Kinzua Bridge and the Hills and Valleys

We are way behind in getting travel posts published this summer because we're having too much fun traveling! So we won't be confused about when each "wandering" happened, we'll start each blog with its actual date.

September 23, 2022

We have enjoyed our Boondocker Welcome stay next to this old red barn near Cortland, New York. But yesterday we had an over-night visitor that woke us up. We heard something very close, rustling around in the barn. From the inside of the motor home we speculated--was it a bear . . . a racoon . . . a person? Mark was the brave one (always) who got up and saw two eyes in the dark.

Then he recognized the silhouette rummaging through the trash can he had just turned over. It was our host's dog, who made an evening escape to check out the trash in the barn. We lost a little sleep over that one.

The next morning Denisa took a walk through the pasture next to the barn. The rolling hills of New York are lovely with their steep hill sides and deep valleys. We experienced those hills and valleys in several different ways today, as we hit the road in the motor home around 10:30. 

We headed straight west across New York just east of the Finger Lakes. You can visualize these large lakes as being made by a giant hand scraping across the landscape from north to south, with the fingers scratching out long narrow lakes. They were actually formed from retreating glaciers that made deep grooves between mountains. So our motor home trip today saw us climbing up a mountain, then down to Lake Cayuga--one of the two biggest finger lakes. Then we headed up a different mountain and back down to Lake Seneca, then south to Lake Leuka--the thumb. The trip today was longer than usual--more than three hours--and the windiest we have seen this summer. We must be in hurry to get back to the Midwest to see our kids and grandkids.

We could have taken the interstate, but Mark prefers the little roads. He checks them out in advance using the detailed views on google maps. When we travel we have three forms of navigation running--our phone on google maps, our big rig GPS, and a paper map in Denisa's lap. Today Denisa had a post-it-note stuck to her New York map to help with navigating the roads Mark wants to travel. The post-it note reads: "Take Highway 8 that runs into Highway 365 to Highway 12 thru Utica then south to Waterville and Highway 20 to Bouckville to Highway 25 to Georgetown to Highway 80 to Shields to Highway 13 to I-81 and exit 10 to Highway 41." That seems simple enough, right?!? The route was successful and we pulled into our new Boondocker Welcome site near Allegany, New York. It was right next to this couple's beautiful old Victorian Bed and Breakfast.

Our camping spot for the next couple days has 50-amp electricity, water, and a dump station beside our second red barn of the day.

The residents of this old red barn came pouring out of the little door at the bottom of the big door.

Denisa spent a good part of her time at this spot trying to make friends with the newest batch of kittens.

Once we were all set up, we took the advice from our friend Mary, and headed south a few miles into Pennsylvania. It was 33 miles to a place we have never heard of before--Kinzua Bridge. In 1882, they needed a way to transport coal, oil, and people over a half-mile wide (and 300 foot deep) valley. Even steeper than the roads we had driven earlier today, a railroad would have had to zig-zag many times to get to the bottom of the valley, and then wouldn't have the power to get up the other side. It would take an eight-mile detour to go around this steep valley. The boldest choice would be to build a train bridge that would connect the mountain walls on either side of the steep valley. In 1882, an iron trestle was built that was the longest and highest railroad viaduct at that time. It took only 94 days to build this impressive structure.

The new visitor center at Kinzua Bridge had interesting displays that tried to explain the height of this engineering marvel. It's about as tall as the Statue of Liberty from the valley floor to the bridge. Trains going across the bridge were limited to 5 miles per hour. With the advent of larger trains and heavier loads, they had to replace the iron trestle with steel.

It was used until 1959. After sitting abandoned for many years, the state of Pennsylvania bought the land and opened Kinzua Bridge State Park in 1970. Visitors could ride an excursion train across the bridge. But that was deemed unsafe in 2002 because of the rusting supports, and the bridge was closed even to pedestrians. In 2003 work began to repair the trestle.

But on the afternoon of July 21, 2003, a tornado made its way down this valley and wrenched the eleven middle towers from their bases and threw them to the valley floor. We could look over the side of the bridge to see the tangled steel that the tornado left behind.

By walking to the end of the bridge, we could look 300 feet down over the twisted metal and see the other end of the bridge still standing.

The bridge is now called the skywalk, and includes a glass section where visitors can look down to the ground. They re-marketed the state park that now is quite popular as a place to see the tornado damage that snapped the 120-year-old anchor bolts. 

After walking 600 feet to the end of the standing section of the trestle, we decided to take a hike down below the bridge.

We stopped at the self portrait viewpoint to take a picture looking straight down those old trestles.

The trail took us down to the bottom of the valley for the ground perspective.

After the 0.6 down-hill walk, we could see the end of the standing trestle where we took pictures earlier. Then it was long steep walk back to the pickup in the state park parking lot.

We drove back to our camping spot, crossing back over the New York state line. New York wanted to warn us about deer and bear, with signs every half-mile or so. Are they really this serious about bear here?

We were home before dark, and got ready for a cold night. It's supposed to be in the 30's tonight. That's cold for wanderers living in a motor home. But we're sure glad we spent the day enjoying the views of the Kinzua Bridge and experiencing some of the hills and valleys of New York and Pennsylvania.