I’m all for devices, software and apps that make finding your way in the out of doors that much easier. I’ve used a handheld GPS to track down a geocache high in the eastern Sierra Nevada, and the same device to map the driving route back home. And, at this point, who hasn’t plugged an address into Google maps or viewed the world through Google Earth?

But there’s something satisfying about sitting down with an honest-to-goodness map and plotting not a starting point and destination, but poring over the possibilities.

National Geographic’s new Pennsylvania Recreation Atlas affords just that opportunity, tailored specifically to those looking for things to do outdoors and every conceivable way to get there.

In the same vein as DeLorme’s familiar Pennsylvania Atlas & Gazetteer, the 2013 Pennsylvania Recreation Atlas includes updated topographic maps segmented by grid. State game lands, lakes, rivers and even small streams are marked; so are national and state forest areas. Trout streams, shooting ranges, recreational lakes, hiking trails, state parks, campgrounds and golf and skiing sites have their own pages and map entries. Boat access points are clearly designated at each site.

Roadways of all sorts are well marked and defined on the 1:150,000-scale grids. Legends on each page set make it easy to determine exactly what opportunities each grid offers. Latitude and longitude markers line each page, making data entry easy for GPS unit users.

It’s a great tool to use to plan your next Pennsylvania adventure, near to or far from home. Cost from most Internet retailers is $24.95 plus tax and shipping.

Encountered June 15 on Route 8, just north of Route 77 in Crawford County. This can’t be easy to back down an access ramp.

Contributed photo/Linda Martin

Actually, Hall Barn is better used as one stop in a daylong reconnoiter of the Allegheny River than as a destination unto itself. It’s one of my favorite places in the region to spend an hour or so walking the short paths and spotting birds and other wildlife.

Hall Barn, along Route 62 in Hickory Township, Forest County, Pa.

Not to mention the bats.

The U.S. Forest Service, which with partner organizations manages the property on the Allegheny National Forest, says as many as 1,000 little brown and big brown bats make their home in the barn each summer,with space for as many as 5,000 more in a nearby bat “condominium.” The best time to see them is as dusk, of course; the Forest Service says most of them leave to feed through an open window best viewed from the parking lot.

An educational placard from the U.S. Forest Service on the premises of the Hall Barn in Forest County.

You’re very likely to see migratory or nesting birds on the property, depending on the time of year. Common yellowthroats and yellow warblers are certainties in spring and summer. So are raptors, like the redtailed hawk that spiraled over the property on June 15. A new sighting that day was two yellow-billed cuckoos who had the run of property.

The view from the parking lot of the Hall Barn in Forest County.

The Forest Service said the barn was built in the 1930s but later abandoned. The Forest Service acquired it in 1979 and began managing it for wildlife by way of fruit and nut trees, shrubs and grasses and herbs. A single trail meanders through the property, leading out of the reclaimed space to the treed border at the Allegheny River. Eastern bluebirds and bald eagles also are likely sightings here.

An educational placard placed at the Hall Barn in Forest County by the U.S. Forest Service.

The barn itself is off limits for entry, but the property, which is unstaffed, is free to visit. There are no facilities on the property. It is an easy drive out of Tionesta, and from Tidioute and points north makes for a nice  place to stretch the legs if you’re making a lazy day’s drive alongside the river. There are outfitters and river access points along Route 62, as well as restaurants in and around Tionesta. Through Tionesta, without stops, it’s about 1 hour and 40 minutes from Erie. Tionesta proper is about a half-hour drive from Cook Forest State Park and 40 or so minutes from Oil Creek State Park.

On the southeast side of Tionesta is Tionesta Lake and its recreation area. Maintained by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, it features camping, boating and fishing opportunities and an information center.

The reservoir at Union City Dam at this time of year typically features a meandering and sometimes braided French Creek in the midst of a dry bed covered with low-lying vegetation.

Not this rainy June.

The reservoir is filled as far as the eye can see from atop the 42-year-old dam. Banks push into the forest. Anglers are fishing an outflow side channel instead of the outflow itself, which has a discharge above 1,200 cfs as of June 17. The mean daily discharge for the past 23 years, by comparison, is 305 cfs, and the average is 111.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says the dam can store the equivalent run-off of 4.08 inches of precipitation from its 222 square mile drainage. The spillway has been called into action to handle excess water from the reservoir, which the Corps says will extend 7.4 miles at maximum flood pool.

Union City spillway, June 15, 2013.

I ask only a few things of the water bottles I carry on fishing outings, hikes and during day trips and cross-country drives.

First, durability. My bottles are going to take a beating — not a Himalayan expedition or first-descent beating, but a battering nonetheless by way of a hundred drops in the stream, on the trail and out of the car door, or just banging off a backpack into trees and rocks.

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These three were keeping the riff-raff out Saturday at Fry’s Landing on Presque Isle State Park.

The storms of the past week left Oil Creek State Park none the worse for wear, based on our day trip Sunday.

We’d hoped to see the same multitude of warblers that haunted the Venango County park in summer 2012 at a time when many of the migrants in Presque Isle State Park had already moved on. And we did manage chestnut-sided warbler and yellow warbler sightings, as well as American redstart and common yellowthroat encounters.

Those were hardly all, though.

On Burns Lane, we spooked a lifer barred owl off a roadside perch and to a new vantage point about 40 yards into the forest:

Barred owl at Oil Creek State Park on June 2, 2013. Contributed photo by Linda Martin.

At Petroleum Center bridge, as we searched the vegetation for singing warblers, a purple finch – raspberry, really — dropped in on us for a look of his own.

Near Blood Farm Day Use Area, a spotted sandpiper sashayed not on the creek bank but down the edge of the road, then fluttered uphill and disappeared into the foliage. And two red-tailed hawks soared through the cut of the valley.

At Miller Farm Bridge, cedar waxwings were nearly as abundant as the insects they chased as dusk neared.

Oil Creek was high, thanks to runoff from our recent spate of rainstorms; kayakers were on the bank at the takeout just north of Petroleum Centre. The banks were overrun at Miller Farm Bridge, nearer the north end of the bank, where fishing was about pointless. At Petroleum Center, the banks also were flooded but the stream was off-color, not chocolate. Fly fishermen were gearing up around 6 p.m. for a go at the trout. Boys with spinning gear fishing midday from the bank there appeared to have had no luck.

Deer in summer red grazed roadside along White City Road as we made our way along Miller Farm Road and back toward Titusville. A bobolink briefly showed itself along Miller Farm Road before settling back into high grass.

Children 12 years and under are invited to participate in the fifth annual Fishing Is For Fun Day Saturday from 9 a.m. to noon near Perry Monument at Presque Isle State Park.

Members of the Erie Pennsylvania Sport Fishing Association will provide fishing tackle for kids who need it, bait, a lunch of hot dogs, chips and soda, and a helping hand from volunteers. There also will be prizes. The event is free, but registration will be limited to the first 75 kids. Parents are invited to attend as well. Parents are invited to attend as well.

To register, call Denise Work between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. at 474-5357. Fishing will take place in the rain if there is no threat of lightning.

Have a libation today in support of Tamarack Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center.

Take a seat at the Cocktails & Hawktales Celebrity Bartending Social today from 5-8 p.m. at the Bel-Aire Clarion Hotel Lounge, 2800 W. Eighth St.

All tips that are collected during the event will go to Tamarack for supplies the staff needs to rehabilitate injured and ill birds of prey and songbirds.

The bartender lineup, according to the Tamarack website:

5-5:45: Holly Best, Presque Isle State Park; Mary Birdsong, Pennsylvania Audubon; Jim Martin, Bankable Consulting.

5:45-6:30: Rebecca Styn, LECOM; Jeff Evans, Employee Benefit Resources.

6:30 – 7:15: Emily Hauser, Presque Isle State Park; Jason Owen, Esq., Yochim, Skiba and Nash Attorneys at Law.

7:15-8: Michele Rundquist-Franz, Presque Isle Audubon Society; Erin Sekerak, Gannon University. (An e-mail from Franz suggests she’ll be serving from 6:15-7:15.)

The event is free and open to the public. Gift baskets will be available for raffle.

A Cocktales and Hawktales fundraiser for Tamarack Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center will take place Wednesday from 5-8 p.m. at the Bel-Aire Clarion Hotel and Conference Center.

All tips raised from the celebrity bartending event will be donated to Tamarack for supplies such as medication, bandages and food.