Ride to Pittsburgh Day 4 - Cumberland to Confluence

 I'm writing the this the next day, because the Outflow Campground in Confluence has no cell service or wifi. It's a very nice place to stay. It's run by the Pennsylvania parks department. It's impeccably clean, and so very quiet. Everyone here but me is in RVs for the fishing. I slept great.

Today was a big day of climbing, where you have to climb up to the Big Savage Mountain Tunnel. It's 1700 feet of climb in 21.5 miles, which is an easy, constant 1.7% grade. It took me three hours. My bike and gear weigh about 90 lbs.

This is what it looks like during the climb. The trail surface is super-smooth crushed stone. That railroad track next to the trail is active between Cumberland and Frostburg, they run a steam excursion train and people coast down in on pedal cars.

You cross into Pennsylvania near the top. They make a big deal about the Mason Dixon line.

Here's the scenic view from the top.

Then you go through the Big Savage Tunnel, which is very, very long (3300 feet!) but it is also lit up except where the lights have burned out and not been replaced.

Just after that, you go through this little tunnel to cross the Eastern Continental Divide. It's a little less than 1% grade downhill clear to Pittsburgh at this point.

I had some lunch at Fox's Pizza in Myersdale. I ate here before when riding the GAP with Max ten years ago. It was really busy then, and the pizza was great.

Now it's empty and forlorn, and pretty much take-out only. There are a few booths you can sit at to eat.

I was excited to get Antipasto for lunch, but the "Antipasto" was actually a regular iceberg lettuce chef's salad with pizza toppings!

Right after Myersdale is the astonishing Salisbury Viaduct. The Casselman River is 100 feet below down there.

40 miles after the high point, and 30 miles after lunch, I got to Confluence, my stopping point. Confluence is a really nice quaint small town with good restaurants. 

My fave place to eat in Confluence now is Pamela's Pint's and provisions, which is a tiny spot in an old garage behind the town gas station. But they have pirogis and stiff drinks!

The Painkiller came in a Tiki glass with an umbrella!

The ride today was in two segments, because a landslide buried the trail between Rockwood and Casselman, and engineers think it's not done sliding yet. So they closed it and they are not messing around. There is a shuttle you can take around the closure for $20 so you don't have to ride a detour on the roads, which the powers that be emphatically do not recommend.

I heard lots of horror stories from people I talked to who rode the detour anyway, about how it's a 20% grade and blind curves all over. But I'm going the other way. I don't mind going *down* 20% grades. I scouted it on Google maps, it's all paved, it looks fine. But when I got there the lady working the information booth in Rockwood talked me out of it and the shuttle driver showed up right then so I took the shuttle.

And the shuttle drove the same route I would have ridden. It would have been no big deal. I'm so lame.

Strava segment 1: https://www.strava.com/activities/15539763063

Strava segment 2: https://www.strava.com/activities/15540662642