Wild Hogs VII (2015) Day 1

It's hard to believe that we are on year 7 of our Wild Hogs Adventures. This year we decided to stay closer to home. Previous years have always been out of state, heading either north or south. This year we decided to stay in the state of PA. I wasn't sure how I felt about that until we actually were riding today. I must say that PA has as good a riding as anything we have seen in the previous 6 years.

For those who may not be familiar with the history of our annual Wild Hogs Adventure, the short version is that for several years my brothers and I (there are 5 of us) had always talked about taking a motorcycle trip together. It was during one of these many conversations, that one of our wives said "why don't you guys stop talking about it and just do it?". We agreed, and the annual Cagno Brothers Wild Hogs Adventure was born (yes named for the movie).

Poker

Living Room

Kitchen

This years trip is to northwestern PA. In past years (except for last year) we have camped on our trip. Last year we decided to do hotels, but all agreed that something was definitely lost without the campfires and late night conversations. This year we decided to rent a cabin in the woods. As I write this it's dark outside and I didn't get a chance to take any pictures of the cabin from the outside. Maybe tomorrow.

We were supposed to start at 0830 this morning, but as with all great plans it was subject to change. Ugly storms in the Lancaster area delayed the Lancaster faction and we were about 2 hours late getting started. The cabin we are renting is in Cook Forest. It is actually only 2.5 or 3 hours from home, but our route to get here took us more like 9 hours. We took a very "scenic" route. The weather was very cloudy with a few sprinkles to start. The further we went the cooler it got, but we started seeing peeks of sunshine here and there. For most of the day we had temps in the mid 60's. By late afternoon we had sunshine and great riding. Many of the mountain roads we were riding reminded me of some of the roads we rode last year in North Carolina.



 We traveled up Rt. 15 from Harrisburg to Rt. 44 south of Williamsport. We then took 44 all the way to Rt. 6 at Coudersport. I don't know how many of you have had the pleasure of riding Rt. 44 through the mountains, but it is right up there with many of the best roads we've ridden on past adventures. Once on Rt. 6 we headed west reaching the little town of Smethport in McKean County. This was something that we were looking forward to. We lived in Smethport for 2 years when I was about 7 years old. (WOW 47 years ago) I did come through this town maybe 20 years ago or so, but I was still amazed that I still was able to find my way around with little difficulty.

Lot on the left was ours

Firehouse across the street

The first stop was actually the second place we lived there. It was a mobile home community (trailer park) across from the fire station. Both are still there. It's funny how things were bigger when we were young. The fire siren tower seemed huge back then. When the siren would go off, we would run to the tower and try to climb it before the siren stopped. That of course would never be allowed now, and truthfully, I don't think our mother knew that's what we did, but it was a much simpler time, where we played outside all day.


Our second stop was the first house we lived in. It was a big Victorian house on King St. It had a neat red bank barn behind it and a huge front yard.

From there we headed to where the old school was (2 blocks away). The school was long ago torn down and a medical clinic has replaced it. I did not take any pictures of it.

We then went another couple of blocks to the old jail. The little blockhouse jail was still in use when we lived there, but has since been closed and is now part of a museum. A couple of my brothers and I could remember walking by there after school to choir practice at the church and talking to an old trustee inmate who would be outside cutting grass. It was a real Mayberry kind of jail. Now they have a new facility just outside town. Still very small, but modern.

On our way out of town we passed by the dam and lake where we used to go fishing as kids. It's hard to believe that we used to walk on the top of that dam when water wasn't flowing over the spillway and nobody said a word. The lake and the creek below were regular hangouts for us in those days. That was a very different time. We were all over town all the time and no one had to worry about anything bad happening. Looking back, it's a wonder we survived our childhood, walking on the top of the spillway to to the dam, paddling a wooden row boat in the creek and swimming at the swimming hole. All on our own at the ages of 7 and less.

Some of you will be disappointed to hear that the day came off without any real incidents. We did get detoured when trying to find our cabin site. We were following Rt 6 to Rt. 66 (not that one) at a town called Kane. Of course, no sooner did we turn onto 66 then we were confronted with large detour signs turning us around and sending us back the way we came. We pulled off at a choice store to figure our next move. The lady who worked there had come out for a smoke break and overheard our conversation and said "good luck with that detour". She asked where we were headed and we told her. She then proceeded to give us directions for a much shorter detour that would get us back on track. Now at the risk of offending some of you, I have to say that these directions, while very detailed were what I like to call women's directions. She told us every road where not to turn and made the directions way more complex than they needed to be. But, with that said, we did make it back to where we needed to be, and ultimately we got to our cabin.

Tomorrow promises to be a good day for riding if maybe a little cool, especially to start. We are planning to ride to the Kinzua Bridge, an old wooden railroad trestle  bridge that was a real marvel of engineering. It was severely damaged in storms a few years ago, but parts still remain. I recall seeing this as a kid. It will be interesting to see it again.