http://www.millerssmorgasbord.com/breakfast.php As usual we had to try at least a little of everything which took a little time but it was well and truly worth it. We had a long chat with Brenda, our server, who was raised in a Mennonite family in the area and was able to tell us a little of the various local religions. Pennsylvania has since the time it was Granted by King Charles II to William Penn in 1681 been known for it's Freedom of Religious Conviction. This wide variety of religions continues today.
The Amish are one of those religious groups and are evident all along the roads and the farms of the area are amazing. Not using motorised farm equipment or transport doesn't seem to hinder good farmers or good farms but the soil seems good and moisture is abundant.
Following Brenda's sugested route we headed through her home town of Strasburg thiough we just missed out on Intercourse. IT'S a TOWN!!!!
We followed the "road less travelled" which while slower gave us the opportunity to see more of the wonderful farmland along the Dutch Country Roads. There wasn't a lot of traffic but some of the traffic was interesting to a couple of Aussies. And the houses in the towns along the road are wonderful
We had stopped at a wonderful lookout at the Pinnacle Overlook which gave us a great view of the Susquehanna River. The river was showing evidence of the rain that had fallen as a result of Hurricane Irene. On the way back to the more main road we stopped and bought some fresh rasberries at a roadside stall that were as sweet as I've ever tasted. Mmmmmm!
Crossing the Susquehanna we headed through more delightful towns and productive farmland before we arrived at Gettysburg. We were pleased that the Visitors Centre and Museum were open to 6 pm. Three hours didn't really do justice to the Museum nor to the sound and light show with Morgan Freeman narrating the Gettysburg Cyclorama http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettysburg_Cyclorama
Julie and I were amazed and overawed at being on the Gettysburg Battleground. The place where the Confederate and Union Armies had fought and where so many lives had been lost during the three days of the battle.
The words of the Gettysburg Address are as powerful now are as they were when President Lincoln delivered them on November 19th 1863.
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
After that sobering end to the day we wound our way back to our room but not before stopping at a "Bob Evans" Restuarant http://bobevans.com/ for a very nice dinner. After a shower and a glass of wine in bed at 11.
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