Jon's Journal (jon@3blooms.net)

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Wednesday, Sep 1, 2010: Laceyville, PA to Eynon, PA (52.9 mi)

When I looked out my window early in the morning, I was greeted by the presence of fog. Patchy, but heavy in spots. I decided to wait a while to see if it would clear off. Meanwhile, I walked over to the restaurant and had breakfast.

After a while, even though there was still some fog I decided to get going. I filled my water bottles somewhat reluctantly because the local water didn't taste too good. I intended to find bottled water as soon as possible.

Since the motel was at the top of the hill I had laboriously climbed the previous day, the start of my ride was a long, quick downhill. About halfway down I ran into a Dandy Mini-Mart -- I was getting to be quite a fan -- where I stopped and refilled my water bottles.

The few miles to the town of Meshoppen followed along the Susquehanna River and were a pleasant enough ride. After passing through Meshoppen, the route cuts across the hills to Tunkhannock. There was still some fog about, but it was thin enough that I felt visibility was adequate. I did have my taillight flashing, though.

I passed through the town of Tunkhannock and out the other side. A few miles after that, I reached the town of Factoryville, where I stopped in a place called the Hoagie Hut for a nice lunch. On the other side of Factoryville, the route turned onto PA 107 for the climb over the hills north of Scranton. I remembered this from my 2005 trip as being one of the most difficult climbing days of the trip. Also, I remembered that there were few places to get water in that approximately 10-mile stretch, so I stopped just before the turn-off and bought enough water not only to fill my water bottles but also to fill the 1-liter Nalgene bottle I carry in one of my panniers. (No, the stop wasn't at a Dandy Mini-Mart. My Dandy days appear to be done.)

Thus provisioned, I started into the hills. Truthfully, they weren't as bad as I remembered. Yes, there was plenty of climbing up and coasting down, but none of the climbs were of the long, steep, demoralizing sort. As I reached the last few miles of that stretch, I realized why that was the case. The profile of the route features more nasty climbs when you are going in the east-to-west direction. In my direction, the climbs were gentler. This was amplified by the last two miles, which was a steep descent into the town of Jermyn. In 2005, I had to climb up those two miles!

Once I was in Jermyn I left Route Y and turned onto Route L, headed south. Route L was where I started my journey, about 100 miles south of where I was now. My next task was to find a nearby motel. There was one listed in the neighboring town of Eynon, so I headed in that direction. Unfortunately, my GPS routed me on a road that didn't exist, so I had to backtrack, adding several miles to my trip. Still, I got there eventually, showered, and headed across the road to a restaurant where I had a mediocre chicken marsala. Then it was back to the motel for reading and sleep.