To the Keystone State
When I leave DC for Pennsylvania, I realize, or should I say remember, one thing pretty quickly.
Driving in DC is an absolute drag.
Sometimes there are no street signs, and when there are they make less sense than if you printed them in Braille. Add the overall poor quality of the roads, and it shouldn’t come as a surprise that people love to complain about the Beltway’s traffic.
On my way to the airport, where I pick up the rental car, I also learn something else.
When the Nationals play, make sure you schedule your plans well ahead of the ninth or final inning, whichever comes first. It’s hard to believe how a baseball game can cripple an entire metro system, but once the Nats' game ends you can forget any plans you might have made about getting into DC, and often even out of it.
On a dark and rainy day, I decide to make the drive to York, Pennsylvania, bypassing the highways as much as I can, instead opting for the more idyllic and easygoing rural roads.
The first stop is Gettysburg along Highway 15, site of the most famous Civil War battlefield. As seems to be the case with most battlefields, the area is drop dead gorgeous. It is inconceivable that this place would be the stage for an unprecedented bloodshed on American soil. I’ve seen battlefields in countries like Ireland and France, and they are as pretty as the most popular postcard shots posted on the web, but they give you the creeps no less. 100,000 casualties don’t lie, and numbers in this case can be even colder than where the blood was shed itself.
Driving westward, you can see the street signs pointing to Berlin in one direction, Hanover in the other. German country, then. There are rolling hills and little country roads leading through small towns that will have the usual American shops and the occasional monument and town square. There are wheat fields surrounding these towns at the foot of the hills. This, too, has a familiarity to it, kind of like Franken in Germany, where I grew up. I have to laugh when I actually see a vineyard in the distance. Franken recreated in the United States.
Then it’s on to British territory and Lancaster and York, America’s modest answer to the War of the Roses. It’s almost fitting that there would be a reminder of one of the grimmest battles on English soil so close to Gettysburg.
Finally, I make it to York.
Of course, I am not here to witness any trivial Americana or write an essay about small towns in the State of Independence. I am here for a different business altogether.
That would be the York marathon, which will start in less than ten hours from now.
Driving in DC is an absolute drag.
Sometimes there are no street signs, and when there are they make less sense than if you printed them in Braille. Add the overall poor quality of the roads, and it shouldn’t come as a surprise that people love to complain about the Beltway’s traffic.
On my way to the airport, where I pick up the rental car, I also learn something else.
When the Nationals play, make sure you schedule your plans well ahead of the ninth or final inning, whichever comes first. It’s hard to believe how a baseball game can cripple an entire metro system, but once the Nats' game ends you can forget any plans you might have made about getting into DC, and often even out of it.
On a dark and rainy day, I decide to make the drive to York, Pennsylvania, bypassing the highways as much as I can, instead opting for the more idyllic and easygoing rural roads.
The first stop is Gettysburg along Highway 15, site of the most famous Civil War battlefield. As seems to be the case with most battlefields, the area is drop dead gorgeous. It is inconceivable that this place would be the stage for an unprecedented bloodshed on American soil. I’ve seen battlefields in countries like Ireland and France, and they are as pretty as the most popular postcard shots posted on the web, but they give you the creeps no less. 100,000 casualties don’t lie, and numbers in this case can be even colder than where the blood was shed itself.
Driving westward, you can see the street signs pointing to Berlin in one direction, Hanover in the other. German country, then. There are rolling hills and little country roads leading through small towns that will have the usual American shops and the occasional monument and town square. There are wheat fields surrounding these towns at the foot of the hills. This, too, has a familiarity to it, kind of like Franken in Germany, where I grew up. I have to laugh when I actually see a vineyard in the distance. Franken recreated in the United States.
Then it’s on to British territory and Lancaster and York, America’s modest answer to the War of the Roses. It’s almost fitting that there would be a reminder of one of the grimmest battles on English soil so close to Gettysburg.
Finally, I make it to York.
Of course, I am not here to witness any trivial Americana or write an essay about small towns in the State of Independence. I am here for a different business altogether.
That would be the York marathon, which will start in less than ten hours from now.
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