Best non urban areas in Pennsylvania to visit

This is awesome. Thanks for the generosity.

 

Elysburg, PA, is home to Knoebels, the world's largest free-admission amusement park, and its rides are top-shelf. It near Centralia, the town with a mine fire burning underneath it, which is worth a look just for how strange it is (steam billowing from the ground, houses with multiple chimneys, a sad and deserted bench in the center of town that says "We love Centralia"). Williamsport, home of the Little League World Series, isn't too far away. And while Scranton would fall under the "urban" umbrella, I'd give a shout out to the Lackawanna Coal Mine tour, which was fun and educational. Scranton's also home to the Houdini museum, which is on my agenda this summer. There's another coal mine tour, Pioneer Coal Mine and Steam Train Ride, in Ashland.

http://www.knoebels.com
http://www.centraliapa.com
www.vacationpa.com/Williamsport_To_Do
www.houdini.org
www.pioneertunnel.com

 

As are Blue Ball, Paradise and Bird-in-Hand.

Pennsylvania: Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Alabama in between.

 

He might have known this, but I didn't.

Love little bits of info like this.

 

I can't believe I didn't think of it last night, but if you go to Gettysburg just down the road is Hanover, as in Snyder's of Hanover, Utz, etc. You can tour pretzel and potato chip factories.

 

I didn't know that either.

Who would have thought that a Canuckistani like Robertson would be pointing the way - all these years later - for JR and HC's Canada Day weekend getaway!

 

Gettysburg is tremendous, but hope you're not actually going on Canada Day. Think there's going to be a few thousand or hundred thousand in the area celebrating the 150th anniversary.

 

Schedule of Gettysburg events:

http://www.gettysburg.travel/150/event.asp

 

There's a town just east of Erie called North East. About 10 great wineries are in or around the town. They're almost always the best wines at local festivals.

Gettysburg does not thrill me. I'm sure it's equal parts of not being a history buff, and being subjected to six field trips there while in school. But if you're there, grab lunch or dinner on the square at The Pub. And you might want to drive 15 minutes down U.S. 15 to see the Mount St. Mary's campus in Emmitsburg, Md.

If you are around Scranton, there is a steam train that takes regular 10-mile round trip tours from the downtown Steamtown Mall. Pretty cool.

 

Some interesting suggestions here. I think we're looking at NW Pennsylvania since Gettysburg and environs is about a 7 hour drive from Toronto (plus border crossing time). Erie looks like a good possibility ...

 

I was just there last week. What a neat little town, outside of the battlefield. Their downtown was really cool I thought. And while I'm not a huge Civil War nut, you can't help but be amazed by the history on that battlefield. I stood in the Wheatfield - where 20,000 men fought - for about 15 minutes.

 

Well, U.S. 6 stretches across the entire northern tier of the state. There is nothing there in the 200-some miles from Erie to Scranton. Nothing.