Pittsburgh to Pipestem State Park, WV

We had a great visit with my son in Pittsburgh.   We spent the whole day with him chauffeuring us around Greene county Penn. looking at old family historical sites.  We left the Fuse at the campground for this adventure.  We should have used a jeep to get to some of the places we went to but, his car made it fine.

We parted ways Tuesday night after dinner.  On Wed morning we did a little cleaning, dumped tanks and then headed for our next stop, Pipestem State Park in West Virginia.   So down I-77 and then on to US-19 heading back to Beckley, WV.   

The weather turned out to be much better than on Monday and Tuesday.  The rain stopped and the temperatures stayed in the low 70s.  The perfect weather and it made Sonya and myself believe that Fall was on the way.  To celebrate, we made lunch at the West Virginia Welcome station and ate with the big rigs.

We have been listening to Siri on the apple phone for directions.  I think I am going to have to stop blindly following the directions.  I am going to be breaking out a map before we start out from now on.   The instructions from Apple Maps brought us on the most curvy, up and down narrow roads I have been on in a long time.  60+ miles of them.  Looking back at the map afterwards I could have stayed on Interstates and US highways and probably only been 10 minutes slower.  Of course I lost way more than that on my lifespan and the few hairs I have left would have been much happier.

On our trip we did get a scare going up and down the mountains.  I got a alert from the engine.  It was complaining about a Fuel Filter issue.  We did a quick search and found a Ford Dealer about 10 minutes away.  We headed that way, parked in the service area and shut down.  Out of curiosity I started back up to see what happened and the message was gone.   Talked to the friendly folks at Mid-State Ford in Summerville, WV and after a short discussion with the service folks we agreed that since the message went away we would be good going on.  Also there were two good dealers where we were heading that could help if the message came back (so far, no more messages).   I know some dealers have not been able to help us, but just having Ford be there to give a word of advice made me feel soo much better.  Try and find a Mercedes dealer in the middle of rural West Virginia to do that.

But the drive up to Pipestem was glorious.  Though it was via small winding roads, the views of the New River Gorge were unbelievable.  It lived up to the scenic drive hype.

Now a little on the mileage.  One tank got 17mpg.  Mostly driving around into and out of Pittsburgh on Interstates averaging 60mph.   The next tank had me driving little bit faster following the speed limit at 70mph.  The milage dropped to 15.6mpg