Inspired by our friend, Bobbie Jo’s childhood memories of the High Rocks of Clymer, PA, we set out to rediscover where they are. Clymer High Rocks is a Pottsville sandstone rock city not uncommon to western Pennsylvania. If you have been to Bilger’s Rocks or Panther Rocks in Clearfield County, Beartown Rocks in Jefferson County, Jake’s Rocks in Warren County, Baughman Rocks in Somerset County, Ohiopyle in Fayette County, Rocky City in Olean, New York, or even Rock City on Lookout Mountain in Georgia, you have encountered a Pottsville sandstone rock city.

Clymer High Rocks is near the Dixon Road section of Clymer. The Pottsville sandstone that creates it outcrops at the top of the slopes bordering Two Lick Valley, suggesting that there may be other rock cities similar to this one.

The Clymer High Rocks Expedition team on the ascent; our Clymer mountain guide, Bobbie Jo, plant specialist Stacey Patrick, and working the camera, geographer Kevin Patrick.

The Clymer High Rocks expedition tackling the steep slope up to the outcrop. The trail was more a faint suggestion of a trail, but the right direction was clear; up.

Finally, like the ruins of an ancient temple reabsorbed by jungle, Clymer High Rocks was revealed. 

A specific set of geomorphic conditions are needed to create a rock city. Widely jointed, massive sandstone overlying shale must outcrop on a hill slope that is not too steep and not too gradual in a periglacial environment like the one that existed in western Pennsylvania at the end of the last glacial period ten to fifteen thousand years ago. Repeating freeze-thaw cycles caused the rock joints to be widened by frost-wedging, and the separated blocks to be gradually moved downhill due to ground heaving (frozen ground heaves up, thawed ground moves down slope). The block in this picture has shifted down slope away from the joint crevice.

The Pottsville formation is a sandstone/conglomerate that lithified from sand deposited in a near-shore beach environment. Sections of the sandy deposits were filled with quartz pebbles that lithified into a conglomerate.

 Climbing the crevice to the top of the outcrop. 

Tiny teaberries growing in the moss of Clymer High Rocks.

Looking down on Stacey from atop the Turtle Neck formation of Clymer High Rocks.

After running around the woods of Clymer, we headed for Houtzdale in Clearfield County for puguch at Joey’s Restaurant. Eastbound on Glendale Lake Road near Patton, the Pottsville formation was never far, outcropping on the horizon as Allegheny Ridge.

Puguch (a.k.a. pagach, pagash) for everyone at Joey’s Restaurant in Houtzdale, Pennsylvania. Sometimes called pierogi pizza or potato pizza, puguch originated as a meatless Lenten dish among the Slavic Catholics of Eastern Europe and carried by them to Pennsylvania. Although there are many variants, it is pizza dough, mashed potatoes and cheese.

 A fitting end to the expedition; teaberry ice cream at Noel’s near Prince Gallitzin State Park. Complete with a teaberry garnish from the Clymer High Rocks.

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— Text and all images by Kevin