Hike #959; Bethlehem and Hellertown Loop

Hike #959; Bethlehem and Hellertown Loop

8/7/16 Musikfest: Bethlehem and Hellertown Loop with Justin Gurbisz, Brandan Jermyn, Carolyn Gockel Gordon, Jack Lowry, Sarah Jones, Pete DeFillipo, Commando Tom Petruccio, Laura Allen Cunningham, Jennifer Berndt, James Quinn, Serious Sean Dougherty, Tom Vorrius, Kevin Gondek, Kralc Leahcim (Lerch), Steve Sanbeg, Michelle McBriarty, Erika Lorin Daniels, Russell Lord Byron Rapp, Sara Melody, Scott Helbing (Tea Biscuit), Amanda Lance, Michele Valerio, John Jason Pryor, , Doug DeGroff, Euin Gonzalez, Tamara Sapilak, Marina Font, Dan Asnis, Susan L Duncan, FlipFlop Duncan, Lance R Beden, Marc Genay, Lowell Perkins, Phøėbə Tĕmpəşťå, and Jim Mathews (Mr. Buckett).

Our next hike would be a loop around Bethlehem and Hellertown PA, our annual “March on Musikfest” hike. This hike is always an overly crazy time, full of silliness and fun. This time would be no exception, and we also added a great tour to the agenda.

The group at the Siedersville Bridge crossing

In the months prior, on two occasions Jillane and I had gone to the new Museum of Industrial History, under development, in Bethlehem. Jillane worked on cleaning off a giant flywheel from a water company in York, PA, and I moved around heavy items and moved pallets with a jack. It’s always nice to contribute to a good cause, and I spoke with one of their most active volunteers, Mike Piersa, about doing a tour with the group when they opened. I decided it would be best to try to arrange it to coincide with our March on Musikfest hike, and it ended up being great.

Bethlehem Steel bridge

I planned the hike to be a loop, and this time we met at the lot used for event parking at southeast Bethlehem, which we’d never done before. We’d be able to walk to the museum from there pretty easily.
We got a great group together for this one, and most went to the museum at the start too. We walked from the lot out across a large grown over field toward the one tower from Bethlehem Steel that’s still on the south side. Pete particularly liked that one and was telling us some of the history. I knew he’d be really into this, and interested in meeting Mike P. because he owns a locomotive.

Bethlemem Steel

We walked across a big grassy field to another parking lot, then had to walk along a section of Rt 412 to get down near the Sands Casino, built on some of the former Bethlehem Steel lands.
We then walked beneath part of it and along the back, which took us along the elevated railroad, and beneath it for a bit. I found out that it had recently been opened as a sort of “high line” trail, and so I knew we had to utilize that as part of the hike, so I changed some of the route that I’d had planned in advance to make the loop shorter. We continued to the museum and congregated outside for a bit until Mike was ready to give us the personalized tour.

Walking the weeds

Mike is an absolute wealth if information. He really needs to write a book, or a volume of books on the history around Bethlehem Steel, as well as plenty of other stuff.

In the museum

Mike came out all dressed up in a blazer; I hardly recognized him at first, out of his dirty coveralls from working in the museum, prepping it to be opened. I called the group in and we began the tour, front to back of the museum.

Fly wheel at the museum

The museum was set up into sections of industrial history. Throughout the entire thing, there are little interactive displays which show how different kinds of machines worked.
It’s really well done, and it’s also amazing to see how clean the museum is now after seeing it in the process of being put in order.
There were several large fly wheels located in the front of the museum. I can’t remember what each one was to, but the large green one was the one Jillane helped to clean off to get it ready for showing. Mike told us that they planned to run it on occasion when it was ready.

Fly Wheel from York PA water co.

The museum actually acts as a sort of Satellite museum to the Smithsonian Museum.
Not really a part of the Smithsonian, but an affiliate, it has many pieces owned by Smithsonian, on loan for display in Bethlehem.
Mike also pointed out that the building itself was very much a part of the museum. The surfaces of things had been sprayed with a transparency, rather than “cleaned up” so that it is safe, but retains it’s look of antiquity and long time use. As we moved on through the museum, we saw how items were cast, drilled, and such. There was even one piece made at Taylor Wharton I figured my friend William Honachefsky Jr. would be very interested in!

Mike relating some history at the museum

As we moved further to the back, there was a section on silk and textiles. It was cool that a lot of the stuff we were seeing had direct relations to places we’d visited recently on the hikes.
We had just recently taken the Morris Canal through Paterson, the “Silk City”, which I brought up.
Mike told us about meetings the workers would have crossing the bridge over the Lehigh between steel mills and silk mills. Lerch made silly jokes all the while, which must have made our group among the more entertaining of the ones that come through the museum.

The York fly wheel

The far end of the museum had an exhibit on propane as well. They really had a lot covered in the place.
With the upcoming series of hikes we have, and with the 911 Memorial Trail series bringing us back to Bethlehem for the next year, I talked to Mike about doing museum tours for the group again. He immediately had ideas for it, and noted that we could do different versions of tours focusing in on the different aspects of industries. I’m looking forward to going back and doign some stuff that will focus on areas outside of the museum, around the steel stacks, and whatever else Mike can think of to showcase.
We left the museum to make our way out to the South Bethlehem Greenway next. The trail was built on a former connection from the Reading Railroad out of Hellertown. We turned left on the trail and followed it to the east for a bit, and stopped at a little playground thing with spinny ride things. Several of us got dizzy. We then took a break under a pavilion area where we waited for Carolyn and Justin, who had both parked and were only minutes away from joining us.
Once we were all together, we continued along South Bethlehem Greenway to it’s end and proposed extension.

The washout as it appeared in 2008

I’d been coming out to this area for many years, and walked this section of the old Reading Railroad many times. There was a bad washout several years back, and I recall how bad it looked in 2008 on my March on Musikfest hike, pictured above.

The same washout on this hike

The same spot is rather easy to pick out today, but it’s grown in to a great extent. The passage of time is absolutely amazing to me.
We followed the line a bit to the south, over the Saucon Creek bridge, where I intended to descend. Just ahead is a giant vertical tower along the railroad bed, and I knew that would catch Justin and Lerch’s attention.

Tower

Of course, Lerch went ahead to explore it while the rest of the group was catching up. Some of the others started checking for the turn off we’d need to make to get down to Saucon Park while we watched the two climb up.
Lerch got more than halfway up, before Justin got on the thing, but then Justin soon passed Lerch on the way up and climbed to the top. He had to dismantle part of an unoccupied old nest in order to get onto the platform at the top.
Lerch soon made his way up to the top as well.
Not satisfied with simply being on top of the platform, they had to get up as high as possible and sit on the railings. My palms sweat just thinking about the craziness. I’d only ever climbed about halfway up that thing before saying “screw it”.
I think it was Doug that found an acceptible way to descend from the railroad right of way to Saucon Park. It was a bit weedy, but we managed to get on through and reach the road at the bottom. We then walked back to Saucon Creek to take a dip.

Craziness

We reached the railroad underpass where there is a good path over to the creek. We went over and got in.
The water is always very cold at this point for some reason, which is great in August. A lot of the group got in, and the rest just took a break for a bit. No one bothered us, and we were able to move on again with no problem soon.
We followed the edge of the Saucon Creek after crossing the road bridge over it just up ahead. There is a good grassy swath along it heading up stream. We continued on this to a pedestrian suspension bridge that took us back across and into the more open, grassy park area.

Bag opening skills?

We passed a pavilion, then crossed another foot bridge over the creek. There is a really nice area of little reflection ponds heading parallel with the up stream from here, which we followed. Dan offered some sort of packaged snack thing, which Serious Sean accepted, then proceeded to try to maniacally open it up with his teeth. After failing to open it up in such a manner, he gave the slobber covered bag back to Dan. It was hilarious. We moved on along the reflection pond area south to a concession stand.

Saucon Park

I think I got something to eat at the stand, but I forget what. We stopped for a little break there before moving on.
Our next leg was to take the edge of the road a short distance underneath Rt 78. Just after, we cut through some high grass to reach a small circuit path into the woods. This was the trail we’d found on the recent night hike through the same area.
We followed the trail out to the former road bed that leads along the Saucon Creek down stream. Before going too far, I cut into an adjacent field and got a couple of ears of baby corn to munch on. They weren’t very big yet, and so I could just eat the entire cob pretty easily.

Climbers

We headed down stream along the Saucon Creek, past the two old spring houses, and then reached the abandoned, closed off Seidersville Road bridge. Jack met up with us there, having parked not too far away. Justin, Lerch, and Sean climbed up the trusses while I prepared to do a group photo.
From this point, we crossed over the bridge, then followed the creek on the other side, up stream toward Hellertown. The trail takes us out through the former Thomas Ironworks site, which was the Saucon Iron Works before that. When we got to another deeper pool area, I took another dip in the creek. Unfortunately, most of the rest of the group went ahead of us.

Well...okay...

Lerch and Sean went off to get us more drinks I think it was in Hellertown, and met back up with us shortly, but many of the others who went ahead just continued and didn’t meet back up with us.
I’m told they took a shitty road walk all the way back to Bethlehem, as they wouldn’t have known how to take the dirt footpaths over South Mountain that lead to the same places more directly. I really don’t know exactly what everyone else did. A few of the others waited up, and we reconnected with them. Brandan was randomly waiting at the edge of the woods when he realized everyone else was just continuing on.

Walnut St. Bridge

We returned to the old Reading Railroad bed, which is now Saucon Rail Trail through Hellertown, and reached Walnut Street. From here, we turned right and visited the last remaining cast and wrought iron bridge left in North America, a through style truss structure.
We turned right through a development on the other side, and had an easy walk out to Friedensville Road and Saucon View Apartments. From here, we used a route I had discovered in 2008 through the back.
By cutting down hill and over a small tributary behind the apartments, we reach mowed trails through the fields on the other side at Murray Goodman Campus and Stabler Arena.
We followed the edges of fields and ate more corn on the cob, which was more mature in this area, and then headed out to the main parking area.

Children of the corn

We reached Goodman Drive, and in this area Lerch and a few others cut out by calling Uber I think, and Lowell and Phoebe joined us.
We were able to continue north through Leadership Field at the Murray stadium, and then follow the edges of more fields on trails
They weren’t going exactly where I was planning on coming out at Mountain Drive, and I was getting pretty hot. We cut through some corn fields and eventually reached Mountain Drive, where a short road walk just under Rt 78 would have led us to the trail system on South Mountain, but I figured everyone would enjoy getting in the water better. I changed the hike just then to head back to Saucon.

Corn fields

We followed College Drive and old Seidersville Road for a bit to the east again, and passed an old log cabin fixed up into some sort of commercial place.
Once we got down to Saucon Park and the Rt 78 underpasses again at Saucon Park, we cut back the way we had gone before, across the fields and along the reflection pond things that took us to the stone foot bridge across the Saucon Creek.
Once we were on the other side, we followed the creek past the pavilion, which had people under it before when we went by. Now, no one was there, and there was lots of stuff left under it. I assumed it to be like Spruce Run, just junk people left.

Jack and yum yums

I looked at it and noticed an upside down plate. Under it were hot dogs! Lots of hot dogs! There was really no one in sight, and I saw some hot dog rolls left, so I grabbed them up. I made up four hot dogs and walked off feeding my face. The entire remainder of the hot dogs were consumed by everyone else in the group. Jack got some grapes, and others found chicken and chips and stuff. I’m not even sure what everyone else had. Either way, the group descended upon this pavilion and devoured just about as much as we could, then continued on walking along the Saucon Creek.
As we walked away, we saw a couple of little kids come running back toward the pavilion.

SOUP GANG

We returned to the spot on the Saucon Creek where we went swimming before and jumped in yet again.
While there, a cop went by and saw us. He put on his speaker for us to get out of the water. He pulled over at the road side, and I headed up to make sure things were alright.
He was a really cool guy, just doing his job, and he apologized for “raining on our parade”. He said it can get pretty crazy in the park there, and I told him I knew exactly what he meant since I work at Spruce Run. We ended up having a pretty nice conversation about the events going on, and dealing with unruly park patrons.

Fly wheels

From here, we made our way across and climbed back up to the former Reading Railroad bed.
James must have been near the end, and as we were heading into the woods, he said some guy pulled up to him and asked “Did you guys eat all our food???”!
I think he responded “Um...no?”
It’s horrible, but it’s also sooo funny.
We continued along the railroad bed back to the old building ruin on the greenway section and checked that out, then walked the greenway to the crosswalk over Rt 412 to the Sands Casino. We continued along the sidewalks around the place until we got to the steps that went up to the elevated railway and headed up.

Bethlehem Steel

It was amazing to be this close to the steel stacks. The closest I’d been on the lower walkways was several years before with Skyler Jermyn when we sneaked in wearing matching jump suits, and carried clip boards.
Justin and I both wanted to climb further up the things. It would have been so incredibly easy to go up, but we’d certainly be seen and get into big trouble.
We followed the walkway on the top to the dead end on the east side, then headed back the other way to the area directly below the main stacks. As we looked down into the people walking around, we spotted Doug walking around.

Dancin in the street

We hung out on the top for a little while, just taking in all the sight, then headed to the bottom. There were live bands playing just about everywhere, and everyone just started dancing around. Lowell and Phoebe started dancing to some sort of swing thing that was playing, and I busted out the best I could remember of multiple musical theater choreographs I’d learned in years past.
Jack was playing his guitar, and somebody from one of the news shows came up and filmed him. Even though it was Musikfest, there are surprisingly very few street performers and such, just out playing music openly the way Jack does most of the time.

Dancing in the streets again

We walked from there to Lehigh Pizza to get a bite to eat. We usually stop there on Bethlehem trips, and they have pretty good slices. They also have Four Loco and other alcoholic beverages, so it’s an extra good stop.
By this time, most everyone I think was getting pretty well blitzed, and we were having a good time laughing and carrying on. I ended up dropping a salt shaker or something and it broke all over the floor. They were really surprisingly good sports about it. I’ve always liked their product and service, but they were really good to put up with us, the rowdy bunch this time.
From here, we walked across the Hill to Hill Bridge I think, and couldn’t continue across into town the way we usually do, so had to take the stairs down to the part along Monocacy Creek. Maybe we went the other way and went down the stairs, I really can’t remember, but one way or another we ended up on Hill to Hill and had to turn back.
We met up with Mr. Buckett at Musikfest and we walked around together for a while. We watched part of one part of a show under one of the tents before moving up up through town on the main street. Every time we went by a performance, we’d end up dancing as we went by.
People dropped off, and it got to where it was just Lowell, Phoebe, Jack, Sarah, Carolyn, Mr. Buckett, Dan, and I enjoying the festival.
It was still pretty hot out, and I figured we should next try to jump in the Monocacy Creek Aqueduct the way we always used to. We all headed over to the spot behind the old Jersey Central Railroad Station, and I found that they’d put up chain link fences around the thing. No matter, I climbed through the railings at the foot bridge and jumped in anyway. Lowell and Phoebe also went in, but no one else was feeling it.

Musikfest!

After we’d had enough of wandering around, we still had to wander back to our cars at southeast Bethlehem. I recall we walked back across on the Minsi Trail Bridge, then headed out through Sands and behind the museum again.
It was getting pretty late, and I figured we could take a shortcut out of a parking lot in front of the casino when we had less than a mile more to the cars, but there was no way through. We ended up turning back and would have to go back and around. Fortunately, Michele was there with her husband Scott Trinkle and one of his friends, and they were able to give us a ride that short bit back to our cars.
If you haven’t figured that out yet, that is 10 people crammed into one SUV. Fortunately we didn’t have far at all to go.
A few of us waited a bit and made sure that James made it back to his car okay before we headed out for the night.
It was certainly a high energy, fun time, and it’s too bad so many in the group missed out on the craziness that ensued for some of the latter portion, but for those of us who experienced it, it was just another shining time to add to museums of recollection.