96, you’ll come upon a small metal bridge. The parents were indulgently watching their children having a blast.įor the benefit of those who miss the open hours of the Bedford County Visitor’s Bureau, here are the directions to the mystery spot: Before you come to the town of New Paris on Rt. The next time we took the guide, and found the spot-a stretch of road between two sets of the spray-painted letters “GH.” We’d probably have missed it again, but for the spring-break revelers rolling basketballs, baseballs, and empty soft drink cans up (or was it down?) the hill. The first time we tried to check out the Gravity Hill, we just looked for New Paris on the map and chanced it. Some people like to take water or various other non-flammable, bio-degradable liquids and pour them onto the road. The visitor’s guide is written (some might say over-written) in a breezy and fun style:Īs you strain your ears to hear the laws of physics being shattered, put your car in neutral (after checking behind you for oncoming traffic, of course) and take your foot off the brake. This is just as well, because to get to this place, you have to traverse some winding roads and very particular directions-or you could just look up TR539 on a good map of the area. Heck, they even registered the Web domain, so you know they mean business. The Bedford County Visitor’s Bureau prints up and gives out a leaflet with directions to the place, and even sells souvenir T-shirts and hats. While there are many gravity hills, only the Gravity Hill in New Paris gets the stamp of approval from the local tourist board. That may indeed be the explanation-but unless you’ve been to one of these places yourself, armed with surveying equipment for good measure, how can you be sure? A road that appears to go uphill may in fact be pointing down, which would account for the weird feeling of disorientation that some visitors report. Of course, skeptics dismiss the gravity hill phenomenon as the result of an optical illusion.
![gravity hill gravity hill](https://uncoveringpa.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Gravity-Hill-Pittsburgh-9814.jpg)
It feels disorienting, but quite pleasantly so. You can (if you’re careful and obey traffic regulations) sit with your car in neutral and experience the phenomenon for yourself. You can pour water onto the roads or roll a ball or bottle downhill, and see it stop and begin to roll uphill. The attraction of gravity hills is plain.
![gravity hill gravity hill](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/RuzbGBg_FUg/hqdefault.jpg)
And one of them is so feted that Bedford County has produced a tourist leaflet to help people find it. This phenomenon has been observed all over the world (there are gravity hills documented in Scotland, Portugal, Barbados, Australia, and Korea), but true to form, Pennsylvania offers several. But they all work in pretty much the same way: If you put your car in neutral on one of these roads, slowly but surely, it begins to move uphill instead of down. They go by many names: gravity hills, gravity roads, mystery spots, or spook hills. And yet there are places in the world in which the laws of gravity seem to be broken regularly. Gravity is a force of nature that even babies understand instinctively, and that even inanimate objects obey without question.
![gravity hill gravity hill](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f7/08/cc/f708ccbb778a73d14be6c86f77b8cb80.jpg)
And one of them is so feted that Bedford County has produced a tourist leaflet to help people find it.Ī little knowledge of physics and a little personal observation will tell you the obvious: Unless something holds them up, objects tend to accelerate downwards. Been observed all over the world (there are gravity hills documented in Scotland, Portugal, Barbados, Australia, and Korea), but true to form, Pennsylvania offers several.