Rail trail, Cabela's and RV Dreams' friends

Because we had stayed more than 3 nights using our Thousand Trails Zone Pass, we had to stay out of the Thousand Trails system for at least 7 nights before we could use our Zone Pass again.  Also, in plotting our way up to New England and Canada, we did not want to travel anywhere near New York City. 

We subscribe to the Big Rigs Best Bets online campground directory.  What I like about this particular campground directory, is they list campgrounds they have visited that accommodate bigger rigs (40’ ft and up).  In other words, if they stayed there, we can stay there.  Plus, we needed to stay where we had full hookups and 50 AMP service so we could get caught up on our laundry.  We decided to stay at one of their recommendations, Pine Hill RV Park, in Kutztown, PA.

We had to do a little “back-tracking” on the Atlantic City Freeway but traveled around the north side of Philadelphia this time rather than the south side. 

 

Tolls were expensive again.  The most expensive one yet:  $20 to cross the Ben Franklin Bridge back into Pennsylvania.  They sure like their bridges and toll roads up here!

Pine Hill RV Park is located a short distance off of I-78,

 

 

 but still out in the country.  

We had site #D-13.   It sure was nice to be able to use both air conditioners again.

 

The Pennsylvania countryside is absolutely beautiful… 

…with farms dotting the countryside everywhere.

 

On Wednesday, we drove to the Schuylkill River Trail in Hamburg, PA.  We started at the trailhead in Hamburg, PA…

…and rode for about 30-45 minutes one direction and then headed back.  The trail was formerly a railroad track and had been converted to a bike trail made of small asphalt-type gravel which was fine even for street bikes like ours.  Can't you just imagine what it would have been like to ride a train through here?

The rail trail had a slight gradual climb on the way out which meant we hardly had to pedal at all on the way back. 

The portion of the trail on which we rode was shaded almost the entire way.

 

Parts of the railroad (and now rail trail) were cut through rock.

Part of the rail trail goes under I-78.

 

A small portion of the trail we rode on opened up to give us this view of the hills surrounding Hamburg, PA.

And we crossed over an old railroad bridge also.

This old railroad bridge crossed over another active railroad track below.

Part of the trail followed the Schuylkill River…

…which was higher than usual due to recent heavy rains.

After returning back to the car, we drove through the old town of Hamburg.

While we were sitting outside enjoying the nice evening after returning from our bike ride, we saw a couple walking by.  Chuck said “I think they were at the RV-Dreams Rally in Hershey.”  And sure enough, it was Ken and Bonnie Hosler who we met last year at the rally.  We remembered all the fun we had at the RV-Dreams rally and talked about the different places we had camped since then.
 

On Thursday, we drove to an RV dealer in Hamburg to buy a new strap for one of our window awnings that had broke.  While in Hamburg, we thought we would just “run into” Cabela’s for few minutes to look for a backpack.  Cabela’s in Hamburg is a very big store – 2 or 3 times bigger than Bass Pro Shop in Nashville.  As soon as we walked in, we knew we would not be just “running into” this store for a backpack.

Cabela’s has the most extensive display of mounts we have ever seen.  They had a spectacular elk and mule deer display.

They had polar bears...

...brown bears...

and grizzly bears.

They had moose...

 

and rams and mountain goats (and a cougar at the top of the hill).

 

Part of what make the mounts so interesting is how the displays were action scenes like lions chasing prey…

…and crocodiles eating their dinner.

Check out this rhinoceros…

Just when we thought we had seen it all, we found this room to the side with hundreds of mounts of trophy deer everywhere.

Needless to say, we stayed at Cabela’s for about a couple of hours rather than just a few minutes.

When we got back to the campground, Ken and Bonnie invited us to their campfire that night.  We met their friends Fred & Delores and Sam & Cathy.

They taught us how to make snakes.  (What????)  How you make snakes is you wrap a crescrent roll around the end of a stick (like a snake).  The stick is about 3/4 inch in diameter and has had the bark stripped off about 3-5 inches on the end.  Cook the snake over an open fire.  When it is done, it will slide right off and you fill it up with chocolate, peanut butter, marshmallows, jelly…whatever you want.  They were delicious.

It was a terrific evening swapping old camping stories and eating snakes.  We look forward to seeing them again sometime down the road.