Some time ago, I stumbled across the very interesting site DirtData.org. The site is “An Experiment in Collaborative Cartography.” The idea is that people can create Google Maps of the gravel/dirt/fire roads in their area and submit them to the site. The more people who contribute, the better the maps will be. I’ve started a map of the Luzerne County area. It’s a work in progress, but so far, I’ve cataloged over 25 gravel roads in this area. Here’s the map. Note: there are two pages of roads listed. You have to open the map in Google Maps (click the link below the map on this page), and click on Page 2 at the bottom of the road list to see the rest.

View Luzerne County, PA for DirtData.org in a larger map

I’ve also started a map of the Bloomington, Indiana area, which I’ll post later. It’s fun making these maps, and I hope that they’ll come in handy in the future, both for myself and for others.

If you ride gravel roads in your area, I urge you to create maps to share with everyone.  Here are some useful links to help you get started.

• Map Key
• A pictorial tutorial
• DirtData.org Blog
• DirtData.org Wiki

I’ve been really enjoying looking at the tracklogs captured by my GPS. It allows me to look at some interesting data about both my riding and the terrain. One common element in many of my rides is Bunker Hill Road. Have a look at it, as seen in Google Earth.

Bunker Hill Road, in Google Earth

As you can see, it winds its way up the mountain. Note: partway between Bunker Hill Road (in blue) and 309 (in yellow), you can see a greyish line. That’s the Back Mountain Trail, another way I often ride. I’m constantly amazed at the level of detail you can see in Google Earth.

Not as flashy, but at least as useful, if not moreso, is TopoFusion. Here’s a topographic view of roughly the same area.

Topographical map from TopoFusion

It struck me during my ride that it takes an awfully long time to get up the mountain, but a much shorter time period to get down. I didn’t think to time it, but by looking at the GPS data in TopoFusion, I can get the information I want.

The crosshairs on the lower left of the profile are pointed at the start of the climb. All data is as of that point.

Now, I look at the data at the end of the climb

As you can see, the climb lasted from 9:25 to 31:07, or 21:42 spent on this climb. Climbing-wise, at the beginning of the hill I had already climbed 218 feet. By the time I reached the top, I had climbed 1,000 feet, so the climb was 782 feet.

As I look at the descent in the same manner, I see that it took merely 6:48 to get down the mountain. This time, I “only” hit about 30 mph on the descent, but it was too cold to handle going any faster. Tears were streaming from my eyes and obscuring my vision. And with the twists and turns, 30 is plenty fast anyway.

A view, looking down (from a previous ride). it’s exhilarating accelerating down toward the valley/city

On Saturday, Sarah and I hiked at Big Pocono State Park. It was cold, with the high temperature for the day in the 20s, and quite windy — with gusts to about 30 mph. We felt every bit of it, too, as the park is at the very top of Camelback Mountain, and that is where we parked, completely exposed at around 2100 feet. The wind was so strong that it kept blowing the trunk closed as we tried to get ready for our hike. The road going to the trailhead was closed, so we parked in the main lot, I snapped a few photos of the views, and we started our hike.

Panoramic view to the north

View to the south

The Delaware Water Gap is visible in the distance

This hike was also a gear test for my new GPS. I had one previously, but at some point it stopped working, and it never worked very well on my bicycle. The new GPS, a Garmin eTrex Venture, worked incredibly well. It gets a much stronger signal and seems to be more accurate than my old GPS. This will allow me to do some cool things like geotagging my photos, and posting maps of our activities. For example, see this hike on motionbased.com, or this interactive Google map:

View Larger Map

I have a lot to learn about that stuff, but I think it will make for some interesting ways of presenting photos combined with maps. Another fun way to look at it is in Google Earth. Here’s an example.

Google Earth view

Since this hike starts at the top of the mountain, there’s nowhere to go but down. It started with a smooth, gradual hike down the side of the mountain, and once we got away from the mountaintop and into the woods, we weren’t as exposed to the wind. Eventually we warmed up from the physical activity, but for the first 15 minutes or so we were quite cold.

Easy hiking through birch trees

You can see how cold Sarah felt

Snowy moss

Me

Sky

The trail got perpetually rockier as we hiked. After a while, we reached the edge of a cliff, which the trail followed, quite close to the edge. This afforded us some great views of Tannersville below us in a large valley, with the Delaware Water Gap and New Jersey in the distance.

Rocky trail

Panoramic view — worth viewing large

Unidentified building

Big rocks, part of the trail

Delaware Water Gap

Sarah

Precipitous trail

The trail turned back away from the edge, and now it was time for some climbing. The rock-to-trail quotient increased further. It was slow going, but we were having a lot of fun. The sun was getting low in the sky, the trees throwing long shadows, and we enjoyed the quiet and beautiful hike back up the mountain.

Hiking into the sun

The trail climbed this rock wall. If you look closely you can see an orange blaze on a rock.

More rocks

We reached the connector trail that went back to the car, but we hadn’t had enough. We looked at the map and figured out a way to extend our hike by about another mile. It looked like it would be mostly flat, but there was still significant climbing ahead of us. In a way this was preferable as the more we climbed, the warmer we felt. And as the sun followed its downward trajectory the sky took on new hues.

Climbing

Looking back at Sarah, and the elevation we’d gained

We reached a power line right-of-way, and peering down we had a great view of the valley below us to the south. There was a small lake that appears to have been Mountain Spring Lake, and another, Trout Lake, behind it, and the whole scene was illuminated by nearly-sidewise rays of sunlight. I fought my way through a bush to get a good shot.

Looking toward Mountain Spring Lake

A short while later I discovered that my efforts to find this clear view were not necessary. We found a vista, complete with a rock on which to sit, or stand. I stood atop this rock and gazed down on the land below, the lakes, the Delaware Water Gap in the distance, and who knows what, beyond that. I watched as the clouds caught the sunlight and refracted it erratically. I took a deep breath, drinking in this crisp mountain air, and held my wife close to me. It doesn’t get any better than this, peering out over the land in our new home, with my beautiful wife. When we lived in Indiana, we grew to feel a sense of ownership of the land. We were familiar with every twist and turn of many roads, the topography of the land, and many of the sights and sounds. I knew, standing here, that soon we’d feel the same way about this place. But more importantly, that we would discover this new land together.

Taking in the view

Panoramic image of the view (view large)

An even better view, if you ask me

We had a little hiking left, but we were almost back. It wasn’t the longest hike we’ve done, or easiest, or the most challenging, but it was quite beautiful, and even more memorable.

Sunlight

Solitary tree

Back in the parking lot; one last look to the north before heading out

Sarah again. If she ever runs for office, maybe she can use this shot.