Tri-State Stunner

[Falban]

Hi All,
I got back yesterday from a most incredible two day ride through west New Jersey, Port Jervis-area NY, and Milford Pa.  Wow, wow, wow!
These pix don't do it justice but I wanted to share them nonetheless.
Here's a link to the route I took: http://www.openroadjourney.com/bigmap.asp?rid=2522

I left Queens at 6:10 am which enabled me to do the traverse of Manhattan into NJ in thirty minutes.  I was very grateful for that.

Thirty miles westing on I-80 got me exit 19.  Almost immediately I was in biker heaven:




Jenny Jump State Forest.  Named after a girl who, legend has it, jumped to her death from Jenny Jump Mt. in order to escape Indians who were chasing her and her father:




My first attempt at a panorama:

[Falban]

Pressing on:


Beautiful Sussex County, NJ:




High Point was a blast to ride.  Again, the pix fail to capture it (as you all know so well  ):

[Brittles]

Nice. I went on a group ride through that area a couple years ago. That Hawks Nest is quite the hangout. This is about what it looked like the day we rode through there.

[Falban]

I made it into Port Jervis, NY way ahead of my estimation.  I continued through and up Rt. 97 - an official scenic byway and home of the Hawk's Nest.  This is a short but twisty mountainside stretch of road.  Unfortunately they were doing maintenance that day, so it was one lane of traffic and no twisty mountain thrills 

Past the Hawk's Nest to Barryville, Pa. for lunch.  Spinach ravioli:


and a chicken something wrap:


There were two Hogsters in the restaurant puttin' down a few beers before heading back out.  Brain buckets, jeans and leather vests...

Heading south again back toward Port Jervis:


This bridge closed for overhaul.  Up close it looked pretty rickety:


South bound on 97 puts you on the scenic side so I stopped past the construction zone and snapped these two:

[Falban]

Nice. I went on a group ride through that area a couple years ago. That Hawks Nest is quite the hangout.

Brittles,
I can imagine it gets really busy up there - it's beautiful, and 97 is a hoot to ride.

[isleofmanfan]

Very nice composition, Falban!  That first panoramic shot has a cool feel to it.

Thanks for the ride.

[hppants]

Great report - thanks.  It would appear that most of the trees have not budded yet?  It's hard for me to imagine you can find that scenery about 60 minutes from NYC.

[Falban]

Tag #9.  Road side sign of historical significance:


I get back to Port Jervis and head south on 521 toward Montague, NY.  My plan was to cross back into Pa. at Montague and stay in Milford, where I have some roots (more on that later...).  521 turns out to be another great, country road with lots of tight sweepers/twisties.  As I'm floating along, I pass a small brown road sign advertising a car-top boat ramp.  I pull a u-ey and turn down the hard-packed dirt trail.  It turns out to be this great path that's no problem for the Nighthawk.   It leads me for about 1/2 a mile through the woods and then comes out at the Delaware.   :






I've got a short video I'd like to embed but I can't make it happen.  Can someone help me?  I tried pasting the YouTube embed code but it just shows the text of the code.  Many thanks.  Resolved.  Just paste the url, not the embed code        HappyCommuter

My roots in Milford:

This house was owned by my grandparents in the fifties, sixties and into the seventies, I think.  My mom and her siblings spent their summers here as kids.  I've heard about "the house in Milford" all my life.  It was cool to finally see it.  Also, my parents were married in Milford as was my mom's sister.

[Falban]

OK, it's sleepy time up north.  I wasn't organized enough to make this a camping trip, so I went with:

Reasonable and comfy  

I forgot to take a picture of my breakfast (and dinner last night, for that matter), so here's the diner itself:

As I left the diner, a couple in their sixties was also leaving.  The wife says, "Oh, so you're the crazy guy with the bike."  She was worried for me because the forecast called for rain and thunder storms.  We chatted for a bit and they turned out to own a Goldwing that the husband had just repaired the clutch on.  They were looking forward to the opening of the season.  

Here's a crazy house in Milford that I had to take a picture of:


Then it was back to Port Jervis for a try at a birthday present for my dad.  The old guy likes old things and PJ has a "bustling" antiques district.  Alas, they were all closed on Tues and Wed.  But that's ok, because they also have...TRAINS!

An ALCO RS-3

and an EMD E8:

While I was snapping these, an old drifter came over to me and explained the the E8 was actually made by General Motors.  I didn't know GM was in the train business.  Today, EMD seems to be owned by Caterpillar (sorry, I'm geeking out  )

The turntable the E8 is on is also of some reknown:

[Falban]

OK, back through High Point State Forest, but via a different route - Saw Mill Rd:


I wish I'd stopped for more pictures to give you the flavor of it - truly awesome riding.

Saw Mill Lake:

That's not lens dust, those are flies all over the place!  The auto-focus box on my camera was freaking out trying to lock on to them.  They were not having any trouble locking on to me or the fishermen that were there.

One more tag - 25. Pasture of Cows:


and before I knew it I was back in the thick of it:


Hrm:


New York Public Library:


That's it.  Thanks for tuning in.  Total mileage was 310 plus a stack of memories that will last forever!

[Falban]

Thanks Isle - I'm glad you liked it.
I did it with GIMP, an open source photo editing program I play with.  It's a lot of fun.

Hi Pants,
There's so much around here, the problem is "escaping" from the city. 
Right now jobs, etc. have us here, but SOQS and I are country mice at heart 

[Snoopy]

Beautiful report thanks!!

[Falban]

You're welcome Snoopy - glad you liked it   

[fishball]

Loved it, thanks for sharing.  Some really good shots too.  Was there a lot of other road traffic on your route?

[Falban]

Glad you enjoyed it Fishball 
There was no one else out there.  Schools are back from Easter/spring break (well, except mine  ) and it was the middle of the week, so I had a great opportunity to explore.

[tbante]

Somehow I just cannot imagine riding a motorcycle into the city of New York.

[Falban]

Yea, it doesn't really have anything to recommend it.

[Hawks_Nest]

Somehow I just cannot imagine riding a motorcycle into the city of New York.

Me either  

Nice report, Falban.  Looks like you had a lots of fun during the trip. I am thinking I will try there this weekend.

Here is my picture that I took last year. It seems we stopped at the same spot.  It was on my way back from a trip to Rochester on the July 4th weekend on my VFR. It was a 90+ day.  

[skramer360]

Thanks for the pics and memories Falban. My grandparents lived in Sussex, NJ for much of their lives and we visited them every year for 20-30 years there. We also liked High Point and visited there often when we were there.

[happycommuter]

Sussex County is great.  Shame it's not closer.  I find the Hawk's Nest to be highly over-rated.  The squiggly portion is all of a quarter mile long, the river is muddy...

If one is really clueless, they can get to High Point off Route 23, pay admission to the park, and totally miss all the good roads.  

The Meany Burger at Arlene & Tom's in Port Jervis is on my to-do list.  You totally escaped the rain?

YouTube links usually display as embedded video here.  Post the link and we'll have a look.

[luckylindy]

Great report and pics Falban. Looks like some great roads.

[ariwhiteboy]

Great ride report Falban, thanks for sharing.   

[fortyhourdays]

Great report.  Makes me really anxious to get riding again!

[Falban]

The Meany Burger at Arlene & Tom's in Port Jervis is on my to-do list.  You totally escaped the rain?

YouTube links usually display as embedded video here.  Post the link and we'll have a look.

HC - I totally missed Arlene and Tom's - have to go back now.  I did also miss the rain.  Not a drop.
Here's that YT embed code.  I chose the "use old embed code" option.  It was uploaded as a .MOV file.  I appreciate you looking at it. 

<object width="560" height="349"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/gThiKpdZegg?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/gThiKpdZegg?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="560" height="349" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

Thanks everyone for the kind words - happy to contribute a little something to the forum.

[LOKi]

great report.