pa biker: KAW 53 & Covered Bridges

As is customary in south central PA, there were almost too many cycling options to choose from today. Just this past Thursday I was party to a 43 mile joy ride through thunderstorms up Whiskey Springs and Kings Gap with two former pros who happen to be married, and happen to live in Carlisle. Carlisle rides are always good. Keith, aka KAW, is sort of the guru of Carlisle's Tuesday and Thursday night rides - one of the longest continually running group rides on the East coast (My friend, Jim, has the longest running one from his shop in Nyack, NY). Regardless, Keith was leading a ride this morning and that was the one for me.

I first met KAW over five years ago on a referral from my younger sister, Sierra. She knew someone who rides a bike. You know how that can go - you show up at the ride start and the dude doesn't even have a helmet let alone a spare tube or water bottles. That was not the case with Keith. Turns out he has taken over the reins on this Pennsylvania standard, rides frequently, knows the routes, vacations to ride, and has a large network of friends who also ride. Little sister was right on this one but don't tell her.

9:30 from the Carlisle Movie Theatre and we were shooting for 50+ miles. The weather was absolutely beautiful, cool, dry, and sunny.

Heading out of town we encountered our first climb, a warm up for things to come.

Up Starret's Gap, turn right on Mountain Road, down the other side and in Perry County the roads became sublime.

For some reason when this guy was pulling I kept getting real thirsty.

Certainly a road bike ride the green team would enjoy.

Covered bridge numero uno:

Graham Watson couldn't make it, he had some other engagement in France this week - his loss.

The powers that be converse on where we ought to go - the field of dreams won out over covered bridge numero dos.

The real field of dreams.

Because Kevin Costner insisted on cellphone coverage while filming we were able to check our voicemails, I made a call to set a ride up for Sunday morning, took a leak, someone decided that the powers that be made a bad call, so we decided to backtrack to covered bridge numero dos.

Jen almost got creamed by a Dodge Ram Dualie SuperStudly 9500k Small Weiner Limited Edition Diesel Truck (you know the DRDSS9.5KSWLEDT) while crossing this obviously single-lane bridge.

We then cruised into Landisburg, took a look at my friend, Ray's, house and I found out that he is a banker. Ray wasn't home or I would still be there drinking Guinness. We tanked up at a Shell station. A Shell station that happens to be sporting the finest beef jerkey selection in southern Pennsylvania and an outside deck with a spectacular view.

We rode some more and climbed some more.
All told the day ended at around 53 miles and close to 4,000 feet of climbing.