In the old "Along Came Bronson" series, Bronson is sitting at a stop sign on his Harley trying to decide which way to go. The audience can tell that he's flipping a mental coin in his head; heads left, tails right. Then he turns left towards the next adventure.

This morning was kind of like that for us, we only knew that we were heading south on SR 14 and we've never, ever been here before. What a pleasure and surprise Pennsylvania turned out to be. Just as we left Elmira, NY the scenery and terrain began to change. Shortly, we passed into Pennsylvania and from the top to the bottom of the state; we enjoyed one great scenic view after another.

Washington calls itself, The Evergreen State. That may well be but they have nothing over Pennsylvania which possess every shade of green known to man or beast. The hills are higher than those in New York, actually several hundreds of feet high in many cases (photo 1). They are usually covered with trees and in the valleys sit small farms (photo 2, 3 & 4) growing corn or oats or some other truck crop. These small farms sit surrounded by small bands of trees that separate them and act as natural property lines. The farms separate the small towns occupied by several hundred to several thousand people. The local roads connect each of these farms and communities together as they follow the contours of those tree covered mountains drawing the motorcyclist left or right, up or down, keeping the rider awake and interested and wondering what the future holds. It was starting out to be a very nice day.

Because the speeds are much reduced from the highway speeds we've been doing for the last couple of days, I've noticed my gas mileage is going up. Still, you have to stop and feed the beast from time to time and I stopped in the little town of Gillett, PA to take on gas, ice, and candy bars. Gillett is a really small town and the most active business in the community that morning was Woody's, a combination gas station and general store (photo 5).

It was also one of the most modern looking buildings in the town. Many of the small towns located in the Pennsylvania hill country are older towns with long pedigrees. Consequentially, most of the homes on the main streets are of the older, two story colonial style. Woody's stood out from the rest because of its modern appearance.

We picked up SR15 at Williamsport and, to our surprise, acquired another lane in our direction at the same time. SR 14 and 15 are good roads but I selected them because they were the closest roads heading in the direction that I wanted to go. They are not marked on any map as scenic roads, which makes one wonder about all of those other non-scenic roads. SR 15 is a strange road at times. It runs the gamut of possibilities, one lane in each direction, one-lane/two-lane combinations, and two lanes in each direction, split.

At Harrisburg, the road split into several directions, and there was a sign that read I-80 East, SR15 South, & SR 78 North. What? I guess at this one intersection of roads, each of these routes overlaps. Still, it seemed funny to be on a road that went in three different directions at once, even if it was only for a short distance.

As we continued on to the southwest, you could see Harrisburg across the Susquehanna River looming large. After Toronto, I was glad we didn't have to battle big city traffic again so soon since I was enjoying this more laid back driving lifestyle.

Shortly after leaving the Harrisburg cutoff behind, we passed a scenic overlook that showed the Susquehanna River and the surrounding countryside in a good light. What you see before you was pretty typical for most of the state. Lush green hills with small and medium sized communities tucked into the valleys (photos 6, 7 & 8).

We had the Susquehanna River on our left for much of the rest of the day. It is a big broad river that eventually flows all the way to Maryland and the Chesapeake Bay. It also added one more scenic appetizer to our trip. I told Linda that if they could only add Minnesota lakes to this state, it would be the perfect state. She said only if they also added California weather. Oh yeah, I forgot about Pennsylvania winters. For the summer, at least, it was an almost perfect state to ride motorcycles in. You've got to come here.

After a long, but enjoyable day, it clouded up and started to sprinkle. Linda had no rain gear on as we pulled off SR15 into our destination of Gettysburg and found a Days Inn for the night.

Tomorrow we will visit the battlefield and monuments, something I'm looking forward to, being one of those people who really enjoy history. We will then decide if we cut back on this ride a little more to make our schedule. We've already eliminated Philadelphia and may also eliminate Annapolis and head directly for the Blue Ridge Parkway. I'm starting to discover that you can't do it all in one trip, even if it is two months long.