The C&O Canal companion / Mike High.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

High, Mike.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Chesapeake and Ohio Canal (Md. and Washington, D.C.)--Guidebooks.

Chesapeake and Ohio Canal (Md. and Washington, D.C.).

Physical Description:

x, 269 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

Other Title:

C and O Canal companion

Place of Publication:

Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.

Summary:

Here at last is a comprehensive guide to the C&O Canal, the unique, 184-mile waterway along the Potomac River that stretches from Washington, D.C., into the Appalachian Mountains.

Beginning in historic Georgetown, the canal passes the battlefields of Harpers Ferry and Antietam, and the great Civil War crossings at Whites Ford, Botelors Ford, and Falling Waters. Its upper reaches traverse the "endless mountains" once crisscrossed with warriors' paths and packhorse trails. Here, amid quiet forests, travelers pass the same landmarks as George Washington did on his many rides to the West during the French and Indian War -- Fort Frederick, Fifteen-Mile Creek, Shawnee Oldtown, and, finally, Cumberland.

Outdoorsman and writer Mike High has spent many hours exploring the C&O Canal, asking questions, making notes, taking photographs, and conducting research to assemble this informative, complete, and user-friendly book. High takes readers on a mile-by-mile tour, skillfully blending history, nature writing, and tour-guide tips to create the only book of its kind. He offers practical advice on cycling, canoeing, birdwatching, and other pastimes along the canal and river. Exploring the canal's history, he describes the early struggle to build a trade route to the Ohio Valley, and the Civil War years, when the canal became a dividing line between North and South. He explains the nineteenth-century technology behind the canal -- how it worked, and how its operations -- were related to water-driven mills and ironworks along the river.

An appendix lists names and telephone numbers for hotels, bed-and-breakfasts, bicycle shops, river outfitters, nearby parks, campsites, and regional associations.The C&O Canal Companion is filled with the kind of information that makes it a pleasure to read -- and take along on a hiking, camping, or cycling adventure.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

0801855705

OCLC:

35814863