Day’s distance / Total distance – 226 miles / 6,100 miles
Temperatures were quite a bit warmer today, ranging from 68 to the low 90s. It was foggy in places for the first few hours but otherwise sunny.
I first headed south on I-70 towards Hancock, Maryland. This part of the ride took only about 30 minutes. Then just over the border, I turned west on I-64 and took that into West Virginia.
Fairmont, West Virginia was the beginning of my ride north on Hwy 250, the “motorcycle road” for today. Before starting up that road, I took a short break at Palatine Park.
The park is located across the Monongahela River from the downtown core of Fairmont.
I would cross over the Adams Street Bridge and ride through a section of downtown before …
topping off my fuel and buying some water to fill my now empty Camelbak. I used the leftover water to dowse my shirt. It helps to stay cool in hot weather.
There wasn’t much fall color in this area, but I found some twists in the road.
Hwy 250 has some good sections and some of the pavement is rough, likely snow plow damage. Most of the road is narrow with no shoulders.
On Day 27 of my Northern States Tour, I rode Hwy 10, not too far from here. Some of my critical comments apply here, as well.
“[T]here were homes and businesses along a vast majority of the ride. This means lots of hidden driveways as well as cars and homes along the side of the road. Also, there were few turnouts and much of the roadway lacked shoulders, making sections a zero-tolerance-for-mistakes type of roadway.”
https://steelhorsejourneys.com/completed-rides/2016-northern-states-tour/
Cameron was one of the larger towns along the route. Parts of the town looked pretty rundown.
However, the high school looked great, which left me feeling encouraged.
It’s likely that I was still thinking about my visit to Huntingdon yesterday, where the town was looking pretty depressed but the high school seemed to be holding up well. But Huntingdon always seemed to struggle, being located in an economically depressed area.
A haze in the air kept vista photos to a minimum, but here’s an example of what I saw when I took the opportunity to look up from the road – lol.
There just wasn’t fall color in the amounts I saw earlier in the trip.
Wheeling, West Virginia was my destination for the night. I was only about six minutes from my hotel when traffic came to a halt. Everyone was waiting until one person turned around on the on-ramp.
It was a move I’d never seen before. 🙂
Soon enough everyone was turning around, including me. It ended up taking another hour to reach the hotel just a few miles away as everyone else was taking the same detour.
It was a difficult day, mostly because of the traffic. But my accommodations were not as expected, either, and the check-in process took some time. I’ll save lodging comments for the reflection at the end of the trip.
Tomorrow I land in Columbus and will stay for two nights while the bike gets serviced. It’s going to be 90 in Columbus – another hot day. That won’t keep me from exploring a few back roads on my way!