Monocacy Battlefield and a Tired Dog

Once Yosemite Sam and I got shed of our house guest, we did some fun things. Living near the nation's capital means there's a lot of history to see, to study, and to learn. We visited the Monocacy National Battlefield not too long ago. We took Cooper the wonder-Basset with us (the park allows leashed dogs).

The Battle of Monocacy was one of those short sharp engagements that few people know about, but helped determine the course of the war. Almost everyone visits Gettysburg, many visit Antietam/Sharpsburg, but few visit Monocacy. All are close together.

When we visited, we had the park almost to ourselves. We roamed around taking pictures and letting Cooper have a good walk. The visitor's center has a good selection of Civil War books and I bought and just finished reading Confederates in the Attic by Tony Horwitz (hmm...might be a book review in there somewhere).

We learned a little history, but one other thing we learned, Basset hounds get tired when you walk them too much. Cooper started lagging behind us while we were walking a big loop. He then tried to go back the way we came and because we had completed two-thirds of the loop, it would been the long way back. Yosemite Sam came up with the perfect solution for Cooper. He carried that short-legged heavy dog the rest of the way.

One other thing, the battlefield is about a ten minute drive from where we live. We live in the lap of history.