Hi all.
Sorry if there is already a post on this. I am planning a trip from NYC to Pittsburgh sometime in late Spring.
Does anyone have advice/suggestions about the designated trans-PA routes on the DOT website. I am in no way looking for the most direct route, as time is really not an issue. I am interested in killer scenery.
Thanks.
My experience wtih the PennDOT bike routes is limited to a few trips in Western PA>
The routes were wonderful when they were far away from the city. They were not nearly so nice near the city.
You might want to check Bike bulletin boards (like this one) or maybe Bikely for alternatives for any places where the PennDot bike routes traverse urban areas.
in my experience the state bike routes are mostly really good. in at least one case i know route S had been re-routed off back-country roads and onto a suburban sprawl hell in chambersburg, but aside from that instance, real nice routes.
a few years ago i made a route based on a ride i took out to NYC. it still looks pretty good to me, the hairyest part is the ten miles on route 30 east of greensburg -no good detour of that. riding through central PA is beautiful. you go near centralia, the town that's been on fire for 30 years. the route goes to newark, because if i were biking out of NYC i would take the PATH train to newark instead of taking the GWB: http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Pittsburgh-to-Newark-NJ
Be careful around Chambersburg. Bike Route S goes through part of it and its suburban sprawl.
I do not have the maps nor the exact routes, but my suggestion would be to cross the Delaware somewhere around Port Jervis and work your way over toward Jim Thorpe and over through the center of Carbon County (Hazleton) and follow the valley system of the middle Susquehanna toward Sunbury and toward State College (via a northeasterly route) and into Altoona following old rte 220 south to Bedford and then take route 30 and follow the reverse route of the Crush the Commonwealth from there.
there are shorter and flatter routes (especialy the first part, but you will love the scenery up around Carbon County). I found a very flat, long valley system (about 35 miles long) that ran from Bloomsburg, PA to Lewistown, PA (via elysburg).
