Allegany State Park - Part I - Bear Man Pig...?

This particular blog starts sometime earlier this week when I was fluttering about the cache pages looking for a wonderful adventure to tackle this weekend. It was then that became aware that a superb cache in Allegany State Park was slated for demise. ASP is a really cool place - and probably my second favorite NYS park behind Letchworth. It covers 65,000 acres of insane mountainous woodlands, and comes with a variety of touristy destinations.

That being said, the cache unto which caught my eye was Mt. Tuscarora by HeadMJ (AKA: Mike). Mike is a regular contributor to the caching scene in ASP, and without sounding too snobby, is probably the best cache-placer the park has. I say this because he places caches that appeal to me - in that - they are located far into the woods away from the other P&G caches in the park (which isn’t to say those are “bad”…but they just aren’t of HeadMJ ilk…haha). Anyway, Mt. Tuscy was placed in 2009, and since I was incapacitated during the vast majority of it’s existence, I didn’t want to see Tuscy V.2.0 pass by without me finding it. You see, caches in NYS parks have a two year lifespan (uh…well…generally…haha), so in Mike’s instance, when the two years is up, he archives his cache and replaces it with a new version. It’s the same hike to the same general area, it’s just a “new” cache to find.

“Blah blah blah Eric, just get to the dang point.”

Well my foul-mouthed readers, the fact that this cache was going to be archived necessitated the trip down south to play in the woods of ASP. I wanted to be the last to find on this cache, and after trading some emails with Mike, it was decidd that the cache would still be available for my grubby mitts on Saturday. An added bonus to this, was two new HeadMJ caches were just released in the Park. One of them was along my route to Mt. Tuscy!

I was out the door early, and made the nice sunny A.M. jaunt down to Bradford, PA. From there I entered the southern side of ASP. The first stop on my journey would be Wild Pig by HeadMJ. This was the new cache posted a couple days earlier - and I figured a nice short hike would be a good warm up before I played king of the mountain. However, when I parked, I realized quite quickly that I underestimated the length of this “short hike.” In total, it was going to be about a mile and half round trip. I decided that if I was going to do it, I was going to do it right. So down the trail I headed.

This was a pretty cool trail actually, because it went just this side of the NY/PA border.  The cache itself is only about 600 feet from the border - so it's neat to think that you're in the middle of the woods and without knowing it you could be crossing state lines.  Not to give anyone any ideas or anything...haha.

The hike in was beautiful, as the air was super crisp and the sun had just crested the tree tops.  It was the perfect day to be outdoors.  I continued down the trail until I knew I had to dive into the woods to cover the rest of the distance to the cache.  It was a mostly open walk - although it's pretty hard to bushwhack through the woods without getting hit in the face with a beech sappling.  The damn things just jump right out in front of ya!  Anyway, after getting smacked around like Mother Nature's beeyotch, I arrived at the cache location and quickly found the prize.  I signed in - and of course took a picture.

That's what a real cache looks like folks - haha.  After I performed my rehiding duties, I made my way out of the woods, returning to my happy little sunshiney trail.  I was hardly back on the trail when I saw the most awesomest thing EVER!

That's right...check out those kick ass ferns!  I probably spent a good 15 minutes photogogging these beauties using the one or two techniques my camera is actually capable of doing.  If I knew I was going to capture them unrolling and springing into fern formation you'd probably be watching a video right now...but I digress.  After documenting the ferns adorable existence...I then found something of equal or greater value as measured on a scale of awesomestness!!!

It's my hand...sweet huh?  Oh yeah, and that thing next to my hand is a bear paw print!  Holy flapjacks Batman!?!  Probably within an hour or so of me being on this trail, a black bear went meandering through and left his paw print in some mud.  I was giddy...like...16 year old prom girl giddy.  Just be glad your reading about it, because if you would have witnessed it, I don't think we'd ever get over the uncomfortable silence. Hahaha.

This was a first for me actually.  I don't think I've ever found evidence of a bear being near me like this before - so of course now I was scouring the woods to see if I could capture a glimpse of this cuddly fuzz ball.  Alas, my lover-bear was no where to be found - but on the bright side he did leave me this:

Classy right?