2 Best Sights in Aberdeen, Baltimore

Cal Ripken Stadium brings Single-A baseball to town with the IronBirds, an Orioles minor-league affiliate team. Owned by Cal Ripken, the team plays short-season ball every June to September in Ripken Stadium, a 5,500-seat venue complete with skyboxes. Future plans include opening the Ripken Museum and a hotel.

The Aberdeen Proving Ground is a 75,000-acre U.S. Army installation on the Chesapeake Bay, about 30 mi northeast of Baltimore's Inner Harbor. On its premises is the U.S. Army Ordnance Museum, one of the world's foremost military museums. If you thought that the Sherman tank in your hometown's square was fun, wait until you see the largest collection of armored fighting vehicles in the country—230 at last count, spread over 25 acres. A huge 16-inch American gun from World War I is on display, as well as the first surface-to-air missile, devised by the Germans in 1945 along with "Anzio Annie," the giant Nazi railroad cannon used to shell Allied beachheads. The collection of small arms includes a 15th-century matchlock—a musket whose powder ignites from a slow-burning wick.