The Beauty Around Us

A Weekend’s Ride – Day 1: Warren, PA to Painted Post, NY

By Linda G. on August 18, 2009

This past weekend (August 14-16) we rode more than 600 miles on our motorcycle. During the weekend we visited a museum, we rode around two lakes, and we attended a family reunion. I will write about the first day of our ride — Friday, August 14th — in this blog post.

Bob came home from work at noon, as is normal for Friday. An hour later we were on our way to Painted Post, NY. It would have been faster to travel along Interstate 86; however, we chose to take Routes 59, 6, 287, 15 and 417 to Painted Post. The rural roads led us through picturesque towns such as Smethport, Coudersport, and Galeton and alongside farms, corn fields, rolling hills and lakes. We travel Routes 59 and 6 quite often. In fact we had traveled this route less than 2 weeks ago on our way back home from Wernersville, PA, by way of Wellsboro. It was our maiden journey, however, along Route 287. We picked up Route 287 a few miles west of Wellsboro. Riding north on Route 287 leads to the town of Tioga, PA. Along the way we passed by Hammond Lake.

Do you see the railroad track in the photograph displayed above? The Tioga Central Railroad of Wellsboro operates excursion trains from Wellsboro Junction (near the intersection of Routes 6 and 287) to the north end of Hammond Lake. The railroad track was alongside us for most of our ride along Route 287. I would like to go on one (or more) of the excursion trains one day. The Tioga Central Railroad website offers several train excursions. For example you can ride a dining train as the sun sets or to celebrate Oktoberfest. There are special excursions such as the ice cream express or for a fireworks extravaganza over Hammond Lake on New Year’s Eve. There’s even a Happy Hour excursion ride on Thursday evenings.

Continuing on Route 287 we arrived in Tioga, where we saw Tioga Lake and the connecting channel that connects Hammond and Tioga Lakes.

We arrived in Painted Post, NY, around 5:30PM. The name Painted Post is such a unique name, I searched the Internet to determine how the town got its name. I learned that early settlers, when they first arrived in this area, found a carved, wooden post at the point where the Conhocton and Tioga Rivers meet to form the Chemung River. This post had the figures of 28 men cut into it, and the figures were painted red. The wooden post disappeared, and no one ever learned what the red figures represented. However, because of the wooden post, when a town was created at the junction of the three rivers, that town was called Painted Post. There is a folk tale about the wooden post that says it marked the burial place of a great Indian chief who died about 1779.

At the corner of Hamilton and Water Streets in Painted Post is a monument of an Indian warrior, arm raised in greeting, standing before a representation of the original wooden post.

 

We spent two nights at the Americas Best Value Inn-Lodge on the Green hotel in Painted Post.

Our hotel room, which was located on the ground floor, was spacious and comfortable.

I can see why this hotel is called Lodge on the Green. The 135 guest rooms were situated around a large courtyard. We could look out on the courtyard from the two large windows in our hotel room.

Even though the hotel is alongside a busy highway, it was a quiet and peaceful place.

We rode approximately 145 miles today.  Click here for a map of our route.