May 25, 2013 (Saturday)
Time for another adventure! This journey takes us camping in
Pennsylvania and Maryland. Drummer Boy Camping Resort was the place we camped
for the first three nights of the trip. It was not our first choice of
campgrounds, but when we were looking at booking something (very early March)
pretty much every place we called was booked for the holiday weekend. We ended
up paying $88 a night! We probably could have stayed at a hotel for only
slightly more and not had to haul the camper at 10 miles per gallon! Luckily,
the further east we went the cheaper the gas – I think the cheapest we saw was
$3.35 (compared to $3.85 when we left and returned MI).
The campground was pretty nice – they had a fishing pond, a
few kids play structure areas, two pools (one had a waterslide), mini-golf,
volleyball courts, etc. The water pressure was a bit low thus they had the
closest bathroom to our site closed. For me shower water was not the warmest
one night, but it was hot for Mike a little later. The roads were mostly stone,
which made biking not the best. It did not get overly loud at night. The
campground is right next to the freeway so there was road noise. There was also
an active rail road track nearby.
May 26, 2013 (Sunday)
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| Welcome to Gettysburg! |
We started the day early (8am) with a visit to Gettysburg
National Military Park Visitor Center. It worked out really well with getting there
so early – it was very busy by lunch time. We opted to watch the film "A
New Birth of Freedom",
view the restored Gettysburg Cyclorama, which depicts
"Pickett's Charge", and tour the Civil War Museum. The film lasted 20
minutes and was interesting. Right after the film, you are directed to the
Cyclorama – that lasts probably about 10 minutes. The film, cyclorama, and museum exhibit cost is $10.50/adult
(reduced rate with the AAA discount, for seniors, military and children). While
purchasing tickets for the Gettysburg activities, we also got tickets to visit
the Eisenhower
National Historic Site ($7.50/adult, $5/youth). There is a bus that takes to
you to and from the Eisenhower site right from the Visitor Center. It should
also be noted that there are many options for viewing the Gettysburg
battlefield – licensed battlefield guide who ride with you in your personal
vehicle ($65/car w/ 1-6 people), bus tour ($30/adult or $18/youth), or you can
do a self-tour (free!). There are audio tour cd’s that can be purchased at the
bookstore, if you want some commentary while on your self-guided auto tour.
Plan to allow about 2 hours for any of the tour choices listed above. Every
stop of the tour had parking available with the exception being the “Big Round
Top”, that parking area was jam packed.
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| Eisenhower National Historical Site |
Okay, back to the order of the day. After the video, cyclorama, and a
partial viewing of the museum we hopped on, at our appointed time, to the bus
to the Eisenhower site. The bus ride was
short and the bus was decent (clean and not smelly). Once to arrive to the site,
you are greeted at the bus by a park guide, you are then escorted into the home
and given a brief summary about each room. Upon exiting the home, you may
stroll about the rest of the estate. There are some gardens, cattle and cattle
barns on the site. There is also a ten minute video that is somewhat
interesting. I recommend allowing 1.5 to 2 hours at the site. The bus picks up
and drops off at the site every 30 minutes.
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| An overhead view of a portion of Gettysburg. |
Back at the Gettysburg Visitor Center, we had a picnic lunch and then
headed back into view the rest of the museum.
If you want to thoroughly view everything in the museum, you are going
to need to allow at least two hours. Once we were satisfied with everything the
visitor center had to offer we headed to the cemetery. There was a National
Cemetery Walk just forming when we arrived so we joined. The walk was led by a
park ranger and lasted about 45 minutes.
The walk was informative and very peaceful. I asked the guide about the
NPS trading cards and he was able to give me the cards for Gettysburg.
There are many other walking tours available – each day of the three
battle days, Little Round Top, Cemetery Ridge, Civil War Soldier, and Spangler
Farm. The walking tours are all free, you just need to pick up the schedule at
the visitor center and find out where the tour starts. The tours vary in length
from 45 minutes to 1.5 hours.
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| Pennsylvania Monument - Gettysburg |
After our walking tour was over we headed out to drive the battlefield. We stopped everywhere we could and the tour
lasted about 3 hours. There really is not too much to see other than a bunch of
memorials. Oh, interesting fact – the Pennsylvania Monument, the largest in
Gettysburg, was cleaned for the 150th anniversary – the cost $1.1
million!
The evening was capped off with a visit to Mulligan MacDuffer Adventure
Golf and Ice Cream Parlor. The ice cream
was delicious – there were probably about 20 flavors to choose from. The 18-hole adventure golf was around $8/game
for adults and $6/game for kids. They have two courses, we opted for the front
course “Highlands”. Some of the holes were quite challenging. We did not have a
hole-in-ones at all on this course.
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