New Paris, Pennsylvania: Gravity Hill

Awesome! We did it several times in a van and even turned the vehicle off completely. Great entertainment and still doesn't make sense as to how it works. We also did the 2nd hill a little past the first. Mind blowing! We did try pouring water and it slowly starting creeping as well.

We would not recommend setting out to find this phenomenon without a really reliable GPS and a healthy set of brakes, but if so equipped, this is a wonderful excursion! With absolutely no effort to try and explain how our car could be rolling backwards uphill, we all just hooted and laughed. Yes, water rolled uphill, too. A puddle of water was poured where the drivers' door is and it rolled uphill toward the car at an elevated level behind us.

The only cars we encountered on the road were other sightseers -- rather a fun atmosphere. And as a side benefit, driving up to the gravity hill is an opportunity to get off the highway and truly soak up the beauty of the mountains. We pulled over to the side of the road and just took in the sounds and smells and views of the less traveled mountain roads.

We never would have found it without the Roadside America app in our GPS, but am so glad we took the time to do so!

I live near Gravity Hill and take all my out-of-town visitors to experience it. Everyone is always amazed and make me go back to the beginning two or three times. I have also taken a bottle of water and an exercise ball and watched them roll uphill. Cheap entertainment, but it really makes you scratch your head in wonder!

The Bedford County Visitors Bureau has really been pushing this obscure attraction, with billboards along the Pennsylvania Turnpike and cute retro brochures at every rest area. While that's more than most "spook hills" get, for now this attraction is just the brochures and billboards and a couple of "GH"s spray painted onto an otherwise hidden county road.

Still -- it's a very rare "double" gravity hill. And the "official" status may discourage local law enforcement from penalizing backwards drivers.

Just outside of the tiny town of New Paris, PA there are two gravity hills on the same road! The first hill is by far the most dramatic. It has a .1 mile rollback, putting it on par with the Burkittsville, MD hill. The rollback speed was over 7 mph, fairly fast for a G-hill. As an added bonus, water appears to flow uphill in the small valley located to the left of the hill. The picture shows the mini-van in the distance where the rollback starts, and I was standing roughly where the rollback ended.

The second New Paris hill is located about 3/10 mile past the first hill. While this is a nice nill, the rollback is shorter and the top rolling speed is less than that of the New Paris Hill #1. New Paris Hill #2 most closely resembles Booger Hill down in Georgia as far as rollback distances and top speeds.

With two gravity hills on the same road and the added bonus of water appearing to run uphill I searched around for evidence of a vortex. There was a leaning shack near the base of the first hill, but it appears that the shack leans due to natural gravitation forces over time. I didn't have the traditional vortex testing broom, but I did have a Hertz Ice Scraper but I am sad to report that I could not get the ice scraper to stand on end anywhere near the hills. In addition, no twisted tree trunks could be found in the area.

But this should not stop anyone from actually visiting the hills! This appears to be the only place with two gravity hills on the same road.