Sunday: After a very rainy and dreary arrival Saturday afternoon Sunday I woke up to gorgeous sunshine and incredible views from the airbnb. Being a carriage house (living space above the garage) a couple miles out of town leads to some amazing views out of some large windows. Good weather and a new location meant that it was time to check out the borough (nothing in PA is a town). Ebensburg has a population of just over 3k and is situated in the Allegheny mountains and the city itself is up on top of a hill so there are some actual steep streets and some nice visual elevation change. I spent too much time in the flat south Im still really appreciating the elevation change 😊 Overall the borough is super cute and seems to be thriving unlike a lot of small towns Ive visited. Not many open shop fronts and there are even hobby stores like a music store, dance book shop, outdoor store etc. Its set up in a way that there are a few chain shopping centers on the outside of town and everything in the borough seems to be a small business or locally owned
which gives it lots of character. Ebensburg is also the county seat and the courthouse is impressive and theres an old interesting looking jail in downtown next to veterans park.
Right on the southeastern part of town is a really nice fishing lake and some other recreation like tennis courts, skate park and plans to build a dog park. On the northeast part of town is the boroughs water reservoir. According to some reviews online there is a loop trail around the reservoir but I couldnt find the loop- ended up doing and out and back to the upper reservoir and back. Still a nice short local hike (about 3 miles from my airbnb). Overall my first 24 hours of Ebensburg were super positive!
Monday: Ebensburg is at one end of a 46 mile Rails to Trails. Old railroad essentially has been converted to be a paved trail that connects multiple towns. Being 46 miles and paved and relatively flat means its not the best hiking trail but its still scenic and copper and I had to do the first few miles of it. I can imagine it would be ideal for a long bike ride!
An adventure to Loretto, PA to pick up a potential amazon package. Amazon said the locker was accessible 24/7 and located outside of the mail room. Turns out its outside of the mailroom on Saint Francis University- a catholic school with about 1800 students. I got there after dark (about 9:30pm) and the address did not take me to the mail room. There was not a single person anywhere on campus- not even a security person or another car driving by. Yet lights were on and TVs were even on inside of academic buildings. There were lights on in residential halls- but no movement from inside it was like an abandoned ghost university. So I never found the mail room or the amazon locker... luckily if you dont pick up your package after 3 days it just goes back to amazon and you get a full refund.
Thursday: Went back to the reservoir and this time started on the trail clockwise to see if I could figure out how it looped. There were multiple branches off of the trail but they just lead to other residential access points in town. There really doesnt seem to be a way to
cross the man made stream that connects the lower and upper reservoirs (the loop trail is supposed to circle the lower reservoir and be 2 miles long). So I guess I know of 2 out and back hikes to either side. Who knows.
Friday: Time to check out the most miserable place to live in PA aka Johnstown. Im not sure why I to check out the most miserable place in PA but it is only 20 minutes away and Ebensburg is part of the Johnstown census area and Johnstown is the largest town in Cambria county.
