Rager Mountain, Charles F. Lewis Natural Area, Gallitzin State Forest

O Pennsylvania, motherland, easily the most haunted of the Fifty--with New York and Massachusetts vying for a distant second!  That's one superlative to your credit.  And yet, you ought to be prettier than you are.  You ought to be more prosperous and pleasant.  But from the top of Rager Mountain (such a cool name), I see not one, but TWO nuclear power plants in the distance and all from a menacing electric line easement where the voltage crackles and hisses.  I wanted to go back to the Buchanan State Forest but wasn't up for another two and a half hour drive.  This place is only one hour and a half from home--even crossing the city for morning rush hour.

Admittedly, there'd be no panorama at all if not for the powerline swaths that cut straight across the mountains.  Trees would obscure the view.  But still...you can almost feel the cancerous energy radiating from these horrible wires.  This is looking west, away from the highlands and toward the lowland that will eventually level out into plains as the Ohio meanders toward the Midwest. 

It's a long upward trek from the parking area to the loop trail at the summit of Rager Mountain, in the Charles F. Lewis Natural Area of the Gallitzin State Forest, which is just a little north of Johnstown.  There were many large butterflies on the sunny areas of the mountain, too.

This fellow had a wingspan of about three and a half inches, and he flew alongside me for about an eighth of a mile as I strolled down a gravel road.  I felt somehow honored by his company, as if he'd chosen me.  He'd flit ahead for a while, then hang back so I could catch up.

Many of the best trails on the mountain are not the ones on the map.  An old logging road led me to this upland meadow where I spent a little time listening to the deep silence of the woods.  A thrush sang its melodious song somewhere in the trees.  This is looking eastward and down the mountain.  The Ridge-and-Valley province of the Alleghenies is off that way, as is the Buchanan.

I spent about six hours on Rager Mountain, even though the loop itself is only about five miles.  I ended up descending by way of a different route, the Clark Run Trail, which traverses large boulders and makes steep descents.  This is the Conemaugh River as seem from yet another electrical easement.  On the other side of the valley, the Laurel Highlands Hiking Trail makes a grueling climb up onto the opposite ridgeline.  I did that stretch of the LHHT as an overnight last summer.