Gettysburg, PA - which tours & activities do you recommend?
 

We'll be in Gettysburg for 2 nights (Saturday afternoon to Monday afternoon) with our 15 year old son. There are so many activities, sites and tours in and around Gettysburg and we're trying to determine which ones to check out. Any must-see suggestions? Thanks!

We loved the evening Park Ranger talks.

To get the most out of your visit to Gettysburg, I highly recommend a tour by a Licensed Battlefield Guide. These guides are absolutely the best in the business and you would not believe how rigorous the training and testing is to become a Gettysburg Licensed Battlefield Guide.
http://www.gettysburgtourguides.org/

If you are going during the tourist season, I suggest you make a booking for a guide in advance of your visit.

The licensed guides are the best, and very resonably priced. You can also do a self-guided tour. You can buy the cd at the visitor's center or other shops in town. You listen to the CD as you drive thru the park. It takes a couple hours but is very informative and you go at your own pace.

There is so much to see, you will find you want to go back again.

Wow, here's a third on the Licensed Battlefield Guides! There's really nothing else to compare to the experience of going through the battlefields with someone who is so immersed in the history and can make it come alive for you.

Just don't make the mistake we did, on our way out of town, we realized we forgot to go to the cemetery where Abraham Lincoln gave that great Gettysburg Address!

The licensed guides -- absolutely. The are fabulous and considering what tours in other places cost, one of the best travel bargain you are likely to ever come across. If things have not changed since we were last there, they will come along in your own car - very convenient.

Another vote for the licensed guide . . He drove our car last fall and did his "tour stuff" as he drove . . well worth the addditional cost!!

One other thing about the licensed guides. I do not know if our experience is the usual, but both times that we used them if we had not arrived first thing in the morning, they would have all been booked. We booked them at the visitor's center.

Just got back last week with 2 first timers to Gettysburg. We did not use a guide, but we began our visit with a trip to the Gettysburg Diorama on Steiwehr Ave. It is a beautiful scale model (complete with sodiers in battle)of the town and battlefied and is something to behold. There is a 30 minute narrated show with lights and sound effects highlighted on the scale model where the action occurs. Once done viewing, we did a self guided tour of the battlefield (mainly the southern end - Devils Den, Round Tops, Wheatfield, Peach Orchard, and PA Memorial). My 2 first timers agreed that the Diorama put what they saw in perspective and gave them a somewhat summarized, but educational, perspective of what they experienced and viewed once touring the battlefield. I found the Diorama just what was needed for persons not too familiar with Gettysburg. Cost was $5 per peson, $3 for seniors. Well worth it. Also, we had a fantastic dinner at the Dobbin House Tavern. Best crab cakes I have had in years!!