Williamsburg is part of what they call America's Historic Triangle. Today we visited the second part of that triangle: Jamestown. The third part is Yorktown.
Jamestown was the first permanent English settlement in the new world. 104 English men and boys first arrived there in 1607. What we saw was a recreation of that settlement, a neighboring Indian village and three ships like the ones the settlers came over on - the Susan Constant, the Godspeed and the Discovery. This was also the settlement of Captain John Smith, John Rolfe and Pocahontas from the history books (and the Disney movie).
We were really kind of unsure if we would have time to visit Jamestown, or if we even needed to since we just saw Williamsburg, but we are glad we did. It was very hands-on for the kids and there was a lot of cool stuff to see. Plus, the "settlers" were giving constant musket firing demonstrations, so they kept us on our toes with loud booms every few minutes.
After we were done with Jamestown, we got in the car to drive the two hours to Charlottesville, VA to tour Thomas Jefferson's home, Monticello. Because we had to make a couple of stops and we were slowed by some road work, we just barely made it in time for our 3:30pm tour. Actually, we missed the beginning of it and the guides were unsure of which tour group to put us in, but it all ended up working out. In fact, the supervisors of the tour guides actually went out of their way to make sure that we heard the whole tour by letting us stand in with another group for the two rooms we originally missed. They were emphatic that we NOT take any photos inside the house and NOT TOUCH ANYTHING, but they couldn't have been any more enthusiastic about sharing the history of the house with us and answering any questions we had. It was a wonderful tour. Almost everything we saw in the house was actually owned by Thomas Jefferson and he did some amazingly innovative things in the construction of the house. It is an architectural wonder. It was pretty awesome to be so close to so much history.
The grounds are just beautiful. Bodie said he wished we had a lawn that big because it would be a great place to play baseball. Yes it would, but I wouldn't want to mow it. The view from the home is incredible. It is no wonder why he chose to build his home here. Except for the large hill behind the house, you can see for miles in every direction. If you are ever in the Charlottesville area, you must go to Monticello and take a tour. It is really cool!
We were really kind of unsure if we would have time to visit Jamestown, or if we even needed to since we just saw Williamsburg, but we are glad we did. It was very hands-on for the kids and there was a lot of cool stuff to see. Plus, the "settlers" were giving constant musket firing demonstrations, so they kept us on our toes with loud booms every few minutes.
After we were done with Jamestown, we got in the car to drive the two hours to Charlottesville, VA to tour Thomas Jefferson's home, Monticello. Because we had to make a couple of stops and we were slowed by some road work, we just barely made it in time for our 3:30pm tour. Actually, we missed the beginning of it and the guides were unsure of which tour group to put us in, but it all ended up working out. In fact, the supervisors of the tour guides actually went out of their way to make sure that we heard the whole tour by letting us stand in with another group for the two rooms we originally missed. They were emphatic that we NOT take any photos inside the house and NOT TOUCH ANYTHING, but they couldn't have been any more enthusiastic about sharing the history of the house with us and answering any questions we had. It was a wonderful tour. Almost everything we saw in the house was actually owned by Thomas Jefferson and he did some amazingly innovative things in the construction of the house. It is an architectural wonder. It was pretty awesome to be so close to so much history.
The grounds are just beautiful. Bodie said he wished we had a lawn that big because it would be a great place to play baseball. Yes it would, but I wouldn't want to mow it. The view from the home is incredible. It is no wonder why he chose to build his home here. Except for the large hill behind the house, you can see for miles in every direction. If you are ever in the Charlottesville area, you must go to Monticello and take a tour. It is really cool!
We did Monticello on our honeymoon in 1990 and I still remember it being incredible. He invented the dumb-waiter (little elevator for food - Not the servers at most restaurants these days) ;)
ReplyDeleteAnd the front hall with no stairs because he wanted a bigger front hall and hid the stairs! I'm glad you all got to go.