Game weekend from the quiet side: a Penn State home game, staying in the valley
A Penn State home game from the quiet side of Happy Valley: dinner at the head of the valley, group lodging near Julian, Pennsylvania, the drive over the mountain to Beaver Stadium, and a Sunday morning by Bald Eagle Creek.
Lodging in the Bald Eagle Valley around Julian, Pennsylvania is 20 to 45 minutes from Beaver Stadium: quiet rooms, whole lodges for groups, and an easy drive back over the mountain on game day.
The weekend has the shape of the published Penn State guide. Arrival day: check in and keep dinner simple. Game day: build it around the current event schedule and your arrival method. Departure day: leave room for one stop or a relaxed meal.
Scroll to travel. The map flies with you between stops and circles each one while you read.
Port Matilda Hotel & Tavern
Stay
Port Matilda is the head of the Bald Eagle Valley and the western gateway to Julian from Altoona and Pittsburgh, at the I-99 / US-322 interchange. The Port Matilda Hotel & Tavern is its historic small-town hotel: rooms upstairs, wings and pizza downstairs, the social hub of Port Matilda.
GodSpeed Events & Lodging
Stay
GodSpeed Events & Lodging is an event venue and group lodging on the Eagle Valley Road between Port Matilda and Julian: weddings, reunions and large-group football weekends.
Not a big group? The tavern you just left has rooms upstairs; The Nature Inn at Bald Eagle is a guest-room stay inside Bald Eagle State Park; Harmony Forge Inn near Milesburg invites Penn State event visitors to ask about rooms.
Beaver Stadium
Towns & Services
Home of Penn State Nittany Lions football and the second-largest stadium in the Western Hemisphere: 106,572 seats. On game days, the Bald Eagle Valley is the quiet side of the drive.
Soaring Eagle Wetland
Fishing & Creek Access
Give the last morning one slow stop by Bald Eagle Creek: Soaring Eagle Wetland, 55 acres of wetland inside Wildlife for Everyone’s 135-acre preserve, with designated parking on South Eagle Valley Road, an accessible trail and a fishing and viewing platform.
Bring binoculars if you like watching birds, or just spend time at the platform. A stop can be worthwhile without checking off a species or catching a fish.
The Junction 144
Eat & Drink
The restaurant in the historic Davidson Inn, at the PA-144 junction on the Eagle Valley Road: the closest sit-down dinner to Julian on the Milesburg side, and on your way out of the valley.