New Market, Virginia

A LOT of confederate flags. I also felt really uncomfortable several times after saying I was visiting from a very blue state – it was creepy. We also went into a restaurant to eat and saw that they were selling confederate flag everything and left. The neighborhood we rented a cabin in for the night was hostile and had several signs at the entrance saying “prepare to be stopped and questioned by armed residents”/“we call the police on people we don’t know” and implying they would shoot trespassers which was scary and we saw similar yard signs elsewhere. Also, there is a “Civil War Museum” here which we made the mistake of going to because it has a well-preserved battle site; I didn’t know this but it’s the site of a confederate ambush/victory, so the museum is basically a celebration of the confederacy, to give some context about the area. I felt unwelcome as a white person with plates from a liberal state, so while I of course can’t speak to what the experience of a person of color would be in this town, I would caution any POC, especially given all the confederate flags and general vibes I got off of some of the locals.