Sep 11, 2019

We didn’t have a very big day of riding lined up toady and had planned to call into the Flight 93 Memorial to pay our respects and hadn’t realised until last night that today was in fact the 18^th Anniversary of the 9/11 attacks so we visited along with several thousand others. We enjoyed a lovely ride there through fields of corn and many small farming communities which was peaceful. Then we arrived at the memorial and considering this wasn’t a public holiday here the numbers were impressive. Much work has been done since we were last here and the trees have grown incredibly so softening the edges of things somewhat. The Vice President, other dignitaries and family members of those on the plane were in attendance so security was tight with Secret Service, State Troopers and local Police all in attendance. We couldn’t go as far as the memorial site and left our bikes some distance away, were cleared by the secret service then transported by shuttle bus. Was quick on our way to the memorial but we waited in line for over an hour for a shuttle on our return. We were pleased to see the incredible number of motorbikes in attendance and the demeanour of all in attendance was respectful and patient. Our not so big day got to be a very big one.

 

Heading out of Cumberland.

 

Pennsylvania farming land.

 

Country roads.

 

Corn corn and more corn.

 

A real general store where we grabbed an iced coffee.

 

Flight 93 Memorial.

 

RIP.

 

What happened.

 

The Investigation.

 

‘We’re going to do something’.

 

Since 9/11.

 

The Tower of Voices and a couple of Aussies coming to pay their respects and despite some of the chimes being readjusted we did hear the chimes.

 

A common field one day, a field of honour forever. What looks like a path heading up between the 'field of' is the path from the memorial to the impact site.

  

Interstate hold up on our way in. We went from 120kmh to stopped in a matter of metres and managed not to get run over with both of us heading over the fog line and  a 4 wheel drive finally stopping beside me not to mention many cars off the sides of the road and choking smoke from all the truck tyres.  2 lanes into 1 and snail pace for around 5kms. We were hugely hot by the time we got past that!

 

 

And the Econo Lodge Hershey where we will lay our heads down tonight. Sorry we couldn’t pick up a Hershey bar this afternoon, it would have melted by the time we got it here so would have been a waste ….and a very messy pannier / saddle bag.