I had a three day weekend....well, almost everyone had a three day weekend since the 4th of July was on a Friday this year...and I wanted to do something besides hang around the house. I keep packets of boxing day trips ready to grab and run if the urge strikes me and this time I grabbed the packet that had me heading west. I had just solved a mystery clue (yes, I do sometimes succeed at doing that) and I wanted to test my theory so my first stop of the day was in York County where I found that my solution had been correct. As I emerged from the woods that morning, this lovely site was in front of me. The haziness that comes from the humidity of summer had lifted and the lake looked lovely.
I moved up the road a bit on my way to Gettysburg when I passed through New Oxford. This is a town that has special meaning to me because my family is from a little town on New Oxford's outskirts called Irishtown. I had spent a tremendous amount of time in the New Oxford area when I was growing up as we visited grandparents and aunts and cousins. This box has been in place for quite a while but my route to and from Gettysburg these days takes me down the turnpike and south on 81 so New Oxford was totally out of the way. But this was the day to capture this box with the very amusing clues. It was in a really great hiding spot for such a public area and I am really happy to have accomplished this goal also.
I headed for the Gettysburg Battlefield and began to collect the boxes that I had not yet found on previous trips there. A walk near the Visitor's Center proved even more rewarding as I noticed many blue dragonflies hovering around. I found the boxes at the Center very easily and when I logged the finds, I was really amused at the comments by others who had found them, claiming that the clues were not accurate. You would think that experienced letterboxers would remember that there is a difference between steps and paces and not complain when they confuse the words.
After accomplishing a major, major coup (at least in my book) by finding a box in a Civil War store in Gettysburg, something that I had tried twice before, I moved on to the cemetery. I still can't believe that in all of my visits to Gettysburg, I have never been to the site of the Gettysburg Address before. I also can't believe that the town of Gettysburg was almost deserted on this patriotic holiday weekend. It certainly was to my benefit that it was not crowded but I was surprised nonetheless. 
I was also amused at the number of people who walked into the cemetery and viewed this monument to Abraham Lincoln and then stood and looked downhill at these white tombstones behind the monument and then left. I don't think they realized that these tombs were more modern burial sites, VietNam era and more recent. The actual plots for those who died during the Civil War were scattered further along the cemetery. But the tourists were probably happy that they could say they were at the cemetery.
When I finished at Gettysburg, I headed down the road a bit more and stopped in to see the Appalachian Trail Museum. I had read in our local paper a few months ago that this had opened and when a fellow letterboxer mentioned finding an unlisted letterbox stamp in the museum a week earlier, it was enough momentum to get me there. It was an interesting and small museum and I was not only able to add a stamp to my collection but also a patch for my patch collection. 
Somewhere along the way this day, I was also able to take this picture of one of the few remaining blooming rhododendrons. I ended the day with twelve new boxes, several hundred miles listening to my audio book, 7 miles of walking and the joy of finally finding the Postage Paid letterbox, successfully solving a Red Cruzsader mystery box, visiting a new local location at the Gettysburg National Cemetery and seeing a whole lot of Adams County.
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