This weekend we drove to Harpers Ferry.

For those of you not familiar with American History and/or the Civil War, Harpers Ferry is where John Brown seized the US Armory and Arsenal that was one of the events that brought the issue of slavery to, perhaps, a boil.

Of course, other things happened in Harpers Ferry, and the Appalachian Trail cuts through Harpers Ferry.

This is the building where John Brown and his group holed up. However, this is not the original location–the building has been moved multiple times, including, at one point, to Chicago.

Facing west.

Facing east, towards the Potomac River.

This monument marks the original location of the building.

The national park has images from the time of the Civil War posted about the city/park, and the fact this building was moved made it hard–initially–to orient the current city to what was in the pictures.

The fact that the two arsenals are ruins now, but were in the pictures, made it even more confusing to me.

But I eventually figured it out.

There are a LOT of ruins around Harpers Ferry. The ruins of St. John’s Episcopal Church particularly fascinated me, and I spent a lot of time wandering around them taking pictures. Enough pictures they’ll be a separate post.

Arsenal ruins: the park has signs with a picture showing the archeological dig of the foundation. The ground level here is about three feet higher than when the building was built.

Virginius Island is an abandoned area. There are ruins there of a water powered cotton mill and other water-operated machinery.

Ruins of bridge footers across the Potomac River.

Ruins of bridge footers across the Shenandoah River.

Stone stairs (here’s a picture that might give you a better idea of the steepness of the stairs.)

It was a gorgeous day, and the advantage of going in November, is there weren’t huge crowds of people.

Our plan yesterday was to drive to Harpers Ferry today. However, the fact I went to bed early and still slept ten hours meant that we ended up looking for somewhere closer.

We set off for Swallow Falls, only to discover it was still closed from the storm. (Yeah, Michael somehow missed the giant bold text at the top of the page, saying they were closed.)

So, we redirected towards Deep Creek Lake.

Since the lake is low, we walked along the shore.

I was (unsurprisingly) fascinated with the multiple tree stumps, lying on the shore like strange, tentacled, sea creatures.

But we also just enjoyed what a beautiful day it was.

In today’s mail:

Bravo Greatland Graphics, you just made my day!

After escaping the crowds at Bridge Day (I love watching the BASE jumpers, but then, so does everyone else), we went to Babcock State Park.

Amusingly, many many other people had the same idea, so by the time we left, the parking lot was overflowing.

Babcock State Park is famous for its grist mill–you’ve probably seen a picture of it.

You had a wait quite awhile to get a picture without people.
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One week after our last visit, we were back at the New River Gorge, this time for Bridge Day.

The skies were overcast and grey, but there were still BASE jumpers to watch.

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Part of the reason we wanted to drive, is so we could see parts of the country we hadn’t before. Which is why we came back through the Great Smoky Mountains. It was an amazingly beautiful day, which made the drive all the nicer.

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The special exhibit at the Georgia Aquarium was frogs.

I can’t say frogs are a personal favorite, but my friend Susan loves them, so I paid close attention and took lots of pictures, because they made me think of her.

They had Poison Dar Frogs, which are Susan’s favorite. I didn’t get many good pictures of them.

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I love aquariums. Every time we visit Cincinnati, we have to visit Newport Aquarium. And we used to visit at least once a year. So I was looking forward to seeing the Georgia Aquarium.

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This week was Michael’s conference, and this year it was in Atlanta. Michael convinced his work to let us drive (everyone else flew), so we drove down via Charlotte, where we got to meet Eric and Kat.

This was the sunrise Tuesday morning, from our hotel room on the 40th floor of the Marriott.

For those of you not from WV, this coming Saturday is Bridge Day. We went last year–and hope to go this year, but were in the area on Saturday so took a brief tour of the area without all the crowds and insanity.

The New River Gorge area is gorgeous, but with the leaves changing, it’s extra pretty.

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We went to Ohiopyle again, this time with my brother et al.

Brian decided we needed to go bike riding, so we left at 8AM Saturday morning.

It was really lovely, and my legs may one day forgive me.

Since I hadn’t been on a bike in … a really really long time … I didn’t take ay pictures while biking, but did get some pictures walking around town.

Saturday we went to Ohiopyle State Park (in Pennsylvania) and stopped by Fort Necessity.

For some reason I’d never been to Ohiopyle before, and I have no idea why.

I have memories of going to Fort Necessity in 2nd or 3rd grade; it was even smaller than I remembered, and my memory was of thinking, “this is it?”

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While in Boston, we visited the Arnold Arboretum. The day started rainy, but the skies eventually cleared.

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