The New England portion of my New England and Mid-Atlantic States road trip had been completed, so when I woke up in my motel room in Vermont, I quickly loaded the rental car, stopped for a quick breakfast, then headed out onto the road for a day-long drive down to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, where I had made my next hotel reservation online. The next three visits on the trip were to upgrade perspectives from mainly childhood trips and stops, and due to these visits being just about an hour from each other, I planned to handle them in one day, starting with Gettysburg NHP, then down to the national mall in Washington, DC, and ending up visiting Fort McHenry in Baltimore, Maryland. My one advantage in visiting three cities in one day was that I was doing it on a Sunday.

When I reached Gettysburg after my long drive from Vermont and checked into my hotel by mid-afternoon, I realized that I had another advantage, a long summer’s day. I drove over to the nearby Visitor Center to check out the sites in the park. Since the civil war battle extended over a wide area around the city, there were many battle locations protected around the small city. After a conversation with a park guide, I accepted the recommendation to head over to the nearby location of East Cemetery Hill. Besides the various memorials and statues within the hilltop park, there was a representative cannon looking out on the small valley that confederate soldiers tried to climb up the hill against the union defense line. Across the street on the other side of the hill park was the Soldiers National Cemetery, a more personal memorial to the historical battle site. My history perspective had been upgraded.

Gettysburg NHP, PA

The next morning, I checked out of my hotel and headed for Washington, DC. The Maps app got me close to the National Mall, but I had to drive around to look for an appropriate parking location. I wound up finding a street side parking spot a couple of blocks from the west side of the National Mall and walked down to explore. I took distant photo shots of the Capitol building behind the Washington Monument on the east side of the National Mall, then began to explore the Vietnam War Memorial Wall near the Lincoln Memorial. I checked out a few more war memorial sites, then I went up to enter the Lincoln Memorial. Having upgraded my childhood memories of my earlier Washington visit, I walked back up to my rental car and drove up to Baltimore to experience Fort McHenry National Monument, the site that inspired Francis Scott Key to write the US national anthem. It was impressive to explore the fort, observe the flag with the number of stars at the time of Francis Scott Key flying over the fort, and check out the Chesapeake Bay view seen from the fort. It was a good day of perspective. I headed over to my nearby hotel reservation.

Lincoln Memorial, Washington DC – Fort McHenry, Baltimore MD

For the next day schedule, I had included a natural visit along the Maryland coast to Assateague Island, known for its herds of wild horses, but I noted a directional concern in the Maps app, so I decided to skip this stop and head directly to the First State National Historical Park in New Castle, Delaware. When I first found the site in my research for a location to represent Delaware in my road trip, I assumed that it would be some sort of memorial statue or structure honoring Delaware’s status in history. However, when I reached New Castle and found a street parking spot near to the site, I discovered that the park was a simple small grass park behind an historical courthouse. I took photos in the park and drove a couple of blocks down to the Delaware River, where I walked around the riverside paths. After a few more photos, I drove back up to the main street location to enjoy lunch where I learned that the historical courthouse had a tour. Even though I joined the tour halfway, I was amazed to discover how Delaware became the first colony to accept the newly written constitution to become the first state of the union. Essentially, since the constitution was written in Philadelphia, this gave Pennsylvania the first opportunity to be the first colony to approve the constitution, but a few representatives delayed the discussion by a couple of days, giving the much smaller group of Delaware representatives who received the written constitution copy just a day after Pennsylvania started their review to beat Pennsylvania in being the first colony to officially approve the constitution. The underlying history was fascinating.

Historic Courthouse, New Castle, DE – Steel Pier Amusement Park, Atlantic City, NJ

After leaving the historical courthouse, I got into the rental car and drove on to Atlantic City, New Jersey to check into my next hotel a couple of blocks from the boardwalk. After checking in, I walked down to the boardwalk and started taking photos of the beachside, casinos, and the amusement park pier. Monday afternoon foot traffic on the pier was light, so many of the rides were not operating, but walking along the pier was nice. Since the Hard Rock Casino was directly across from the pier, I chose its restaurant for my dinner. The nice, relaxing afternoon truly honored reaching my bucket list goal of visiting and taking a photo within every state in the United States.

Even though I had accomplished my bucket list goal, I figured that navigating New York City traffic to reach La Guardia airport for my flight home, so I had scheduled an extra day on my road trip plan. This gave me time to make one more stop on my tour. During my trip planning, I had noticed that Ellis Island was located close to a national park service location along the Hudson River called Liberty Park in northern New Jersey. On a map, I had noticed what appeared to be a small bridge from the park to Ellis Island, so after I checked out of my Atlantic City hotel, I headed to Liberty Park to check out Ellis Island. However, once I reached a visitor center near this bridge, I was informed that the bridge was built just for park employees and access to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty was only through a roundtrip ferry trip that launched hourly at a northern port in the park. Each ferry trip headed out from the Liberty Park port to the Ellis Island port, then headed on to the Liberty Island port, before heading back to the Liberty Park port. For passengers, the round-trip ferry cost was not restricted to one ferry, allowing groups to exit the ferry to explore each stop, then boarding the next ferry to take on the next leg of the trip. Since I was not sure about the New York City traffic, I stayed on one ferry, skipping the island tours, but taking excellent photos of Lady Liberty looking out towards the New York skyline. After arriving back at Liberty Park and retrieving my rental car, I successfully navigated the New York traffic to get to my Long Island hotel. The next morning, I dropped off my rental car near La Guardia and caught my flight back home. I relaxed on the plane, contemplating my very successful road trip journey.

Statue of Liberty facing New York City skyline