Washington County — Meadowcroft's Ancient Rockshelter, Trolleys & the LeMoyne House

Just forty minutes southwest of Pittsburgh, Washington County packs an astonishing depth of history into an easy day trip through rolling farm country. The centerpiece is Meadowcroft Rockshelter, a sandstone overhang that has sheltered people for some 16,000 years — the oldest documented evidence of human presence in North America, now a National Historic Landmark with a reconstructed 16th-century Indian village and 19th-century frontier hamlet alongside it. From there the day winds to the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum, where restored streetcars still roll on original track, and closes in the town of Washington at the LeMoyne House, an 1812 stone home that served as a documented stop on the Underground Railroad. It's a relaxed, low-mileage loop through deep time — from Ice Age hunters to the electric-rail age — with a hearty small-town lunch in between.