Hiking to the Ice Cream Shop with Abe Lincoln...or something like that

The work week was filled with conferences, webinars and several meetings about writing letters and making calls. The highlight for Kelly came at a conference on Wednesday at a building across from the White House. During the lunch break, she walked over to see if the President was available to talk Illinois politics. On her way back Kelly walked past St. John's Church. Always intrigued by historic churches, she stopped in a visit. As it turns out, due to the proximity to the White House, many Presidents would worship there. The pew in the very back of the church was were Abraham Lincoln often chose to sit during a service.

According to a plaque on the wall, Lincoln would normally show up after the service had started and leave a little early so to not draw attention.  Kelly was able to sit in the pew and reflect for a few minutes   before heading back to her conference.

We stepped up our physical activity this week in an effort to prepare for the "Cherry Blossom 10 Miler" race that we signed up for, which circles through DC during the Cherry Blossom Festival. Many of you remember Ben got in a good habit of running home last summer, so we decided to incorporate that into our training regimen. In our three attempts, we have beaten the bus that we normally take home. We have also started walking to work in the mornings, it takes approximately ten more minutes to walk than taking the bus, but it is good exercise and a chance to spend some quality time together.

Things have been really busy at both our organizations, so we were excited to make it to the weekend.  On Saturday, we woke up at a reasonable hour and set out on a training run. Our training route provides much needed distractions along the way. We run past the Supreme Court, around the Capitol and onto the National Mall. The Mall has great gravel paths with either the Washington Monument to look at if your running west or the Capitol on the way back.

We ran a little over 4 miles on Saturday, which is a good start to our training. We spent the rest of the day hanging with the dogs and taking care of life chores. Ben picked up a movie at the grocery store for our evening entertainment. We watched all two hours and 17 minutes of "J. Edgar" and walked away disappointed. While both of us were intrigued by the subject matter, something didn't translate to the big screen.  Luckily, we had a decent treat for dinner with the movie.  In the tradition of turning lemons into lemonade, we made a pizza out of leftover pulled pork and collard greens.

(These last two bites didn't last long.)

Sunday we headed to Harper's Ferry, West Virginia for a little sightseeing. After about an hour drive, we made it to this civil war era town.

(Yes, that is a wax museum.  No, sadly we didn't go.)

Harper's Ferry played a major role in several Civil War battles and events. Most of the downtown remains preserved from that era and offers little shops and restaurants. It is a little bit touristy, but overall a beautiful little town.

 

It sits on the corner of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers and has mountains in the background. We walked around, reading the dozens of historic markers and checking out a few museums.

 

Harper's Ferry is most famous for John Brown's raid. On October 16, 1859, abolitionist John Brown and several followers seized the United States Armory and Arsenal at Harper's Ferry. The actions of Brown's men brought national attention to the emotional divisions concerning slavery (Thank you Wikipedia).

We ate lunch at the "Canal House". They don't have a regular menu and only serve dishes with local and fresh ingredients.

 

It was a delicious lunch and we were now ready to hit the trail.

We headed out on a section of the Appalachian Trail. The Appalachian Trail starts in Georgia and spans over 2,000 miles  across 14 states and ends in Maine. It takes approximately 6 months to complete from beginning to end.  Ben would like to hike the entire trail, but Kelly believes hiking the trail in moderation seems more attractive.

We hiked up to Weverton Cliffs, which was a two mile trail and a 500 foot climb in elevation. The result was a beautiful view of the Potomac River and miles of mountains.

(1 mile down 2,179 to go.  They say the first mile is the hardest.)

After descending back down to our car, we headed over to Antietam National Battlefield.  Luckily, Ben recently read Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.  Aside from learning some tips about killing vampires, the book reminded/informed Ben about a significant amount of Civil War history.

 

For the most part, it was field, but the more we learned, via signage and pamphlets, the more we could visualize the events of the battle. Over 100,000 soldiers participated in the battle and it was the single most bloodiest single-day battle of the Civil War with over 23,000 killed.

After walking around for a while, we headed back toward DC.  On the way home we stopped in a small Maryland town for some ice cream.

(It isn't every town that has a Mt. Dew vending machine next to a Restaurant/Guns & Ammo establishment.)

It had been a long day and it was good to get home and relax before another week living the dream.