Page 4 of 5
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
And I could meet you any place if the brakeman turns my way
I did my best to try and see places I hadn’t seen before when I started planning this road trip, but for every Annapolis, Glenstone or Harper’s Ferry, there was a Baltimore, somewhere I had been before but also somewhere where I could still things I never saw before. Harrisburg falls into that category. I have driven through it many, many times and even stayed overnight nearby at Hershey more than once, But all these times I was there, I was never really there. I never walked (or even really drove through) downtown, and, to my surprise, what I was missing was actually surprisingly nice. Downtown Harrisburg, at least the area near the State Capitol Building, is walkable with good local coffee shops (where I got a very tasty cold chocolate), a great scale and lined with interesting buildings. Something I probably would have already know if I ever bothered to check any of those many times I drove right past it.
The clear highlight of Harrisburg is their magnificent State Capitol Building, with its St Peter’s inspired (or perhaps copied) dome. The capitol building is most definitely a good one and I can say that with some level of reference. I have been inside (or toured) a fair amount of US state capitol buildings (my best recollection is CO, ID, LA, MD, MA, MN, NC, NE, NY, OH, OK, TX, UT and WI) and while it is no Nebraska (best state capitol building ever) it’s still one of the best
The Pennsylvania State Capitol Building is more than just an inspired (or copied) dome, and to prove it, I joined a guided tour that took me around and in to some of the other spaces. The building was quite impressive throughout, and to prove that all you need to do is look at these pictures.
Harrisburg is more than just a walkable downtown with good cold chocolate and an inspired (or copied) dome, and my time there included stops at three museums, two of which we’ll talk about now. First up is the State Museum of Pennsylvania, directly across the North Street from the Capitol Building. The museum was cheap, only seven dollars for an adult admission, which was not all that much more than that tasty cold chocolate I keep talking about. So you would think that my expectations were low for a museum so cheap, yet somehow I still walked away disappointed. Pennsylvania has a lot going for it and I would have thought that a museum celebrating that would have somehow been better, even if it only cost seven dollars to get in.
After only spending seven dollars but still complaining about the first museum, the second museum I visited cost a whopping eight dollars but luckily felt like a good value. The Susquehanna Art Museum was small but interesting. The spaces included a repurposed bank, the exhibitions were interesting, thoughtful and well presented, and even the staff were friendly. So if you visit Harrisburg with less than ten dollars and only have time to visit one museum, I’d definitely recommend the art museum over the state one.
When I visited the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Historical Park back in Maryland, I chose to buy an annual pass. I was planning to visit five National Park Service sites on this trip alone, so it’s eighty dollar price would likely pay for itself before I knew it. With this scheme in mind, I decided at almost the last minute to add another NPS site to the road trip with a somewhat quick stop at Valley Forge National Historical Park, which was enjoyable and, it turns out, free. So much for my money saving scheme, at least for now.
Valley Forge is near King of Prussia, somewhere I have been through a lot, yet this was still my first visit there. With somewhat limited time, I still was able to watch the visitor center movie, drive through most of the Encampment Tour Loop, stop by the cabins and the National Memorial Arch and visit the somewhat out of place but still worth visiting Washington Memorial Chapel, all of which is pictured below.
We’re finishing up this page of the slideshow in Strasburg, Pennsylvania, home to the Strasburg Rail Road, a heritage line in Amish Country that I had never ridden before. Truthfully I have been to Amish Country a few times in my life but never really thought much of it. Sure Amish sightings are kind of fun, but they’re really just people living their lives, and as pretty as that part of the country can be, it’s not all that dissimilar from areas closer to home. With all that said, my short time in Strasburg ended up being a real highlight of this trip along with Glenstone and the Naval Academy.
Here is a view and something I was not expecting, but probably could have anticipated if I really thought about it. Our certainly non carbon neutral ride out of the station was led by a steam engine that belched these dark clouds over the green fields of Strasburg. The dark clouds hovered low and led away from the train at about a 45 degree angle (in plan), creating an absolutely wondrous kinetic scene, something that I found exceptional but that a typical passenger in the 1890s probably wouldn’t have thought twice about.
My $28 ticket for the Strasburg Rail Road bought me an unassigned seat in the open car, one which was right behind the steam engine to start but open to the tracks on the way home. The trip was short, just 45 minutes from start to finish, and it consisted of an out and back stretch of tracks through Amish farmland where Amish families would stop and wave at us. The combination of it all felt ever so briefly close to perfect, and almost lost in time, which in this case at least I mean as a great compliment.
