Steve's Excellent Adventure

· There are many towns on the east coast named Greenville and Fayetteville.

· The road construction projects in Washington DC are the biggest I have ever seen and the traffic is insane…even on a Sunday afternoon.

· There is a difference in food and culture between eastern and western North Carolina.

· I always forget how bad the mosquitoes can be after being spoiled back home.

· Still freaking out that my baby has a baby.

· It was kind of cool to catch a shark while fishing the inter-coastal waters….and to go “shrimpin” too!

· Uncle Terry can dance.

· 10 days is the limit on being away from my wife, if I can help it.

· Skype is nice to be able to keep in touch while on the road.

· East coast is nice, but the mountains are way better.

· Antietam Civil War battlefield was very moving and a powerful experience.

· Gettysburg Civil War battlefield was very well preserved and moving also.

· Harris makes the best pizza in the world.

· Inner ear infections suck.

· I can still drive the golf ball, but after that, it is an adventure.

· Those grandkids are growing up.

· Conversations on planes can be fascinating. I talked to a movie producer, who wants to include me in one of his upcoming movies.

· It is very difficult to take 3 weeks off a Masters College course, and get back into it.

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Found an old picture of Phillip. These kids are growing up FAST.  This picture is a contrast to the movie in the previous post  :) .

Met wifey in Illinois to visit the grandkids.

Me, Dad, Bill and Oney got to play some golf too.

Made it to Illinois.  On the way, I stopped for gas, and guess what I found?  Yummy!

Time to hang out with Dad, Joannie and the rest of the family.

After a big day yesterday, I did another 1/2 day in Gettysburg.  The fall colors were spectacular and I had the whole battlefield to myself by getting out there at daybreak.  It was pretty freaky walking around by myself where all this happened 150 years ago.  Trying to imagine the events of the day and being RIGHT THERE where it happened was something I will never forget.  I took this first picture at daybreak around the “valley of death”, close to Devils Den and Little Round Top.

I also visited Culp’s Hill in the morning that was where the far right flank of the Union Line was.  The 137 NY was the last line of defense and withstood many attacks but held the line. The far left flank of the line was the 20 Maine Regiment and was stationed on Little Round Top.  Colonel Joshua Chamberlain commanded his troops here and fought off the 4th, 47th and 15th Alabama until he was almost out of ammunition.  After losing 1/2 of his men, he decided to fix bayonets and charge down the hill.  The charge was successful and he killed and captures the rest of the Alabama troops.  His action held off the Confederate advance on the far left flank and gave time for reinforcements to arrive and secure the hill.  For this action, he received the Congressional Medal of Honor.  This marker shows where the 20 Maine’s line was.

Yours truly at the top of Little Round Top looking down where the Confederate attacks came from.  The Alabama 4th, 47th and 15 regiment and the Texas 4th and 5th stormed up this mountain, but never did take it. If anyone is interested, there is a great movie out there that depicts this famous part of the battle.  You can get it here from Amazon…   http://www.amazon.com/Gettysburg-Widescreen-Tom-Berenger/dp/B00003CXA6

I did a video of a walk up Little Round Top.  This is an abbreviated video of the beginning of it.  It would show how the Texas 4th and 5th regiments started up on the second day of the battle.

The last thing I did was to walk the route of Picket’s Charge.  There were over 13,000 Confederates that made the charge, and only around 6000 that made it back.  The “charge” lasted only 45 minutes and the Confederates made it into the Federal lines, but reinforcements from the Union lines came together and beat back the charge.  This was the final attempt that Lee made on that 3rd day, and then he retreated back to Virginia after this.  If you look far over the field, you can see my white car in the tree line.  This was the Confederate position at Seminary Ridge and where Pickets Charge started.  It was a mile away and took me only around 10 minutes to walk it.  This picture is of a place called the “Angle” and is famous for the place that the CSA General Lewis Armistead was killed and where the “High Water Mark” was.  The marker shows where General Armistad fell(to my right) and the other picture shows a clump of trees where the farthest advance of the Confederate troops advanced to.  A monument was placed in front of those trees giving tribute to those Confederate troops and an iron fence surrounds the trees.  Also, in this picture, you can see the end of the Union line in the background at Big and Little Roundtop.

On my way out of town, I took a picture of this house that was original when the battle took place.  You can see the bullet holes in the walls.

I toured Gettysburg today.  Did an MP3 tour until my IPOD pooped out, then I went to the visitor center and watched a movie about the battle.  Afterward I left the visitor center and ran into a guide in the parking lot. We negotiated a price and he took me all over the battlefield for about 3 hours……it was amazing.

The battle of Gettysburg resulted in over 50,000 casualties in 3 days as the Confederacy almost won a huge victory. The Confederacy won many tactical battles but could not deliver a “knock out punch” on the Union positions that had superior ground to fight on.  For 3 days on July 1,2 3 of 1863, the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia met north of the town of Gettysburg, PA in what, ultimately, would become a huge victory for the Union.

The first day started with a shot from a company of Illinois calvary towards the oncoming Confederate army north of town.  The Confederates “succeeded” in pushing the Union army through the town, but the retreating Union army settled on the high ground south of town that ultimately led to their superior position and ultimate success.

One of the most famous battle sites was that of a little mountain on the far southern part of the battlefield, called Little Round Top.  This picture is me on the summit looking down onto Devils Den and the Confederate positions below.

This is a picture of Little Round Top from below.

This doesn’t look like much, but is a place called the Wheat Field, and there were over 6000 casualties in a couple of hours here on day 2.

On day 3, General Lee amassed 13,000 troops for a final attack on the center of the Union line.  Pickets charge started with a 2 hour artillery bombardment and then the infantry marched out from the far trees up to the Union line where this picture is taken.  You can see a monument on the left to a North Carolina regiment that made it within yards of the Union position.

A picture on Culps Hill.  Such a beautiful place and yet a place of such horror.  Thousands were killed when the Confederacy tried to take this hill on the second and third day of the battle.

Today, I went to the Antietam Civil War Battlefield next to Sharpsburg Maryland.  It was very impressive and exhausting.  This battle was earlier in the war and was the first incursion of the Confederacy into the North.  It was on September 17, 1862, and by the time it was over, there were around 23,000 casualties IN ONE DAY.  This is and was the bloodiest day in American war history, and far outnumbered D-Day.  As the day started, the battle began in a cornfield to the north.  By the time this part of the battle was over at 9am, there were more than 10,000 casualties.  It was weird to walk through the same cornfield where this happened over 150 years ago.  Off to the distance of this photograph, was the position of the Confederate troops with cannons positioned behind them.  This picture would be of the Union advance at the start of the battle.

Then the battle shifted farther south to a place called “Bloody Lane”.  The Confederate soldiers took a position in a sunken road and used it to protect themselves from the Union advances.  It worked well for a while until the Union flanked the road and rained musket shot into the lane and routed the Confederates.  There were thousands of casualties here.

Photographs were just starting to be used at this time, and a picture was taken of Bloody Lane a couple of days after the fight.

We walked to the Western Woods around the Hagerstown Turnpike and there was a marker showing what it looked like that day on that very spot.

The battle then turned to a bridge at the south part of the battlefield.  It is now called Burnside Bridge and place that the Federal troops used to cross the Antietam Creek.  It took 3 tries before the bridge was taken with thousands of casualties.  The Confederate troops held the high ground on the west side and could shoot 1200 rounds/3 times per minute onto the bridge.  This bridge is original and the big tree on the left was a “witness” tree, as it was there during the battle.

I met 3 college professors that taught the Civil War and hung with them all day.  They tour guided me all day and it was fascinating.  Thanks to Tom, Chuck and Pete.

Me and Terry had some “Eastern Carolina Barbecue” for lunch.  We had round potatoes, some weird chili and great pulled pork with some sauce that looked like Tabasco sauce.   On my way to Maryland, I drove by tons of cotton fields.  It sure looked different from all the corn fields that I am used to.

The “Beltway” around Washington DC was no fun to drive.  Another thing that is weird is all the overpasses and roads that are dedicated to politicians.  Pretty sick if you ask me.  How about naming them after our heros in the armed forces, if they have to be named.  Just a thought.

Spent a couple of days with uncle Terry in Greenville, NC.  We played golf and got EATEN by a billion mosquitos.  Terry also has a couple of “foo foo” dogs.

Nice dogs, but a little too girly for me.

Spent a couple of days in Fayetteville, NC to see Bill and Linda.  Bill is an evangelist who I met in a prayer chat room a few years ago.  We shared “war stories” and had some great fellowship.

Bill has a booth at the local flea market that he works every Saturday and Sunday.

While in Fayetteville, we also visited the ruins of the old Fayetteville Armory that was destroyed by Sherman’s army when they marched through the town in the Civil War.

Me and the kid and the grandkid… hanging out at the docks in St Marys Georgia.

Dylan and “Poppy” are both pretty cool…don’t you think?!

Dylan like his shades

Took some pictures of Dylan..he is such a cutie.

Anika likes the Halloween outfit we got Dylan.