Cross-Country Road Trip! Day 36-37, Mile 6497: Fixin' to Mason-Dixon.

Our friends in Baltimore recommended that we make a slight detour from our planned route to Gettysburg in order to visit Harpers Ferry. We're glad they did.

It was only about 50 miles out of our way, and well worth it. It made our day into a rare four-stater, touching Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania.

Like Appomattox Court House, Harpers Ferry is more of a museum piece than an actual town. The buildings have been mostly rebuilt after being destroyed by the war and repeated flooding. It's now a National Historical Park.

Geographically, the location is beautiful. The town is built on a rocky point in a river gorge carved deep into the Blue Ridge Mountains by the confluence of the Potomac and the Shenandoah.

Well, as deep as these dinky mountains allow.

Harpers Ferry was a hub of industry by the early 1800s. The energy supplied by two major rivers provided the power needed for a wide variety of manufacturing companies. The Lewis and Clark expedition stopped here to acquire most of the equipment needed by the Corps of Discovery. 

By the 1850s, it was an important railway hub and a center for weapons production. Which is why John Brown decided to raid the armory here as the beginning of his plan to free and arm the slaves.

And why Lee made the town a main target in his 1862 invasion of Maryland. All the factories and much of the townwere destroyed by the war and the catastrophic flood of 1877.

What's left is a charming little tourist attraction. 

There are several cute shops selling souvenirs and crafts.

We hiked up to Jefferson Rock from whence in 1783 our third president proclaimed the view "worth a voyage across the Atlantic." I guess they had lower standards for scenic vistas in those days, because we found it underwhelming.

Rather more picturesque were these overgrown ruins of St. John's Episcopal church.

The B&O railroad line still runs through the town.

And this 19th century ad for talcum powder is still visible on the mountainside opposite town.

The look of the rolling stock has changed, though.

This display made me wonder if maybe Putin has a point about Ukraine being corrupted by Satanic gays.

In Gettysburg, we bought tickets for a battlefield tour by bus the following day. We had just enough time (about two hours) to go through the very detailed museum at the visitor center. The museum has thousands of artifacts and gives a thorough, day-by-day account of the battle and its aftermath. 

We were especially impressed by the section that deals with the consequences of the emancipation of the slaves, the betrayal of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the rise of Jim Crow, the rule of white supremacy, the marches and victories of the 1960s, and the necessity to continue the struggle for equality.

The high point of the museum is the cyclorama of Pickett's charge. It's a huge 360 degree painting, a restoration of the 1883 original. The original, by French artist Paul Philippoteaux and five assistants, took a year and a half to complete and stood 22' high and 279' long. The restoration is 42' high and 377' long.

It's impressive.

Our hotel is on Cemetery Hill, one of the Union strongpoints during the battle.

We had dinner at Dobbin House Tavern, right across the street. Built in 1776, the tavern is the oldest building still standing in the town of Gettysburg, a town that boasts over 200 very old buildings.

Dobbin House was one of the first stops north of the Mason-Dixon line on the Underground Railway. This concealed space between the floor was built to hide runaway slaves on the journey to freedom.

Like most tourist attractions, almost everything in Gettysburg revolves around one  main theme. 

There are dozens of statues of Lincoln, Blue and Gray sports bars, even Confederate gifts.

The next morning, we took a bus tour through the vast battlefield.

Our first view of Big and Little Roundtop, the southern anchors of the Union lines.

The view north from Little Roundtop looks straight up the Union line on Cemetary Ridge and encompasses almost the whole battlefield. Seminary Ridge, where Lee's army massed to attack, is clearly visible across the far fields.

Directly in front is the Wheatfield and beyond that the Peach Orchard, capitalized because they were the sites of some of the most worst fighting the battle. The fight in the Wheatfield is said to have been so intense that the soldiers were up to their ankles in blood. At the end, 4,000 bodies covered the field so thickly that you could walk across the battlefield without ever touching ground.

Looking southwest across the Valley of Death to the Devil's Den, the pile of rock at the curve of the road. The tree in the center marks the Slaughter Pen, where sharpshooters on both sides cut down hundreds.

The tour and the museum gave us a good overview of the battle. Later we hiked another section of the battlefield around Culp's Hill at the northern end of the Union lines.

Walking the ground where the fight took place gives you a very different perspective than just reading about the various incidents. 

The battlefield is crowded with monuments placed over the years by the survivors and other interested groups.

The little stone block marks the right flank of the 68th New York Infantry during their successful defense of Cemetery Hill on July 3, the last day of the battle.

Stones marking the left and right flanks of the various regiments engaged are everywhere and really help give you a picture of the troop positions. Often a regiment, nominally 1,000 men, but probably attrited to around 300 at this time of the war, was crammed into a frontline of about 50 yards. New York regiments stood shoulder to shoulder with regiments from Ohio, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, every state in the Union, in  a practically continuous line 4.5 miles long. 

The temperature was about 85; the humidity was high; the hygiene was poor. And the troops on both sides were dressed in thick wool uniforms. Miserable even without the fighting.

Cannon have been placed to mark the positions of the batteries on the final day of battle. The tubes are real, but the mounts are reproductions. 

There are two types of cannon at Gettysburg--the green-patinaed copper tubes are smoothbore pieces firing solid shot about a mile and canister at shorter ranges. Smaller black pieces have rifled barrels for longer-range (up to 4 miles) and more accurate shooting.

The woods are rapidly greening, the dogwoods and other flowering trees are bursting with color. It's hard to imagine the suffering and death that took place here all those years ago.

Gettyburg is one of the most studied battles in history. Towers like this one on the summit Culp's Hill were built to give military historians and tacticians a bird's eye view of the terrain where the most significant actions took place.

And to give gawkers like us a superb view of the surrounding countryside. 

P.

Cross-Country Road Trip! Day 33-35, Mile 6350: Having a Capitol Time. Except for the D.C. Bitchslap.

Adding to the list of places I didn't expect to see a major building by Frank Gehry, we found this lovely specimen as we were leaving Roanoke, VA, in the morning. It's the Taubman Museum of Art, and it's not actually designed by Gehry, but by a protege of his named Randall Stout. Quite a departure from the mostly conventional architecture of downtown Roanoke. Had we known it existed, we might have planned a visit.

Oh, well, you can't see everything.

Rather than head directly to D.C. for Roanoke, we decided to take a detour through the back roads of Virginia to Appomattox Court House. Since we saw where the Civil War started in Charleston, we felt an obligation to see it through to the bloody end.

These are some of the most beautiful roads in the country--tree-lined corridors of the purest green, rolling hills and meadows, broken by a few whitewashed clapboard farmhouses. It's idyllic. Pleasing to heart and soul.

I always thought Appomattox Court House was a structure, which it is, but it's also the name of the town. That's how they do in Virginia, I guess. 

Appomattox Court House, the town, is not a town, but a National Historical Park. It's largely a rather bucolic re-creation of the town that existed when Lee and his army were trapped here by Grant's forces. Minus a few dozen buildings and a lot of mud.

Appomattox Court House, the structure, is the red brick building left center. It is not where Lee surrendered to Grant. 

This is where the surrender was signed--the McLean house, a private residence a few houses away from the court house. In the town of Appomattox Court House, but not in the Appomattox court house. Which is where the confusion arises. 

The McLean house is on the road Lee's army was taking toward Appomattox Station, the railhead where trainloads of supplies awaited his hungry troops. Unfortunately for them, Sheridan's cavalry got there first, burned the supplies, and, with the help of 12,000 Federal troops, including 5,000 Black soldiers, blocked his way west.

Surrounded, Lee saw no choice but to throw in the towel.

Literally.

This is the tea towel the Confederates used as a flag of truce.

The room where Grant and Lee signed the surrender agreement has been preserved as it was that day.

In another room, presses were quickly set up to print parole passes for the surrendering troops.

Heading into the urban landscape of D.C. entailed dealing with Washington traffic. The lovely back roads gave way to bumper-to-bumper freeways.

Inching our way through that concrete maze, we eventually found our hotel in Silver Spring, Maryland, a suburb of the capitol.

I'd heard of Silver Spring, but had no real idea of what it might be like. I only knew it was not too far from downtown with convenient access to the Metro.

The town was founded in 1840 by Frances Preston Blair, an aide to Andrew Jackson. Blair fell off his horse near a mica-flecked spring and instantly fell in love. He purchased the land and built a house.

The house and the spring are long gone. All the remains is this acorn-shaped gazebo in a rather forlorn little pocket park where the spring used to be.

Downtown Washington was about 45 minutes by Metro, about half of that was walking to and from the station.

We walked across the Mall to the National Museum of the American Indian.

It's an imposing structure with four floors packed with an impressive array of artifacts from native cultures all over the Americas, from the Inuit of Alaska to the Mapuche of Chile.

Most impressive to me is that the exhibits have been curated by members of the tribes represented, instead of the usual whitesplaining.

So refreshing.

I love masks, and there were many.

And so many carvings of animals and spirit beings.

It is really a remarkable museum. We spent over three hours there, and could easily have spent longer.

O was very excited to see this native painting of the Battle of Little Bighorn (the Battle of the Greasy Grass to the native participants). She has seen photos of it many times, but seeing the original was quite a thrill.

It is paired with a idealized painting from the mid-1800s of American Progress, symbolized by a chubby white woman in flowing draperies sweeping away the benighted savages as she guides the inevitable tide of civilizing settlers to their Manifest Destiny. 

Ugh.

That evening, we visited with old friends who live about an hour away in Baltimore. The traffic (early rush hour) was abominable, so it was with considerable delight that we arrived in their calm, beautiful neighborhood.

The area used to be a mill town and many of the houses have been converted from mill workers' apartments to lovely single-family homes.

This old warehouse has been converted to a sculptors's studio.

We went to their favorite crab eatery for blue crab.

We're used to ordering one Dungeness crab for the two of us. With the smaller blue crabs, it's three or four per person.

The whole mess of Old Bay-smothered steamed crustaceans gets dumped on the table, and the free-for-all-feast begins.

It's a scene of utter destruction.

Look at the glee on those faces. We were pretty happy to see each other, too.

Next day, we took a bus tour of D.C.

So many historic buildings. Here's Forest Service HQ.

The National Museum of African American History is designed to resemble a Yoruban headdress.

Looking across the tidal basin at the Jefferson Memorial and the Washington Monument. 

The city is refreshingly low-rise. The Monument is the tallest structure in the capitol.

Downtown is filled with dozens of interesting and historic structures.

The China-America Friendship Gate features hundreds of dragons symbolizing good fortune.

After lunch, we visited the International Spy Museum.

They have the original gadget-crammed silver birch Aston-Martin from Goldfinger.

Amazing gadgets explain a great deal of the attraction of spying. Who could resist an escape radio concealed in a false scrotum? 

The museum covers the history of espionage from Elizabethan times to the present in both real life and fiction. It is all well-organized and well-presented, with attention paid to the contradictions between the need to protect national security and the maintenance of a free, democratic society, including a well-done presentation on our ill-conceived descent into legalized torture in the period following 9/11.

There are lots of fascinating artifacts, like this dummy tank built as part of the elaborate deception operations leading up to D-Day.

And this replica of the first weaponized submersible, built in 1775 to attack the British fleet in New York Harbor. The pod on the side held a timed explosive device to be attached to the underside of a British warship. The Turtle was never successful.

Everything was going well until one night I hit this divider and tore the sidewall out of the front left tire. This piece of concrete sits in front of the crosswalk. There is a standard road divider behind the crosswalk, but this useless little half moon is placed in front where you don't expect there to be anything. It's almost impossible to see at night.

As you can see, I wasn't the first to hit the damn thing, and I'm sure I won't be the last.

Luckily, it happened only a couple blocks from our hotel, so I was able to park safely in the hotel lot until morning. Unfortunately, our car has no spare, so I had to call AAA. They towed me to a nearby tire store. Which was closed. So they towed me to another nearby tire store. Which had no appointments available and was going to close for good on Friday, which meant they were limited to the tires they had in stock.

I told the sales person my sad story and he just shook his head in commiseration: "You got the D.C. bitchslap." He explained that many people, the minute they get inside the Beltway, have a sudden onset of bad luck.

Taking pity, he fit me in, found a tire that worked, and everything worked out fine. 

Except for that damn bitchslap.

P.