Moraine State Park Pennsylvania

 More hike videos from yesterday while on the North Country Trail (NCT)

Moraine State Park - Pennsylvania

I have only recently found the North Country Trail (NCT).  This trail starts in North Dakota and stretches to Vermont. Its does this via and actual dedicated trail and via roadways. Here are a few websites if you want to know more.  https://nct.maps.arcgis.com/apps/View/index.html?appid=247bfb7befd64180a4471533b937ec25&extent=-80.9868,39.8497,-77.4766,42.4751

https://northcountrytrail.org/

I first encountered a section of the NCT here in Ohio. The trail sections I have encountered have been more remote and take more effort to hike than other trails. The effort is what makes it all worth it. The volunteers they have working on this trail system do an amazing job.

So, back to my hike on the NCT. I was looking at challenging myself physically and mentally with a hike this summer. I looked through to start with utilizing AllTrails found here https://www.alltrails.com/.

After hiking on the NCT in Beaver Creek State Park I wanted to see if I can find other sections in Pennsylvania and in New York. I found several sections of the NCT, but one stood out to me.

This section would be in the Moraine State Park 

This park is in Portersville, Pennsylvania and is big enough to get away from most of the people. Lake Arthur is in the park. This sees heavy boat traffic and a lot of people in the summer.

The NCT trail section here has plenty of elevation deviation. I ascended and descended through out the hike 3300 feet.  As you can see in the graphic below it is quite the roller coaster ride. There were only two climbs and descents that were tough I thought.

I also wanted to mention I don’t think a lot of people out there are used to this, let me explain. When you get into an area that has a trail that goes up and down for several hundred feet these trails become rivers and creeks when it rains.

When this happens the dirt and sometimes the smaller rocks get washed away. If you in an area with clay this can be very slippery when wet.  For example, every step you take must be deliberate and caution must be taken.  You will see in the videos water still running down the hills. The creeks and springs were all running strong. I love the sound of running water there is something about it that just makes me feel at peace.

I deliberately chose to go no faster than 2.0 mph on this hike. I wanted to finish the entire length of the trail I laid out in Garmin Basecamp. I had calculated it was 16 miles long, but ended up being 17.10 miles.  I place mile marker waypoints along the trail to assist myself to monitor how I was doing.

I would make a conscious effort like at mile 6 to do a system check on myself. I would ask how do I feel? Do I feel hydrated? Am I drinking enough water? How much water do I have left?

Since I do a lot of my activities solo, I need to make sure I do these system checks. Out of the three people I saw on the trail today most of the time I saw no one.

Yes, so please use common sense and be prepared.

I saw only wone deer today and a bevy of hoof prints. The mosquitoes were annoying but as wet as it was it could have been a lot worse.

I saw two interesting birds yesterday. I saw this bird down in Beaver Creek State and along the trail.  The one was an American Redstart. I thought at first it was a mismarked Baltimore Oriole. The next bird I saw I thought I was seeing things. Its body was bright but deep red in color and its wings were black. What I saw was male Scarlet Tanager.

I try and be very aware of animals that I see and hear around me. This was neat to see these two birds. Especially the Red Tanager. I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me.

This would be one of the highlights of the day. At about mile 16.15 I was ready for the hike to end. I was very hydrated, but my almost 60 yo body was over it. My dogs were barking, and I was done. I call it zombie hiking. This is where your body knows what has to be done to complete the task, but your brain is off! Lol

I hope you enjoyed the write-up and the artwork and be well.

Sonder

Pennsylvania 15.8 Mile hike on 6.21.2025

 

I am headed to Pennsylvania for a 15.8 Mile hike on 6.21.2025

I will be hiking another section of the North Country Trail (NCT).  Between Alltrails and Garmin Basecamp I have laid out the hike.

It is telling me that the ascent and descent will be over 3300 feet. I am going to see how it goes through the hike. I would like to complete it on Saturday.  We will see I have never been there.

I am taking two water bladders with me in my pack. The one bladder is 3 liters and the other is 2 liters. I am only going to carry a total of 4 and not 5.

I have not covered terrain like this since the service and that’s been decades ago.  I will monitor my pace and keep it slow and steady.  Even at a 2-mph pace that’s 7.9 hours! I will pack my head lamp just in case lol “not really funny, but kind of is”.

Be well,

Sonder

Beaver Creek State Park in Ohio

The one thing about hiking is getting there early. This is for several reasons. some of the reasons are to be ahead of everyone, sometimes it's for a photo and I don’t want other bipeds in it, less noise, and now so I can get spiderwebs in my face. The spider webs show me that no animal or human has been on that part of the trail today.  

I arrived at the Beaver Creek State Park parking lot at 0800. This would be my baptism under fire for the new chest pack.   

I would start out with my battery pack today as the prime power source for the GoPro13. The set up worked better than I had hoped.   

I will utilize this set up when fishing in the future.   

I put on a hike together in the park consisting of 13 plus miles. I will be concentrating on the North Country Trail today.  

The trail goes through the state park. I would take it to the west where route 7 reaches.  

This section is not used to a lot. I had my Garmin 64sx and I could reconnoiter to find the trail. Yea this section is where I saw bear scat and believe I heard a bear huff at me. I was on the high ground, and I just kept on trucking.  

The GoPro13 does not do well in low light scenarios. The videos look ok, but I know they could be better. I just wanted to mention that some of the quality is not the best and explain the reason.  

I only saw one person physically on the trail I was hiking today. I think the wet trail and the number of mosquitoes scared a lot of people away.  

On a wildlife note, I saw more rabbits today thanks to seeing them in the wild in a long time. It was nice to see the numbers I did.  

At the start of the hike, it was nearly 70 degrees. With the amount of fog in the valley it was going to be humid and hot. I had three liters of water today.  

I was wearing shorts and long sleeves. I have found that in the hottest conditions that 3 liters will work for me.   

The morning weather was foggy, very foggy. The GoPro had several issues as you can tell when I was under canopy. The pace was ok, I truly could have gone faster, but I would have paid for it dearly on the return loop. I backed off each time I found myself leaning into the hike and swinging my arms.

I notified the NCT folks about the bear. I will do another section of the NCT this week weather dependent.

Be well folks and drink water!

Sonder

Headed out for a 13 miler today

Stay tuned folks I am sure I will have plenty of videos to share.

Sonder

Video Collage

 

Beaver Creek State Park in Ohio

Aerial Photo

I have been here before but only to fish. This was the first time I have ever visited this area.

This is part of the Western Allegheny Plateau and shown here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegheny_Plateau

You will find Calcutta, Ohio nestled in Columbiana County. This area is very rural and you will need to plan accordingly because of the lack of infrastructure.

This is not a bad thing and in fact it is a good thing from a visitors point of view.  A person just needs to plan accordingly when visiting the area.

I arrived on Saturday the 7^th of June to an almost empty parking lot.  Beaver Creek was up and muddy and on the drop.

I laid out a trek of 13 miles, but I would end up falling short because of how busy I saw the park when I got back to the parking lot.

I started with the Alltrails (alltrails.com) web site and downloaded a few trails. Then I linked them all together using my Garmin Basecamp program.

During the 11.2-mile hike I would ascend and descend over 1200 feet.

I only saw a few hikers out on this day.  I was a little surprised. I don’t know why it was not as busy on the trails. Most of the people I saw were involved more with the park festivities.

There were a lot of people attending the goings on at Pioneer Village. Here is a link for the park. https://ohiodnr.gov/go-and-do/plan-a-visit/find-a-property/beaver-creek-state-park

I managed to see two beautiful Barred Owls on this day. They were roosting and I happened to catch them off guard. They flew away but you can clearly see a glimpse of them on the video below. They come and go out of frame quickly.

The terrain I would encounter would go from gravel, rocky, dirt, and spongy dirt under the hemlock trees. This would be a great area in the fall to see wit the mixture of hard woods and conifers.

The bathroom facilities were extremely clean.

One note was nice and never really had an opportunity to hike on single track trails. This means when passing someone, they would need to step off and allow you to pass. This was unique to me and likely another reason I did not see other people on this day.

I hope you enjoy the artwork and the write up.

Be well,

Sonder

A friend and I fly fished in Lake Erie

I can see your eyebrows raised already asking yourself “how can you fly fish Lake Erie?”.

My friend who took me out on Lake Eries is one of the fishiest friends that I have. We fished forty miles on Lake Erie.

My friend’s boat has a lot of bells and whistles. This includes side scan radar that I have never seen used before. The morning started out as a chilly 47 degrees.  The winds were at 4-9 knots and the chop on the lake were at 1 foot.

Our targeting species on this day was to be freshwater drum.  These guys and gals are a hoot on a fly rod. They fight hard and at times they pull drag. The rod setups for open water Lake Erie can vary from 6 weights to 8 weights.  The lines you will need to throw are 250 full sinking lines and a sinking leader that sinks 5 inches / second.  A word of warning is you need to have a decent set of casting skills for this style of fishing. To know how to perform a double haul is going to be key in reaching fish most of the time. Another point about this type of fishing is the more stamina you have for casting 10 straight hours the better shot your going to have at hooking a fish.

The flies we used all had heavy lead dumbbell eyes on them. The tippets we used were 15-pound test fluorocarbon. In this trip we fished areas that he knew could possibly hold fish.

Depending on the wind, waves, and depth of water you will need to switch it up to see which set up is allowing you to keep your fly the deepest in the water column for the longest amount of time.

Other than trolling and one time in the ocean I have yet to fly fish out of a boat all day. My good friend’s boat has more bells and whistles along with being armed to the gills in tech. He had 22” screens with radar this sonar that and then I was floored by the side scan radar he had on the boat.

We departed the marina and headed out. He got up on the plane and cut through the 1-foot swells like a knife. He has been a boat captain for over 30 years, and I could tell him by his tactics.

We arrived at the first rock out cropping aka jetty and would fish both sides. The water was 64 degrees here in this area.  With my very buddy jigging fly I through it five feet from shore.

I felt its ticking off the ballast and then when I thought I was done a fish doubled over my TiCr 6-weight fly rod.  At this moment I did not know it would be a nearly seventeen-inch largemouth bass.  I was ecstatic as my six-weight doubled over in pain.

My fingers created a brake while fighting the fish. Its bull dogged me and turned out to be a decent fish. My fishing partner would be gracious enough to net my fish.  This fish would remove my skunk, but I had no idea what was in store for me ½ mile away.

I learned that in Lake Erie you have structure, humps, troughs, ledges, rocks, and weed beds.  What I did not know that will also hold fish is where the clay (silt) meets sand or other material.

For an example he went to a spot that had a gentle slope to it that was loaded with small cobble and small stones aka river rock. This would intersect the clay (silt) in the lakebed.

This would also hold fish and using the crab crawl technique with the retrieving of the fly it’s an extremely deadly practice to hook fish.

When I arrived at the next spot, he was giving me directions on the areas where I needed to cast. I covered the first 100 square foot area he told me then we pushed out into 10 fow (feet of water).

Here is where with the height of th4e waves and the 8 knot winds we switched over to a 250-grain full sinking line. I used his Scott rod for this. I could have used my TFO TiCr 6 weight, and it would have been fine.

All the flies of choice were olive, buggy, some rattles, and tied on jigging hooks. These flies were also max 3-inches long. Some of them had rubber legs and some did not. The only time we switched patterns was where we found a large pod of feeding white bass (WB). When we fished for WB it was a chartreuse clouser over white.

Let’s get back to the freshwater drum adventure.  These fish pull hard and the large ones over 10 pounds you will need to put on the reel IMHO. We hooked between the two of us, I am guessing 30.

After hooking several in the area my friend took us too, I was looking to get a break. He knew I was a little worn down from all the hook ups we had. He said, “hey want to try and find some White Bass?”.

I of course said yes to give my harm and hands a break! So, we headed off to another part of the area.

We arrived on the opposite side of a jetty to find birds sitting on top of the water. I told my friend there is a lot of bait here. He said, “how do you know that?”. I said the gulls are not resting on the jetty that is fairly close, and they have decided to rest and float low around where we are. This is just like saltwater when you see active birds it’s a potential sign that something is about to happen.

Then the White Bass (WB) started to smash bait all around us.  It was a WB blitz!  These 10-to-14-inch WB with a few larger ones sprinkled in had their feed bag on.

Like most WB fishing when you find them it’s a good time. One after another WB was caught, and it was a welcome relief for me. I have not had a day on the water like this in a long time and never in a boat.

I told my friend over and over have grateful I was to have this opportunity to do this with my friend because of his generosity.  It was a blessed day all day.

Then my friend said “hey, want to take a trip and see some of the other islands?”.  I of course said yes, and we put everything away and took a boat ride.

We made a pit stop and fished for one area that he had known about.  With the 250-grain sinking line we drifted as slow as we could with his trolling motor to stay in out casting lane.

The water looked so amazing this far north and as I started to not think about fishing, I hooked a moped.

With the head shaking and then followed by coming out of the water there he was. A Dark olive green with darker olive stripped smallmouth. He wasn’t a big smallmouth, and it did not need to be. I just wanted the opportunity to hook an open water smallmouth.

My friend was johnny on the spot with the net.  We hooted and hollored and picked up stakes and pressed on.

We visited North Bass Island and that’s a pretty place. We saw a few gars and I attempted to sight fish to one. Instead of putting the fly into his swimming lane I put it on its head lol. Needless to say, that opportunity was blown I laughed, and we pressed onto a spot in the middle of no wheresville!

My friend spot locked us into the spot, and we hooked a few more freshwater drum and decided to start on our return leg back to the dock.

My friend would end up driving his boat 40 miles to put us onto fish.  The boat traffic was heavy for a Monday, but we also saw a lot of boats far north fishing. 

We arrived at the dock baked and ready to go home. 

We unloaded our gear and loaded up our vehicles. I thanked my gracious host over and over because he did not have to do all this today. He could have made it a short day, but as good friends do, he made it into a trip of a lifetime for me.

I hope you enjoyed the adventure as much as I did. I hope you also liked the artwork.

To my dear friend thank you for me this was a trip of a life time thank you.

Be well,

Sonder

 

Cuyahoga Valley National Park 8 Mile hike loop

Sorry for the late content

My good friend and I linked these two trails together for a longer hike. Yes, we had to do a little road work, but still worth it.

Sonder