Harper's Ferry

Seems like the replay of this trip is going on forever. It took less than a week in real time. We are leaving Washington D.C. I have decided that D.C. is my favorite city to visit, but I'm pretty much done with it. A lot of things I saw this time, I had seen before. And in fact I could have spent more time here, but I'm renting a car and finding other adventures.

I've heard that renting in the airport is more expensive. There was a Hertz place right next to the motel, so perfect. They were outrageous. I got one at the airport that was less than half what Hertz were charging. It nice than the car I currently own, too.

First stop Monocacy battlefield. It was on the way, so why not. I love battlefields. I didn't have time to really explore it and it wasn't a major battle. It was a last gasp chance for the Confederacy. Lee had lost at Gettysburg, but another Confederate army was approaching Washington. This battle slowed them up until they could be stopped by another army.

Next, Harper's Ferry. I didn't have huge hopes for this, but I thought it might be kind of interesting. My hopes level was set just about right. It had the building John Brown had his raid at. It had a lot of quaint old buildings. Also, the Potomac and some other river come together right there and make three states - Virginia, WV, and Maryland. You can walk across the bridge from Virginia to Maryland. It happens to also be part of the Appalachian Trail. So not huge fun, but fun.

Last stop today was Antietam. This is one of those battles that has two names - Either named for the Antietam River or the town of Sharpsburg. I decided to jog through the different parts of the battlefield. I usually love that. Today it was hot and muggy and, almost when I was almost done, I got to the famous Burnside Bridge which they had completely blocked off, so I had to retrace my path. Arrrrrgh!! I didn't have heat exhaustion, but I had to take it really slow on the way back.

A cool thing is a picture I took of a current street in Sharpsburg. I recognized it from an old picture I had seen of the city. I thought, "I've seen a picture of this before." Maybe not for everyone, but it was really cool to me.