in the distance.

Soon we were near the Catskill Mountains and Catskill Park. The road took us from the start of the East Branch of the Delaware River near Grand Gorge and followed the river all the way down to its end.

The river makes up the border of the Catskill Park and about halfway along we crossed it and entered the park. While we remained in the park, the road did not stretch for more than half a mile before taking a sharp hairpin turn. At one point, with all the turns we were making, I was convinced that we had made a loop—my sense of direction was totally off by now.

We crossed out of the park and continued to parallel the river, every twist and turn. Eventually we came to NY 17, basically a highway. We took this west for about 10 miles and got off in Hancock, New York.

We spotted a Subway sandwich shop so we got some lunch. It was about 1 or 2 in the afternoon at this point with only one state left to travel. We found our way to the bridge that crosses into Pennsylvania and joins PA 370. We were in Wayne County and took 370 to PA 171. This area is hilly and there are many trees. We turned on PA 247 west in Forest City hoping to cut over to I-81. Unfortunately, the map and the road signs were not to clear and somehow we found ourselves on a different road marked PA 247 east. We were heading back into Forest City. So, rather than try that again, we continued south on PA 171 into Carbondale and US 6.

Carbondale is an old town with many Saturday afternoon drivers out. To top that off, there was some kind of fair going on and the traffic was backed up a bit, nothing major though. Finally, we cut over on PA 107 to I-81 and took it south toward Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. This put us on the PA Turnpike and it was a straight shot home from there, about 3 hours.

The sun was out and it was a beautiful day by the time we got home. It was about five or six in the afternoon and it just so happens that we were having a little family get-together that evening. Linda & Tom and Brian & Courtney and their better-halves were over for dinner and we walked in the door, without showers, and after sitting in a car all day with no air flowing since we couldn’t open the windows with the plastic rear window, and the fan in the car worked only when it wanted to (which wasn’t often). It was cool outside though, and the humidity was gone. We got all my stuff out of the car and Sergio went home, probably to get a decent shower, which is exactly what I did.