Day 96. Saturday 3 August. Locust Lake State Park Pennsylvania to Emmitsville, Maryland

After a soggy night in the forest, the morning has turned warm and pleasant. 

A little explanation about my photography dilemma. The camera, a Casio Exilim HS is an amazing piece of electronic wizardry. It has enough technology packed into point and click pocket camera to give it ‘big camera’ capability. 

Anyway, it has stopped recognising the iMac or the Mac has stopped recognising it. While it is still taking great pics, it’s a waste of time if we cant download them. The other issue is that I’m not able to recharge it. What to do when you are on the road? 

I have to say, I have not had a good run when it comes to cameras. The newer electronic ones are more failure prone, no matter what the cost, or brand.  Give me back my 1950’s Voigtlander Vito C, with built in light meter!!!…:)

The course set today is for Gettysburg. Scene of some extraordinary loss of life in the American Civil War. First stop was Harrisburg. A small dot on the map but a biggish city. Not the prettiest city, by anyones standards. Next Pottsville. Not a lot to say about that either. Then a combination of highway and secondary roads to get us to Gettysburg by around 4pm. 

We have had little success with wifi on the way. Stopping at Walmart in Harrisburg was a waste of time. Likewise a little further on, at McDonalds. The Public Library in Gettysburg was open and it allowed us half an hour to check emails, post Jen’s blog from yesterday, and do some banking. 

The next challenge is finding a campsite. Jen checked and found four online, but visiting two of them left us back on the road shaking our heads. They were like zoo’s. Full to overflowing and “that will be $58 please”. No way!! Wanting to stay in Gettysburg to do a Battlefields Tour but with nowhere to stay was a problem. 

I decided to hit the road out and head for the tiny speck on the map of Emmitsburg, via the shortest route. Well, it took us down some lovely country roads, not all paved and on turning up one, saw a young couple sitting on their veranda enjoying the balmy afternoon, so I stopped and asked them if the knew where we could pitch our tent for the night. Stacey looked at Luther and said, ”if you want, you can park in the paddock next to the house”. It didn’t need a second invitation, because that would be just perfect for us. 

Tracy & Luther, our gracious host’s for the evening.

There are trees all around us and it’s as peaceful as it gets. The sun is fading fast at 6.45pm but it’s enough to dry the Caranex, which is still soaking from this morning. Mind you, there is thunder rolling around upstairs and heavy cumulus clouds forming into dramatic shapes. 

The birdlife is pretty good. Lots of strongly colours birds that we need to refer to granddaughter, Charley’s Book of Birds of North America, for identification. She would know in an instant, what they are..:)

On a back road earlier in the day a deer had been hit by a car and was being torn asunder by a dozen vulture looking birds, with red heads. My guess is, they were Turkey Vultures.

It hasn’t been the most satisfying day.  Lots of decaying towns but Gettysburg is the exception. There is obviously huge interest in the early Civil war battles and the town reflects the income from it. 

It’s going to be another sticky night. Now at 8.30pm we are being treated to a display of lightening against a very very dark sky. It’s spectacular. To set the scene, Fireflys are providing us with their own light display in the foreground. The trees surrounding us give a near black contrast to proceedings. A Firefly flew within 300mm above my head and proudly flashed it’s light, as if to say, “bet you can’t do that”! 🙂

We are getting close to the nation’s capital, Washington DC.  Because we have both been to New York, we decided we didn’t need the stress from driving in there. From Washington we head south west and it’s fair to say, looking forward to some quieter back roads in the mid west?

Visits: 20

8 Comments:

  1. Back on the net bro and good to catch up with your adventures. Will be off again tomorrow till we hit Normanton in a day or three. I must admit to feeling spoilt by our selection of free camps after your trials. I would love to see the lightning show, remember when you made us little kids cover the mirror during storms in the Bay, did Jen have to do the same? Glad the visa went well.

    • Hi Kelvin & Jen, if you hadn’t covered the mirrors, we could be dead…:) You saved my life, again!

      Will write soon.

      Best

  2. If the camera problem is related to transferring photos via Wifi or cable to the iMac then a computer shop or phone shop might be more likely to do the trouble-shooting than a camera shop. Or, if the iMac has a USB slot then use a card reader to get the photos off the camera’s SD card.

    • Hi John, had thought about that and in fact have been using Jen’s card. Her camera wont read mine! Could easily buy a card reader when we find a camera shop!!! Charging the camera could be the challenge.

      Us

      • It’s possible to buy simple universal camera battery chargers which get their power from USB but I don’t know what bricks and mortar stores to recommend since your nomadic lifestyle isn’t compatible with ordering from the internet sellers. However, look on the Walmart website for “Onn Universal Camera Battery Charger” and see if it is available somewhere nearby.

  3. Lindsay Forbes

    Your Mac may have had a software upgrade. Mac is terrible at wanting to block any device other than Apple. Cameron’s big MacIntosh won’t read photo’s from anything other than an Apple device. Not sure how he got around that
    Charging. Go to a store like NZ’s Jaycar. USB cable for your device and USB cigarette lighter plug in for the LR with a few USB female sockets

    • Hi Lindsay. no, it’s the camera. Must be a malfunction in the power input side. Have solved it by buying a battery charger from Walmart and a card that both cameras will read. I now use Jens camera to load my pics onto the Mac. Problem solved but will buy a card reader to reduce the hassle.Thanks for the tip re the Mac though. 🙂

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