There is a Bear Out There!!!

After 8000km of driving, we finally saw a bear! Just after stopping for a picnic lunch by the Delaware River a few km north of Bushkill NY, Mike happened to notice a black bear cub in the field. He was grazing on some maize stalks, but took off when he saw us. Mananged to get a photo, not close enough of course! This was the highlight of our day after peering into forests for a bear for all this time!

Prior to this, after surviving the ice storm in Washington, we headed north through Maryland and into Pennsylvania. We called into the snow-covered Gettysburg battlefields (which surround the town), and did a road tour. These battlefields were the bloodiest in the Civil War and, apparently, Union victories there turned the tide against the Confederates. The fields are immense, and are peppered with hundreds of memorials and markers to various armies, regiments, positions and soldiers. Unfortunately the Visitor Centre was closed when we got there, "due to inclement weather" the rough notice on the door said, so we missed out on the ineveitable, very informative interpretive exhibits and movies. This is the only time we have felt let down by the management of the battlefields - there was no justification for the closure. We talked to a school teacher who had arrived there with a bus full of students, to meet a guide for the day. She was not impressed!

Gettysburg township itself is old and very pretty. The historical buildings are in very good condition, not doubt funded by the myriad of visitors to the battlefields in summer. But in winter now, the town was quiet (although many trucks seem to drive through), and we found a nice place to have cappucino and hot chocolate. We stayed overnight in Harrisburg.

The next day dawned perfectly fine but extremely cold, as predicted accurately by the Weather Channel, but the residues of the ice storm made for lots of black ice in car parks and sidewalks, and piles of snow, having been rained on and then frozen, were as hard as concrete. This made walking hazardous all day, especially morning and night, so we had to be very careful not to slip.

We called into Bethlehem PA to find a cappucino. The historic district of this town is very close to the now defunct steelworks, and it's quite sad to see this city, the birthplace of Galvalume, in a depressed state, a real rust-belt town [photo]. We passed through Pennsylvania into New York State. The landscape of fields and hills, was snow covered, and calm, with glimpses of the Catskills in the distance as we moved into NY. The town of Port Jervis on the NY side of the border was quaint, and provided us with an afternoon hot chocolate to help combat the cold.