Harrisburg (PA) Bicycling Club Three Creek Century - my new favorite ride
 

The Potomac Pedalers Sheperdstown WV ride I was going to do on Sunday was cancelled, so I made the 100 mile drive up to Newville PA to do the Three Creek Century ride that the Harrisburg Bicycling Club puts on.

First I did the 50 mile loop, then the 25 mile loop for a total of 75 miles. Very foggy at the start but by the 15 mile mark the sun started to burn through - beautiful streams and valleys. The start/finish had amazing food choices and dozens of types of home baked cookies. No fat cells were harmed on this ride. This is my new favorite ride - I will gladly make the 100 mile drive up there again just to have the Nilla Wafer/peanut butter/banana snacks that a guy was making at the first rest stop.

Nice! Was this more of a pavement ride or a trail ride?

I'm looking forward to starting to participate in more group rides in the spring.

Travbikeman - the loops I did were all pavement, mostly on low traffic roads. There was a 20 mile option from a different starting point that was on a rail trail that I think is mostly paved, might have some dirt sections. There may have been some gravel stretches on some of the routes I didn't do.

My problem with that sort of ride format is that after the first loop I sometimes get tempted by the food and often never end up doing more than one loop. :D

Yeah, I agree - if a rest stop is back at the start, very tempting to pig out and then just put the bike back in the car!

I managed to ignore that temptation to add the 25 to the 50 but wasn't motivated enough to add the other 25 mile loop to get to 100 miles - I succumbed to the cookies after 75 miles...

Side note - someone else told me the Cumberland Valley Rail Trail is mostly crushed limestone, with a short paved segment.

Hello

I just did the 2021 Three Creek Century ride, this time did 51 mile loop and hilly 29 mile Opossum Lake route. Just as awesome a ride as in 2018.

Short writeup on Cycle 365 here.