Day 43, Washington to Confluence, 89 + 4 miles extra

Best: Seeing Falling Water, finally.

Worst: Riding with half of the road coating my bike and my body.

Most Unexpected: The road to Falling Water wasn't as bad as I expected.

Rain again last night, what a surprise.  However, the tornado warning was cancelled, so it was an uneventful night.  We had Taqueria dinner last night including tamales, tacos (make yourself), and pie for dessert.

We rode off and found some more hills in Pennsylvania.  I was getting pretty cocky because the hills weren't too bad, but then the roads must have heard me because they turned up the volume.  We then rode through Mingo park which was beautiful, as was most of the ride after we got out of Washington city.  Mingo park was fairly flat, and gave us a nice rest before we hit some bigger hills and then at mile 35 we got onto the bike trail the YRT, (Youghertiney rail trail).  This is a crushed limestone trail that does give up a lot of dust, and is a very slight uphill.  Because of the roughness, the speeds seemed to be around 15-16 mph while on it.  At mile 78 we got off the YRT to go up to Falling Water.  The climb started pretty steep, then flattened, then got steep again for about a mile.  Then to my surprise the road went down to Failling Water (this meant I got to climb out of Falling Water as well). The drizzle started on the climb, then increased on the descent.  We managed to dodge some rains while we toured Falling Water, then when we got back on the YRT, we got soaked.  The rain poured down on us, filled up the trail with water, and we ended up with dirt all over our bikes, and bods.  Getting to the campground gave us about 7 minutes of no rain to set up our wet tents from this morning, then once again the rain poured.  By my excellent calc, the hard rain on the YRT lasted for 7 miles, and we gained 46 pounds of road material.

Falling Water was awesome.  Our tour guide seemed new, so I asked her how long she had been giving tours.  We were her first tour.  I really enjoyed the tour, but they did not allow us to take pictures from inside the house.  Still, it was well worth the effort that I will feel on tomorrows ride.  REALLY AWESOME.

Early morning roads.

Riding through Mingo park.

Notice how brown the water is from the rains.

Leaving Mingo Park.

"I don't care if you are building a small bridge, I'm not moving"

This guy is made out of railroad spikes,  The guy on the right.

The YRT

more of the YRT

A modest house.

Well worth the extra miles.

Just a little road grime.

Looking down at the waterfall from the cantilevered section of the house.  This is an illegal picture as I was in the house.  I showed this last to show the lengths I will go to serve my bloggees.